bims-evares Biomed News
on Evaluation of research
Issue of 2021‒12‒05
forty-eight papers selected by
Thomas Krichel
Open Library Society


  1. J Cerebrovasc Endovasc Neurosurg. 2021 Dec 02.
      Objective: Carotid endarterectomy (CEA) is the gold standard surgical procedure for managing carotid stenosis due to atherosclerosis and reducing the risk of ischemic stroke. This bibliometric analysis summarizes the most-cited articles on CEA and highlights the contributing articles to today's evidence-based practice.Methods: A title-specific search using the Scopus database was used to perform the search. Pertinent article-based, journal-based, and author-based parameters were obtained for review.
    Results: A total of 6,824 articles were published between 1970 and 2020. The top 100 most-cited articles accumulated a total of 54,153 citations with an average citation count (CC) of 541, with only a 4.53% self-citation rate for all authors. The publication trends peaked between 1997 and 2010, in which two-third of the highly cited works were published. The most prolific categories with top citations are the clinical, indications, and management, in a descending order. There were 41 published Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT) in the most-cited list.
    Conclusions: Citation analysis on carotid endarterectomy has witnessed a marked shift in the publication trends from studying the outcome and complications to comparing carotid stenting with endarterectomy. This analysis is a good introductory article to physicians interested in this topic, as it summarizes the highly impactful articles and enlists the most-cited RCT on CEA.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric analysis; Carotid artery stenosis; Carotid endarterectomy; Citation analysis; Stroke
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.7461/jcen.2021.E2021.03.010
  2. J Transl Med. 2021 Nov 27. 19(1): 483
      BACKGROUND: The evaluation of translational health research is important for various reasons such as the research impact assessment, research funding allocation, accountability, and strategic research policy formulation. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the research productivity, strength and diversity of research collaboration networks and impact of research supported by a large biomedical research centre in the United Kingdom (UK).METHODS: Bibliometric analysis of research publications by translational researchers affiliated with the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Oxford Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) from April 2012 to March 2017.
    RESULTS: Analysis included 2377 translational research publications that were published during the second 5-year funding period of the NIHR Oxford BRC. Author details were available for 99.75% of the publications with DOIs (2359 of 2365 with DOIs), and the number of authors per publication was median 9 (mean  = 18.03, SD  = 3.63, maximum  = 2467 authors). Author lists also contained many consortia, groups, committees, and teams (n  = 165 in total), with 1238 additional contributors, where membership was reported. The BRC co-authorship i.e., research collaboration network for these publications involved 20,229 nodes (authors, of which 1606 nodes had Oxford affiliations), and approximately 4.3 million edges (authorship linkages). Articles with a valid DOIs (2365 of 2377, 99.5%) were collectively cited more than 155,000 times and the average Field Citation Ratio was median 6.75 (geometric mean  = 7.12) while the average Relative Citation Ratio was median 1.50 (geometric mean  = 1.83) for the analysed publications.
    CONCLUSIONS: The NIHR Oxford BRC generated substantial translational research publications and facilitated a huge collaborative network of translational researchers working in complex structures and consortia, which shows success across the whole of this BRC funding period. Further research involving continued uptake of unique persistent identifiers and the tracking of other research outputs such as clinical innovations and patents would allow a more detailed understanding of large research enterprises such as NIHR BRCs in the UK.
    Keywords:  Author networks; Collaborative research; Research Institutions; Research outputs; Research productivity; Translational Research Organisations
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s12967-021-03149-x
  3. J Complement Integr Med. 2021 Dec 03.
      OBJECTIVES: St. John's wort (Hypericum perforatum) has been used in traditional medicine for centuries for different conditions, including kidney and lung ailments, insomnia, depression, and to aid wound healing. The objective of the present bibliometric analysis is to capture the characteristics of research publications on the topic of St. John's wort.METHODS: Searches were run on April 09, 2021, and results were exported on the same day to prevent discrepancies between daily database updates. Trends associated with this subset of publications were identified and presented. Bibliometric networks were constructed and visualized using the software tool VOSviewer.
    RESULTS: A total of 1,970 publications were published by 5,849 authors across 961 journals from 1859 to 2021. Beginning in the late 1990s, a steep increase was found in the volume of publication on this topic. The journal that published the largest number of publications was Phytotherapy Research. The most productive countries included Germany and the United States.
    CONCLUSIONS: The present study provides the characteristics of the St. John's wort literature that allows understanding of the past, present, and future of research in this area. It is a useful evidence-based framework on which to base future research actions and academic directions.
    Keywords:   Hypericum perforatum ; St. John’s wort; bibliometric analysis; research trends; scientometrics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1515/jcim-2021-0417
  4. JMIR Serious Games. 2021 Dec 01. 9(4): e32721
      BACKGROUND: Research into the application of virtual reality technology in the health care sector has rapidly increased, resulting in a large body of research that is difficult to keep up with.OBJECTIVE: We will provide an overview of the annual publication numbers in this field and the most productive and influential countries, journals, and authors, as well as the most used, most co-occurring, and most recent keywords.
    METHODS: Based on a data set of 356 publications and 20,363 citations derived from Web of Science, we conducted a bibliometric analysis using BibExcel, HistCite, and VOSviewer.
    RESULTS: The strongest growth in publications occurred in 2020, accounting for 29.49% of all publications so far. The most productive countries are the United States, the United Kingdom, and Spain; the most influential countries are the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. The most productive journals are the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR), JMIR Serious Games, and the Games for Health Journal; the most influential journals are Patient Education and Counselling, Medical Education, and Quality of Life Research. The most productive authors are Riva, del Piccolo, and Schwebel; the most influential authors are Finset, del Piccolo, and Eide. The most frequently occurring keywords other than "virtual" and "reality" are "training," "trial," and "patients." The most relevant research themes are communication, education, and novel treatments; the most recent research trends are fitness and exergames.
    CONCLUSIONS: The analysis shows that the field has left its infant state and its specialization is advancing, with a clear focus on patient usability.
    Keywords:  VR; bibliometric analysis; citation analysis; health care; healthcare; literature review; review; usability; virtual reality
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2196/32721
  5. Spec Care Dentist. 2021 Dec 01.
      AIM: To conduct a bibliometric analysis of the top 100 most-cited papers in dentistry for individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders.METHODS AND RESULTS: A search strategy was constructed and conducted at the Web of Science in the category of "Dentistry, Oral Surgery, and Medicine". The following information was extracted from each paper: title, authorship, year of publication, title of the journal, study subject, study design, age range of sample participants, type of disability, institution, country and continent, number of citations and citation density. Google Scholar and Scopus were used to crosscheck the number of citations of the most-cited papers. The VOSviewer software was used to generate bibliometric network maps. The papers received 4453 citations in Web of Science, ranging from 30 to 106 citations. Most papers were published by the USA (35%), had an observational design (78%) and the main subject was epidemiology (31%). Most studies focused on individuals with Down syndrome (34%) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (18%) and were published in the Journal of Periodontology (10%) and the Pediatric Dentistry Journal (7%).
    CONCLUSION: Most of the studies included in this review were characterized as epidemiological studies. Future research should focus on behavior guidance, dental education, and access to dental services.
    Keywords:  Autism Spectrum Disorder; dental care for people with disabilities; dentistry; down syndrome; people with disabilities
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/scd.12684
  6. Eur J Investig Health Psychol Educ. 2021 Nov 05. 11(4): 1362-1387
      Research on the relationship between architecture and neuroscience has increased in number and significance since the 1990s. Although a growing number of studies revolve around this field of research, there are very limited studies that have reviewed and assessed the field and there is a gap in the literature to address the overall analysis of neuroarchitecture literature and its evolution. Additionally, neuroarchitecture literature is now challenging to manage because of its multidisciplinary scope and wide range spread within different themes and journals. The primary aim of this study is to present a bibliometric analysis of three decades of research on neuroarchitecture. This provides an overall picture of the field and its research landscape. Two hundred and ninety-five publications were included in the final database of the study after screening processes. Next, a science mapping tool, VOSviewer, was utilized to detect major topics as well as influential authors, countries, publications, and prominent journals using different network analysis techniques such as term co-citation, term co-occurrence, and bibliographic coupling. Next, a similar co-occurrence analysis was conducted to identify the major themes and the evolution of the intellectual basis of the field. SciMAT was also used to detect how the intellectual base of the knowledge in the field has evolved over time. It also assisted to identify the major themes that have contributed to this evolution. The results show that this field has initially been mainly focused on few themes but has later become more diversified to acknowledge the multi-faceted characteristics of neuroarchitecture; over time, the intellectual base of the field of neuroarchitecture started to grow, particularly from 2016. Major progress in the development of theoretical and methodological approaches has been achieved and there has been a paradigm shift toward major keywords in neuroarchitecture such as EEG, fMRI, and virtual reality.
    Keywords:  VOSviewer; architecture; bibliometric analysis; environmental design; neuroarchitecture; neuroscience
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe11040099
  7. Food Waterborne Parasitol. 2021 Dec;25 e00137
      Echinococcus granulosus sensu lato and Echinococcus multilocularis are responsible for serious health and economic implications for humans and animals. This study was designed to conduct a bibliometric analysis of global research on echinococcosis/hydatidosis included in the Web of Science Core Collection databases from 2000 to 2019. A total of 7066 relevant articles between 2000 and 2019 were identified. Most articles were published in 2015 (502 articles), 2017 (492 articles) and 2018 (493 articles), with the Veterinary Parasitology journal publishing the largest number of articles (237). Researchers from Xinjiang Medical University, China authored the most articles (388) in the field. Authors Craig, P.S. and Deplazes, P. were the most active in publishing143 and 126 hydatid cyst research papers, respectively. The most echinococcosis/hydatidosis publications originated from Turkey, China and Iran, with 1210, 708 and 531 articles, respectively. The highest levels of research collaboration were evident between China- England, China-France, England-France, China-Australia, and China-Japan. Also, the top researchers in this field had relatively extensive collaborations with each other. Our bibliometric analysis provides a picture of the scientific research into the echinococcosis/hydatidosis field. Further multi-national collaborative research efforts in this field should show promising progress in the future.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric; Echinococcosis; Echinococcus granulosus sensu lato; Echinococcus multilocularis; Hydatidosis; Scientific collaboration; Web of science
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fawpar.2021.e00137
  8. Vision (Basel). 2021 Nov 11. pii: 56. [Epub ahead of print]5(4):
      Eye tracking provides a quantitative measure of eye movements during different activities. We report the results from a bibliometric analysis to investigate trends in eye tracking research applied to the study of different medical conditions. We conducted a search on the Web of Science Core Collection (WoS) database and analyzed the dataset of 2456 retrieved articles using VOSviewer and the Bibliometrix R package. The most represented area was psychiatry (503, 20.5%) followed by neuroscience (465, 18.9%) and psychology developmental (337, 13.7%). The annual scientific production growth was 11.14% and showed exponential growth with three main peaks in 2011, 2015 and 2017. Extensive collaboration networks were identified between the three countries with the highest scientific production, the USA (35.3%), the UK (9.5%) and Germany (7.3%). Based on term co-occurrence maps and analyses of sources of articles, we identified autism spectrum disorders as the most investigated condition and conducted specific analyses on 638 articles related to this topic which showed an annual scientific production growth of 16.52%. The majority of studies focused on autism used eye tracking to investigate gaze patterns with regards to stimuli related to social interaction. Our analysis highlights the widespread and increasing use of eye tracking in the study of different neurological and psychiatric conditions.
    Keywords:  autism spectrum disorders; eye movements; eye tracking; gaze tracking; psychiatric disorders
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/vision5040056
  9. Ann Med Surg (Lond). 2021 Nov;71 103021
      Background: Limited research has evaluated the relative citation ratio (RCR), a novel measure of research productivity. Accordingly, there remains a minimal understanding of its practical value relative to established metrics such as the h-index. Here, we examined correlations between the mean and weighted RCR scores and the h-index and explore the influence of academic rank, career duration, PhD acquisition, and fellowship training on these metrics.Methods: Data regarding the academic rank (e.g. assistant professor, associate professor, professor, or "other"), career duration, degrees, fellowship training, and research yield were collected for 1018 academic ophthalmologists practicing in the southern United States of America. The iCite and Scopus databases were utilized to quantify research yield via calculations of mean and weighted RCR, and h-index, respectively.
    Results: Significant correlations were observed between the h-index and the mean (ρ = 0.62, P < 0.001) and weighted RCR (ρ = 0.84, P < 0.001). Advanced academic rank was associated with increased indices values. In a subset of ophthalmologists excluding members of the "other" category, career duration was moderately correlated with h-index (ρ = 0.45, P < 0.001), and weakly correlated with mean (ρ = 0.14, P < 0.001) and weighted (ρ = 0.26, P < 0.001) RCR. PhD and fellowship acquisition were associated with increased research yield.
    Conclusion: The findings suggest that the RCR is an effective measure of research yield, while resolving deficiencies present in the h-index. Further research remains to characterize the RCR's value relative to other established markers of research productivity.
    Keywords:  Academic promotion; H-index; NIH, National Institutes of Health; RCR, Relative Citation Ratio; Relative Citation Ratio; Research productivity
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amsu.2021.103021
  10. Clin Ophthalmol. 2021 ;15 4513-4525
      Objective: To outline the current impact of Canadian ophthalmology and vision science research as measured by novel research metrics.Design: Cross-sectional survey.
    Participants: All Canadian ophthalmologists (n = 687) and vision scientists (n = 119) with an online bibliometric profile and academic appointment at a major ophthalmology training centre were included.
    Methods: Faculty lists of Canada's 15 major academic ophthalmology departments were obtained. Faculty names, appointments, sex, and educational background were recorded. Elsevier's Scopus database was used to calculate H-index, m-quotient, and total citations for each faculty member. Details around grant funding were obtained through the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Funding Decisions Database.
    Results: Average H-indices were 7.42 ± 7.98 for ophthalmologists and 23.78 ± 15.25 for vision scientists. Higher academic appointment was correlated with higher h-indices and m-quotients (p <0.0001 for both). Most academic departments had significantly more males than females (avg. 71% male, 29% female); however, more equal ratios were seen in faculties in Quebec. No significant differences in research impact were identified between male and female ophthalmologists when controlled for academic appointment and career stage (p > 0.05). In clinical ophthalmology research, the top three departments with the highest average H-indices were Western University, the University of Toronto, and Dalhousie University. The University of British Columbia, Université de Montréal, and McGill University received the most funding from the CIHR in the last 10 years.
    Conclusion: This study highlights the current scope of ophthalmology and vision science research in Canada. Important trends were identified in research productivity across academic rank, sex, and clinical subspecialty.
    Keywords:  bibliometrics; h-index; m-quotient; ophthalmology; research; scholarly impact
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2147/OPTH.S335503
  11. J Environ Radioact. 2021 Nov 27. pii: S0265-931X(21)00250-2. [Epub ahead of print]242 106778
      Phosphogypsum is a by-product of the phosphate fertilizer industry. It is generally treated by stacking, which not only causes environmental pollution, but also wastes resources. Therefore, the harmless, comprehensive, and high-value utilization of phosphogypsum has attracted more and more scholars around the world. From the perspective of bibliometrics, this paper systematically and comprehensively describes the research progress, trends and hot spots of phosphogypsum resource utilization. This article is based on a scientific network database, and a total of 1067 articles from 1985 to 2020 were collected. Then, use VOSViewer software to perform co-occurrence, co-citation analysis and cluster analysis. The visual analysis results demonstrate that the research on the resource utilization of phosphogypsum shows the characteristics of rapid growth. The active countries are mainly China, Brazil, Spain and the United States. Four of the top 10 active organizations are from China. It systematically expounds the changes in research hotspots in this field at different stages and possible future research hotspots. Including the gradual attention to the preparation of phosphogypsum building materials, phosphogypsum adsorption materials, and radioactive elements in phosphogypsum; the extraction of rare earth elements from phosphogypsum; the use of phosphogypsum to prepare fertilizer or soil improvement. Research shows that phosphogypsum can be reasonably designed, transformed, and used in different fields.However, the radioactivity contained in phosphogypsum should be paid attention to because it has an impact on humans and the environment. We believe that this research provides a comprehensive and systematic overview for future research on phosphogypsum resource utilization.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric analysis; Phosphogypsum; Resource utilization; VOSviewer
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvrad.2021.106778
  12. Jt Dis Relat Surg. 2021 ;pii: jdrs.2021.406. [Epub ahead of print]32(3): 752-758
      OBJECTIVES: This study aims to investigate the topics distribution trend and evaluate the characteristics of orthopedics and traumatology residency theses during a 20-year period using a bibliometric analysis.MATERIALS AND METHODS: Between January 2000 and December 2020, orthopedics and traumatology residency theses of all centers providing postgraduate education in Turkey were reviewed from the online application of the National Thesis Center of Higher Education Council. Using the advanced search screen, a total of 1,907 theses were reached. Massachusetts University Orthopaedics and Traumatology Fellowship Programs and Turkish Society of Orthopaedics and Traumatology sub-study groups.
    RESULTS: During the study period, the three most studied topics ones were orthopedic trauma (n=536; 28.1%), adult reconstruction and arthroplasty (n=301; 15.8%) and spine surgery (n=203; 10.6%). The least studied subject was bone and soft tissue tumors with 3.8% (n=73). The topic with the highest rate of publication in all years was again orthopedic trauma. There was a very strong positive (r=0.876) correlation between the total number of thesis publications and the years (p<0.001; R2=0.767). Based on institutions types, the number of theses published in the training and research hospitals increased as of 2016. More theses were published than expected on orthopedic trauma, adult reconstruction and arthroplasty, sports injuries and arthroscopy, shoulder and elbow surgery, foot and ankle surgery in the training and research hospitals (p=0.003).
    CONCLUSION: The orthopedic research trends were differentiated over the years in our country. The classification of the orthopedic thesis topics shows in which orthopedics subfield research subjects are concentrated in our country and in which fields, research is needed.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.52312/jdrs.2021.406
  13. Eur J Radiol. 2021 Nov 19. pii: S0720-048X(21)00533-7. [Epub ahead of print]146 110052
      PURPOSE: To understand the contribution of the concept of "biomarker" to quantitative imaging research.METHOD: The study consists of a bibliometric and a network analysis of quantitative imaging biomarkers research based on publication data retrieved from the Web of Science (WoS) for the period 1976-2017. Co-authorship is used as a proxy for scientific collaboration among research groups. Research groups are disambiguated and assigned to an institutional sector and to a medical specialty or academic discipline. Co-occurrence maps of specialties are built to delineate the collaborative network structure of this emerging field.
    RESULTS: Two very distinct growth patterns emerged from the 5432 publications retrieved from WoS. Scientific production on «quantitative imaging biomarkers» (QIB) began 20 years after the first publications on «quantitative imaging» (QI). The field of QIB has exhibited rapid growth becoming the most used term since 2011. Among the 12,882 institutions identified, 56% include the term QIB and 44% include the term QI; among the 14,734 different research groups identified, 60% include the term QIB and 40% the term QI. QIB is characterized by a well-established community of researchers whose largest contributors are in medical specialties (radiology 17%, neurology 16%, mental 10%, oncology 10%), while QI shows a more fragmented and diverse community (radiology 13%, engineering 13%, physics 10%, oncology 9%, neurology 6%, biology 4%, nuclear 3%, computing 3%). This suggests a qualitative difference between QIB and QI networks.
    CONCLUSIONS: Adding biomarkers to quantitative imaging suggests that medical imaging is rapidly evolving, driven by the efforts to translate quantitative imaging research into clinical practice.
    Keywords:  Bibliometrics; Co-authorship networks; Emerging research fields; Quantitative imaging; Quantitative imaging biomarkers; Radiology
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrad.2021.110052
  14. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Dec 02.
      Critical metals are indispensable to a world seeking to transition away from carbon. Yet their extraction, processing, and application leave an unsustainable global environment and climate change footprint. To capture the development dynamics and research emphases of critical metals throughout their life cycle, this paper adopts bibliometrics to analyze the various stages of global critical metal flow in multiple dimensions to reveal the hot issues and future strategic trends. The research results indicate that the number of research papers on critical metals is annually rising, with remarkably rapid growth after 2010. Judging from the number of articles published by the authors and the citations, among the authors, Kawakita, Poettgen, Anwander, Inoue, and Dongmei Cui have a significant influence on critical metal research fields. The institutions with the most research on critical metals are universities, not research institutes. In addition, the focus has extended from a single discipline to the interdisciplinary development of multiple disciplines. Analysis of keywords shows that "rare metals" and "precious metals" are the most popular metals among the researched metals. The researched buzzwords of critical metals are disappearing, convergent, and merging over time. The research has focused on the mining and the whole life cycle process of extraction, treatment, and application. Based on the above characteristics, this paper tries to understand the dynamic development and evolution of global critical metals from multiple dimensions, resorting to giving a reference for follow-up-related research scholars.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric analysis; Critical metals; Precious metals; Rare metals
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-17816-5
  15. Chirurg. 2021 Nov 30.
      BACKGROUND: One of the performance criteria of a university hospital is its publication activities. The aim of this bibliometric study was a comparative benchmarking of the publication activities of German orthopedic trauma surgery university hospitals.MATERIAL AND METHODS: The publication performance of the leading groups, consisting of chief and senior physicians, section and division heads of 39 German orthopedic trauma surgery university hospitals, was recorded over a period of 10 years (1 January 2010-31 December 2019). All publications that were listed in PubMed and for which the appropriate persons were first or last author were considered. In addition, the impact factor (IF) was determined.
    RESULTS: A total of 4438 publications were recorded published by 381 surgeons. The share of publishing authors was 72.8%. The articles were published in 545 journals. The average IF of all publications was 1.81. The publication activities of hospitals showed a wide range, this applied to both the number of publications and the IF generated by the individual author. The publication activity ranged from an average of 16.4 publications per author in the top-ranked hospital to 1.5 publications in the last-placed hospital. The same result was seen with the total IFs. In the highest ranking hospital according to this criterion the individual surgeon achieved on average of 42.1 cumulative IFs compared with 1.7 IFs in the last placed hospital.
    CONCLUSION: The publication performance of German orthopedic trauma surgery university hospitals showed a high variance, as was also found in other disciplines. The causes must remain open, but a different research motivation cannot be ruled out.
    Keywords:  Benchmark; Journal impact factor; Publication rate; Research activity; University hospitals
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s00104-021-01538-y
  16. Cureus. 2021 Oct;13(10): e18993
      There is a gender gap in the representation of women in the authorship of surgical literature worldwide. In Brazil, data on the gender distribution of the authorship of articles are scarce; and hence, there is a lack of awareness about the contemporary situation of women surgeons within the academic surgery in the country. In light of this, we conducted this study with an aim to describe and evaluate the authorship trends in a Brazilian surgical journal over a period of 10 years (2010-2019). We included 4,301 authors from 792 articles extracted from 60 editions of this journal. We analyzed the female representation as authors in general, first and last authors, and the female surgeons' representation as first and last authors for 568 original articles. We found that, in general, women represented 27.8% of all authors. Regarding original articles, women surgeons represented 8.4% and 6.1% of first and last authors, respectively. The linear regression analysis demonstrated that there was an increase over the years in women authorship. However, despite this increase over the years, a gender gap still persists in terms of women's representation as authors in the Brazilian surgical literature.
    Keywords:  authorship; brazil; female representation; sex inequality; surgery; surgical literature
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.18993
  17. Account Res. 2021 Dec 02.
      The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in publishing a quantity of scientific research. In less than a year, a record of 200,000 scientific articles has been published on COVID-19. Publishing such a massive quantity of scientific research has instigated publishers to accelerate the review process. An upsurge in publication rate has resulted in increasing retraction rate. This paper focuses on the COVID-19 studies originating across the world from 1 January 2020 to 10 October 2021. The data for this study was mined from http://retractiondatabase.org/. A total of 157 withdrawn articles on COVID-19 were retracted, and it was found that the United States of America contributed 31 (19.75%) retracted articles. Also, 16 (51.61%) of the retracted papers from the United States of America emerge in journals having an Impact Factor (IF). The study presents that 31 (19.75%) retracted articles were worked together by two authors, 26 (16.56%) with one author, and 22 (14.01%) by five authors. Further, Elsevier publishers have the highest retraction rate with 80 (50.96%). Half (50%) of the articles were retracted with "no information" as a reason for retraction. Other reasons for retraction include concern/issues about data, duplication, journal error, lack of approval from a third party, plagiarism, etc.
    Keywords:  COVID-19; journal impact factor; pandemic; research misconduct; retractions; scientific research
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1080/08989621.2021.2014327
  18. Folia Histochem Cytobiol. 2021 Dec 01.
      INTRODUCTION: . The occurrence of osteoporosis (OP) has drawn considerable attention from scholars around the world due to the significant impacts thereof on the social economy and the quality of human life. OP research has been rapidly expanding since the inclusion of microRNAs (miRNAs) as critical regulators of gene-expression. However, despite the ability to evaluate miRNA gene therapy in OP being enhanced, there has been a scarcity of updated citation analyses that reflect such developments. In the present study, through bibliometric analysis, the global research activity and trends in regard to the relationship between OP and miRNAs were reviewed.METHODS: Publications related to miRNA and OP from 2000 to 2021 were retrieved via Web of Science (WoS). The data included publication years, countries, journals, institutions, authors and keywords, and were sorted and summarized by bibliometrics, before being visually analyzed through VOS Viewer.
    RESULTS: In the past five years, 599 articles have been published, with said studies accounting for 79.11% of all relevant documents, indicating the increased interest in the present research topic. The country with the highest contribution rate was China, and the publication rate of Journal of Bone and Mineral Research was the highest, followed by Bone. The institutions with the highest contribution rate were Nanjing Medical University. The most frequently occurring keywords were clustered into five groups. The research area of the first group described that circulating miRNA would be a potential biomarker for postmenopausal osteoporosis (PMOP). The remaining four groups involved the influences of miRNAs and exosomes on the osteogenic and adipogenic differentiation of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), and the interactions of lncRNA and miRNA with OP.
    CONCLUSIONS: . The results of the present study will expand the research on miRNAs and OP. The research direction with the highest frequency was the miRNAs acting on osteoblasts and osteoclasts. The influence of miRNAs carried by exosomes on the differentiation of MSCs might become an effective method for OP cell-free treatment.
    Keywords:  bibliometric analysis; exosomes; miRNA; osteoporosis; visual analysis
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.5603/FHC.a2021.0024
  19. Scientometrics. 2021 Nov 21. 1-15
      Research on COVID-19 has proliferated rapidly since the outbreak of the pandemic at the end of 2019. Many articles have aimed to provide insight into this fast-growing theme. The social sciences have also put effort into research on problems related to COVID-19, with numerous documents having been published. Some studies have evaluated the growth of scientific literature on COVID-19 based on scientometric analysis, but most of these analyses focused on medical research while ignoring social science research on COVID-19. This is the first scientometric study of the performance of social science research on COVID-19. It provides insight into the landscape, the research fields, and international collaboration in this domain. Data obtained from SSCI on the Web of Science platform was analyzed using VOSviewer. The overall performance of the documents was described, and then keyword co-occurrence and co-authorship networks were visualized. The six main research fields with highly active topics were confirmed by analysis and visualization. Mental health and psychology were clearly shown to be the focus of most social science research related to COVID-19. The USA made the most contributions, with the most extensive collaborations globally, with Harvard University as the leading institution. Collaborations throughout the world were strongly related to geographical location. Considering the social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, this scientometric study is significant for identifying the growth of literature in the social sciences and can help researchers within this field gain quantitative insights into the development of research on COVID-19. The results are useful for finding potential collaborators and for identifying the frontier and gaps in social science research on COVID-19 to shape future studies.
    Keywords:  COVID-19; Scientometric; Social science; VOSviewer; Visualization
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-021-04206-4
  20. Orthod Craniofac Res. 2021 Nov 28.
      OBJECTIVES: To identify the 10 most numerically prolific authors publishing in the field of orthodontics for each year over the last decade (2011-2020), describe the characteristics of these outputs and identify trends in the types of study being published.MATERIALS AND METHODS: A Scopus literature search was conducted to identify the 10 most numerically prolific publishing authors in orthodontics for each year during this decade. Number and characteristics of all publications for each author were analysed with descriptive and inferential statistics.
    RESULTS: Forty-nine different individual authors were identified who were collectively prolific for between 1-8 years within the assessment decade. These authors published a total of 2025 papers, with a median annual output of 18 papers per year; however, half of these authors published between 15-24 papers per year (range 5-200). Amongst authors, 2 or more collaborated on only 7% of the identified papers. The median number of authors per paper was 5 (range 1-27) with significant variation according to study design (P<0.001). The majority of authors originated from Brazil (19.3%), Italy (14.1%) and India (12.7%). Most papers described non-prospective clinical studies (38.1%), case reports or case series (11.1%) and narrative reviews (10.8%). Finally, prolific authors had a smaller annual output when publishing in orthodontic journals (P<0.001) and when publishing experimental primary research (P=0.04).
    CONCLUSION: A cohort of prolific authors in orthodontics between 2011-2020 was identified. Extreme variation was found in annual output between these authors but case reports, non-prospective clinical studies and narrative reviews predominated in their outputs.
    Keywords:  author contributions; authorship; bibliographic analysis; orthodontics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/ocr.12551
  21. Res Integr Peer Rev. 2021 Dec 01. 6(1): 15
      BACKGROUND: The current paper follows up on the results of an exploratory quantitative analysis that compared the publication and citation records of men and women researchers affiliated with the Faculty of Computing and Engineering at Dublin City University (DCU) in Ireland. Quantitative analysis of publications between 2013 and 2018 showed that women researchers had fewer publications, received fewer citations per person, and participated less often in international collaborations. Given the significance of publications for pursuing an academic career, we used qualitative methods to understand these differences and explore factors that, according to women researchers, have contributed to this disparity.METHODS: Sixteen women researchers from DCU's Faculty of Computing and Engineering were interviewed using a semi-structured questionnaire. Once interviews were transcribed and anonymised, they were coded by both authors in two rounds using an inductive approach.
    RESULTS: Interviewed women believed that their opportunities for research engagement and research funding, collaborations, publications and promotions are negatively impacted by gender roles, implicit gender biases, their own high professional standards, family responsibilities, nationality and negative perceptions of their expertise and accomplishments.
    CONCLUSIONS: Our study has found that women in DCU's Faculty of Computing and Engineering face challenges that, according to those interviewed, negatively affect their engagement in various research activities, and, therefore, have contributed to their lower publication record. We suggest that while affirmative programmes aiming to correct disparities are necessary, they are more likely to  improve organisational culture if they are implemented in parallel with bottom-up initiatives that engage all parties, including men researchers and non-academic partners, to inform and sensitise them about the significance of gender equity.
    Keywords:  Authorship; Equity; Gender disparity; Qualitative research; STEM
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s41073-021-00117-3
  22. J Med Libr Assoc. 2021 Oct 01. 109(4): 688-689
      As part of a larger project to understand the publishing choices of UVA Health authors and support open access publishing, a team from the Claude Moore Health Sciences Library analyzed an open data set from Europe PMC, which includes metadata from PubMed records. We used the Europe PMC REST API to search for articles published in 2017-2020 with "University of Virginia" in the author affiliation field. Subsequently, we parsed the JSON metadata in Python and used Streamlit to create a data visualization from our public GitHub repository. At present, this shows the relative proportions of open access versus subscription-only articles published by UVA Health authors. Although subscription services like Web of Science, Scopus, and Dimensions allow users to do similar analyses, we believe this is a novel approach to doing this type of bibliometric research with open data and open source tools.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.5195/jmla.2021.1360
  23. Eur J Radiol. 2021 Nov 24. pii: S0720-048X(21)00550-7. [Epub ahead of print]146 110069
      PURPOSE: To evaluate the general rules and future trajectories of deep learning (DL) networks in medical image analysis through bibliometric and hot spot analysis of original articles published between 2012 and 2020.METHODS: Original articles related to DL and medical imaging were retrieved from the PubMed database. For the analysis, data regarding radiological subspecialties; imaging techniques; DL networks; sample size; study purposes, setting, origins and design; statistical analysis; funding sources; authors; and first authors' affiliation was manually extracted from each article. The Bibliographic Item Co-Occurrence Matrix Builder and VOSviewer were used to identify the research topics of the included articles and illustrate the future trajectories of studies.
    RESULTS: The study included 2685 original articles. The number of publications on DL and medical imaging has increased substantially since 2017, accounting for 97.2% of all included articles. We evaluated the rules of the application of 47 DL networks to eight radiological tasks on 11 human organ sites. Neuroradiology, thorax, and abdomen were frequent research subjects, while thyroid was under-represented. Segmentation and classification tasks were the primary purposes. U-Net, ResNet, and VGG were the most frequently used Convolutional neural network-derived networks. GAN-derived networks were widely developed and applied in 2020, and transfer learning was highlighted in the COVID-19 studies. Brain, prostate, and diabetic retinopathy-related studies were mature research topics in the field. Breast- and lung-related studies were in a stage of rapid development.
    CONCLUSIONS: This study evaluates the general rules and future trajectories of DL network application in medical image analyses and provides guidance for future studies.
    Keywords:  Bibliometrics; Deep learning; Diagnostic imaging; Radiology
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrad.2021.110069
  24. J Surg Res. 2021 Nov 24. pii: S0022-4804(21)00678-8. [Epub ahead of print]271 41-51
      BACKGROUND: Less than half of medical school professorships and decanal ranks are held by women. Our study investigates the gender-based geographical distribution and differences in lifetime peer-reviewed publications, H-index, and grant funding by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) of all allopathic medical school deans in the United States (US).METHODS: A cross-sectional cohort study utilizing data from US allopathic medical school websites, PubMed, and the NIH Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools regarding lifetime peer-reviewed publications and quantity/monetary sum of NIH grants received by medical school deans. Descriptive statistics, independent sample T-tests, and ANOVA were performed with statistical significance defined as P < 0.05.
    RESULTS: Women occupied 33/157 (21.0%) dean positions overall. Compared to women, men possess higher mean number of lifetime peer-reviewed publications (112.0 vs. 55.2, P = 0.001) and H-index (43.2 vs. 25.7, P = 0.001); however, there are no differences in the mean number of NIH grants (27.5 vs. 19.1, P = 0.323) nor mean total NIH funding received ($18,931,336 vs. $14,289,529, P = 0.524). While significant differences in mean H-index between all US regions were found (P = 0.002), no significant differences exist between major US regions regarding the mean lifetime publication count (P = 0.223), NIH grants received (P = 0.200), nor total NIH funding (P = 0.824) received.
    CONCLUSION: A significant discrepancy in the gender distribution, lifetime peer-reviewed publications, and H-index of allopathic medical school deans exists across the US, highlighting the need for adequate support for women in academic medicine. Greater implementation of mentorship, increased institutional support, and diversity training can improve the representation of women in medical school decanal positions.
    Keywords:  Academic Medicine; Diversity and Inclusion; Gender equity; Medical school dean; Women leadership
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2021.10.018
  25. PLoS One. 2021 ;16(11): e0260239
      This paper addresses the relationship between age and international research collaboration. The main research question is: do younger researchers collaborate more internationally than their senior colleagues? A common assumption is that younger generations are generally more internationally oriented than older generations. On the other hand, senior researchers may have larger international networks compared to younger colleagues. The study is based on data for 5,600 Norwegian researchers and their publication output during a three-year period (44,000 publications). Two indicators for international collaboration are used: The share of researchers involved in international collaboration measured by co-authorship and the average proportion of publications with international collaboration per researcher. These indicators reflect two different dimensions of international collaboration. Although the findings are not consistent across age cohorts and indicators of internationalization, the overall trend is that international collaboration tends to decline with increasing age. This holds both at aggregate levels and within groups of academic positions. However, the generational differences are not very large, and other variables such as the field of research explain more of the differences observed at an individual level.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260239
  26. J Med Internet Res. 2021 11 26. 23(11): e25394
      BACKGROUND: Tissue engineering (TE) constitutes a multidisciplinary field aiming to construct artificial tissues to regenerate end-stage organs. Its development has taken place since the last decade of the 20th century, entailing a clinical revolution. TE research groups have worked and shared relevant information in the mass media era. Thus, it would be interesting to study the online dimension of TE research and to compare it with traditional measures of scientific impact.OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to evaluate the online dimension of TE documents from 2012 to 2018 using metadata obtained from the Web of Science (WoS) and Altmetric and to develop a prediction equation for the impact of TE documents from altmetric scores.
    METHODS: We analyzed 10,112 TE documents through descriptive and statistical methods. First, the TE temporal evolution was exposed for WoS and 15 online platforms (news, blogs, policy, Twitter, patents, peer review, Weibo, Facebook, Wikipedia, Google, Reddit, F1000, Q&A, video, and Mendeley Readers). The 10 most cited TE original articles were ranked according to the normalized WoS citations and the normalized Altmetric Attention Score. Second, to better comprehend the TE online framework, correlation and factor analyses were performed based on the suitable results previously obtained for the Bartlett sphericity and Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin tests. Finally, the linear regression model was applied to elucidate the relation between academics and online media and to construct a prediction equation for TE from altmetrics data.
    RESULTS: TE dynamic shows an upward trend in WoS citations, Twitter, Mendeley Readers, and Altmetric Scores. However, WoS and Altmetric rankings for the most cited documents clearly differ. When compared, the best correlation results were obtained for Mendeley Readers and WoS (ρ=0.71). In addition, the factor analysis identified 6 factors that could explain the previously observed differences between academic institutions and the online platforms evaluated. At this point, the mathematical model constructed is able to predict and explain more than 40% of TE WoS citations from Altmetric scores.
    CONCLUSIONS: Scientific information related to the construction of bioartificial tissues increasingly reaches society through different online media. Because the focus of TE research importantly differs when the academic institutions and online platforms are compared, basic and clinical research groups, academic institutions, and health politicians should make a coordinated effort toward the design and implementation of adequate strategies for information diffusion and population health education.
    Keywords:  advanced therapies; altmetrics; communication of science; online; scientometrics; tissue engineering; web
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2196/25394
  27. Front Mater Sci. 2021 Nov 18. 1-17
      Unclear biological fate hampers the clinical translation of nanoparticles for biomedical uses. In recent years, it is documented that the formation of protein corona upon nanoparticles is a critical factor leading to the ambiguous biological fate. Efforts have been made to explore the protein corona forming behaviors on nanoparticles, and rearrangement of the relevant studies will help to understand the current trend of such a topic. In this work, the publications about protein corona of nanoparticles in Science Citation Index Expanded database of Web of Science from 2007 to 2020 (1417 in total) were analyzed in detail, and the bibliometrics landscape of them was showcased. The basic bibliometrics characteristics were summarized to provide an overall understanding. Citation analysis was performed to scrutinize the peer interests of these papers. The research hotspots in the field were evaluated, based on which some feasible topics for future studies were proposed. In general, the results demonstrated that protein corona of nanoparticles was a prospective research area, and had attracted global research interests. It was believed that this work could comprehensively highlight the bibliometrics landscape, inspire further exploitation on protein corona of nanoparticles, and ultimately promote the clinical translation of nanoparticles.
    Keywords:  Web of Science; bibliometrics; nanoparticle; protein corona
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11706-021-0571-7
  28. J Hosp Leis Sport Tour Educ. 2021 Nov 22. 100360
      Academic research in tourism and hospitality sector adds value directly to the way the industry grows and develops. Scholars in this area struggle with the pressures to publish in high ranking journals. The present study attempts to help doctoral students and tourism educators in identifying emerging themes in the tourism and hospitality arising out after COVID-19 pandemic. Using bibliometric analysis, five broad areas of emerging research themes are identified. Such research would further help managers, tourism related state administrators, and firm owners to recover from the devastating impact of COVID-19 on the industry across the world.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric method; Covid-19; Education; Hospitality and tourism; Literature review; Network analysis
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhlste.2021.100360
  29. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Dec 02.
      With the global outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) all over the world, artificial intelligence (AI) technology is widely used in COVID-19 and has become a hot topic. In recent 2 years, the application of AI technology in COVID-19 has developed rapidly, and more than 100 relevant papers are published every month. In this paper, we combined with the bibliometric and visual knowledge map analysis, used the WOS database as the sample data source, and applied VOSviewer and CiteSpace analysis tools to carry out multi-dimensional statistical analysis and visual analysis about 1903 pieces of literature of recent 2 years (by the end of July this year). The data is analyzed by several terms with the main annual article and citation count, major publication sources, institutions and countries, their contribution and collaboration, etc. Since last year, the research on the COVID-19 has sharply increased; especially the corresponding research fields combined with the AI technology are expanding, such as medicine, management, economics, and informatics. The China and USA are the most prolific countries in AI applied in COVID-19, which have made a significant contribution to AI applied in COVID-19, as the high-level international collaboration of countries and institutions is increasing and more impactful. Moreover, we widely studied the issues: detection, surveillance, risk prediction, therapeutic research, virus modeling, and analysis of COVID-19. Finally, we put forward perspective challenges and limits to the application of AI in the COVID-19 for researchers and practitioners to facilitate future research on AI applied in COVID-19.
    Keywords:  AI; COVID-19; Coronavirus disease; Data visualization; Knowledge graph; Visual analysis
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-17800-z
  30. Eur J Investig Health Psychol Educ. 2021 Nov 10. 11(4): 1406-1421
      Research related to blockchain is rapidly gaining importance in the higher education. This opportunity collaborates with a proposal for a review of papers on the main blockchain topic. The bibliometric analysis included 61 peer-reviewed articles published in the Scopus database during the period of 2016 to 2021. This paper offers the identification of gaps in the literature enabling studies on the subject in higher education. The article identifies the main applications of blockchain technology in higher education around the world, as well as suggests future investigations. For further scientific investigation, we propose the operationalization of each of the researched approaches, especially combining the blockchain relationship, artificial intelligence, digital innovation, digital maturity, and customer experience in higher education.
    Keywords:  bibliometric studies; blockchain technology; digital transformation; disrupt higher education
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe11040101
  31. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Dec 01.
      A social science perspective to carbon accounting is essential for determining the appropriate allocation of reduction responsibility, and thus contributing to addressing the climate crisis. It is crucial to have a comprehensive review of the literature in this field to better understand how relevant research has evolved, and to identify gaps that future studies need to work on. Based on the bibliographic database from the Web of Science (WOS), we identified 897 publications relevant to carbon accounting in the social sciences published between 1997 and 2020. Bibliometric analysis is applied to analyze the trends and features of carbon accounting research in the social sciences. The results show that international trade has spurred considerable scholarly interest in responsibility allocation from a consumption perspective. IO (input-output) analysis that can be used to derive embodied emissions in trade has therefore become the most popular method in this domain. It is also revealed that few publications have addressed quantification of emissions at organizational level. In consideration of the importance of organizations especially corporations in emission reduction, a shift of priority to this particular area is needed for further research. Carbon label and supply chain have emerged as a subject in keywords analysis, but have not been addressed enough either. To achieve carbon neutrality, solely relying on actions at country and organizational level may not be sufficient. Greener consumption behaviors of the public and individuals could play a remarkable role. Thus, it is important to formulate a consistent framework for labeling carbon embodied in products and investigate the drivers of consumers' low-carbon choices.
    Keywords:  Bibliometric review; Carbon accounting; Input–output analysis; International trade
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-17600-5
  32. J Med Libr Assoc. 2021 Oct 01. 109(4): 590-598
      Objective: We sought to determine how many abstracts presented at the 2012 and 2014 Medical Library Association (MLA) annual conferences were later published as full-text journal articles and which features of the abstract and first author influence the likelihood of future publication. To do so, we replicated a previous study on MLA conference abstracts presented in 2002 and 2003. The secondary objective was to compare the publication rates between the prior and current study.Methods: Presentations and posters delivered at the 2012 and 2014 MLA meetings were coded to identify factors associated with publication. Postconference publication of abstracts as journal articles was determined using a literature search and survey sent to first authors. Chi-squared tests were used to assess differences in the publication rate, and logistic regression was used to assess the influence of abstract factors on publication.
    Results: The combined publication rate for the 2012 and 2014 meetings was 21.8% (137/628 abstracts), which is a statistically significant decrease compared to the previously reported rate for 2002 and 2003 (27.6%, 122/442 abstracts). The odds that an abstract would later be published as a journal article increased if the abstract was multi-institutional or if it was research, specifically surveys or mixed methods research.
    Conclusions: The lower publication rate of MLA conference abstracts may be due to an increased number of program or nonresearch abstracts that were accepted or a more competitive peer review process for journals. MLA could increase the publication rate by encouraging and enabling multi-institutional research projects among its members.
    Keywords:  congresses as topic; health sciences librarians; libraries, medical; publishing
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.5195/jmla.2021.1220
  33. J Safety Res. 2021 Dec;pii: S0022-4375(21)00115-8. [Epub ahead of print]79 173-198
      INTRODUCTION: Scholarly research on road accidents over the past 50 years has generated substantial literature. We propose a robust search strategy to retrieve and analyze this literature.METHOD: Analyses was focused on estimating the size of this literature and examining its intellectual anatomy and temporal trends using bibliometric indicators of its articles.
    RESULTS: The size of the literature is estimated to have exceeded N = 25,000 items as of 2020. At the highest level of aggregation, patterns of term co-occurrence in road accident articles point to the presence of six major divisions: (i) law, legislation & road trauma statistics; (ii) vehicular safety technology; (iii) statistical modelling; (iv) driving simulator experiments of driving behavior; (v) driver style and personality (social psychology); and (vi) vehicle crashworthiness and occupant protection division. Analyses identify the emergence of various research clusters and their progress over time along with their respective influential entities. For example, driver injury severity " and crash frequency show distinct characteristics of trending topics, with research activities in those areas notably intensified since 2015 Also, two developing clusters labelled autonomous vehicle and automated vehicle show distinct signs of becoming emerging streams of road accident literature.
    CONCLUSIONS: By objectively documenting temporal patterns in the development of the field, these analyses could offer new levels of insight into the intellectual composition of this field, its future directions, and knowledge gaps. Practical Applications: The proposed search strategy can be modified to generate specific subsets of this literature and assist future conventional reviews. The findings of temporal analyses could also be instrumental in informing and enriching literature review sections of original research articles. Analyses of authorships can facilitate collaborations, particularly across various divisions of accident research field.
    Keywords:  Road crashes; Road safety; Road trauma; Scientometrics; Traffic safety
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsr.2021.09.002
  34. Dan Med J. 2021 Nov 25. pii: A10210792. [Epub ahead of print]68(11):
      INTRODUCTION The quality of surgical research was criticised 25 years ago in a Lancet commentary, where an analysis showed that papers published in prestigious surgical journals were rarely randomised clinical trials, but typically simple case series. Therefore, the aim of the present paper was to conduct a new publication analysis to establish if this has changed. METHODS The January issues of the ten surgery and ten general medicine journals with the highest impact factors were analysed. Only original articles were included, and funding and study design were registered. RESULTS Medicine journals had higher impact factors (median 25.0 (range: 9.0-91.2)) than surgical journals (9.1 (7.0-14.8)) (p = 0.004). More randomised trials and fewer retrospective studies were recorded in medicine than in surgery, and more prospective studies were found among surgery than the medicine publications. Furthermore, funding was more frequently involved in medicine than in surgery papers (94% versus 62%, p less-than 0.00001). CONCLUSIONS In the field of surgery, randomised trials remain rare and the field is characterized by more retrospective studies being published than in the field of medicine. The reasons explaining why may be found in knowledge and research traditions, but funding opportunities may also play a role. Furthermore, in clinical trials in surgery, it may be difficult or occasionally impossible to employ a double-blind study design. FUNDING none. TRIAL REGISTRATION not relevant.
  35. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Dec 02.
      The recycling of spent lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) is both essential to sustainable resource utilization and environmental conservation. While spent batteries possess a resource value, they pose an environmental hazard at the same time. Since the start of development to recycle spent LIBs in 1990s, important contributions have been made and a number of achievements have been accomplished by scholars globally. Therefore, it is valuable to summarize the developments on spent LIB recycling and to analyze the characteristics and trends comprehensively. A review of the progress in this field will provide guidance for future development. In this study, recycling characteristics and developing trends including the research foundation, milestone, research hotspot, key technologies, and emerging trends were identified based on visual scientometric analysis followed by a discussion on future research directions in this area. For the analysis, 1041 publications in English were collected, summarized, and categorized. The distribution of scientific publications on spent LIB recycling from 1995 to 2020 displayed an increasing trend in numbers. China made the biggest contribution with 528 publications and basically cooperated with all other countries. The research fields with the highest contributions were "engineering", "chemistry", and "environmental science and technology". The keywords recovery, lithium ion battery, and cobalt appeared in high frequency. "Metal value" was identified as the most frequently used keyword which began to burst in 2005 and ended in 2013.
    Keywords:  Battery recycling; Citespace; Electric vehicles; Resource recycling; Scientometric analysis; Spent lithium-ion battery
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-17814-7
  36. Hu Li Za Zhi. 2021 Dec;pii: JN.202112_68(6).12. [Epub ahead of print]68(6): 91-98
      The advance of information technology has led to the significant diversification of scholarly publishing. Over the past decade, the popularity of open access in scholarly publishing has led to an unintended rise in the number of predatory journals and the growth in predatory open access (POA) publishing practices. The main goal of POA publishing is to profit from article processing charges, and thus little or no attention is given to proper peer review or to editorial / publishing standards. Most articles published in predatory journals are tainted by examples of academic ethics violations such as falsification, deception, and fraud. Moreover, the risk of citation contamination is high, as articles published in POA publications may be cited and referenced in the legitimate scientific literature, with consequences including confounding subsequent research, negatively influencing public policies, and hindering social progress and public health. However, most nurses in Taiwan remain unfamiliar with this issue. This article provides a brief review of the open access movement and insights regarding how to assess the credentials of journals and publishers before submitting manuscripts to avoid predatory journals, promote academic integrity, and contribute to the sustainable development of the nursing profession.
    Keywords:  nursing; open access; predatory journals; science citation index
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.6224/JN.202112_68(6).12
  37. J Dent Educ. 2021 Dec 02.
      The aim of this perspective paper is to highlight the potential role and value digital scholarship can have in dental education. The use of digital scholarship and alternative metrics for academic assessment, promotion, and tenure is growing rapidly among healthcare scholars and can complement traditional frameworks. The US dental academic institutions might consider expanding the scope of their promotion and tenure guidelines from reliance on publications and grants to a greater appreciation of the impact of the scholar's work in the digital sphere by integrating newer citation indices and altmetrics.
    Keywords:  altmetrics; citation index; dental education; digital scholarship; faculty promotion and tenure; professional development; social media
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1002/jdd.12846
  38. Med Sci (Paris). 2021 Nov;37(11): 1035-1041
      In order to effectively contribute to scientific knowledge, biomedical observations have to be validated and debated by scientists in the relevant field. Along this debate that mainly takes place in the scientific literature, citation of previous studies plays a major role. However, only a few academic studies have quantitatively evaluated the suitability and accuracy of scientific citations. Here we review these academic studies. Two types of misuse have been pointed out: Citation bias and citation distortion. First, scientific citations favor positive results and those supporting authors' conclusion. Second, many statements linked to a reference actually misrepresent the referenced findings. About 10% of all citations in biomedicine are strongly inaccurate and misleading for the reader. Finally, we give two examples illustrating how some citation misuses do affect public health: The opioid crisis in the USA and the unjustified fostering of hydroxychloroquine for Covid-19 treatment in France.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1051/medsci/2021142
  39. Microb Biotechnol. 2021 Nov 30.
      This year, 2022, Microbial Biotechnology (MBT) celebrates its 15th birthday. In journal terms, 15 is adulthood. It has been a privilege to develop the idea, launch the journal, nurture it in its infancy and stimulate and support it during its adolescence and early adulthood. The success of MBT - its growth over the last 4 years averaging > 30%, and the highest impact factor in the field, making it the leading research journal in applied microbiology/microbial biotechnology and the most attractive to publish in - gives us enormous pleasure and satisfaction, and not a little pride.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/1751-7915.13984
  40. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Dec 01.
      The time of concentration (Tc) is the main hydrological parameter used to characterize the response of a given Hydrological Response Unit (HRU) to a precipitation event. Because of its importance, the determining Tc is an integral step in several studies involving runoff. Thus, this work presents an unprecedented review of the application of Tc in different lines of research involving water resources around the world. In this article, 1252 publications were listed, obtained from seven different databases, published by 2020, that presented the expressions "time of concentration," "runoff," and "watershed." The articles and conference papers obtained in this research were classified into 12 topics. The number of publications per topic and per country was measured and a cluster analysis was developed to verify the similarity of the distribution of topics per country. In addition, 125 equations applied in related publications for the estimation of Tc are also listed. Graphical abstract.
    Keywords:  Cluster analysis; Flood; Rainfall; Runoff; Time parameter; Watershed
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-16790-2
  41. Plast Reconstr Surg. 2021 Dec 01. 148(6): 1408-1413
      BACKGROUND: Gender equity remains to be realized in academic plastic and reconstructive surgery. The purpose of this study was to measure the proportion of women in leadership roles in academic plastic and reconstructive surgery to verify where gender gaps may persist.METHODS: Six markers of leadership were analyzed: academic faculty rank, manuscript authorship, program directorship, journal editor-in-chief positions, society board of directors membership, and professional society membership. Descriptive statistics were performed, and chi-square tests were used to compare categorical variables.
    RESULTS: About 16 percent to 19 percent of practicing plastic surgeons are female, as measured by the percentage of female faculty and American Society of Plastic Surgeons members. Female plastic surgeons comprised 18.9 percent (n = 178) of the faculty from 88 academic plastic surgery institutions, and represented 9.9 percent of full professors and 10.8 percent of chiefs. Nineteen institutions had no female faculty. Women were first authors in 23.4 percent of publications and senior author in 14.7 percent of publications. No journal studied had a female editor-in-chief. Of the examined plastic and reconstructive societies, the proportion of women on the board of directors ranged from 16.7 percent to 23.5 percent.
    CONCLUSIONS: The proportion of female program directors, first manuscript authors, and board members of certain societies is commensurate with the number of women in the field, suggesting an evolving landscape within the specialty. However, women remain underrepresented in many other leadership roles, heralding the work that remains to ensure gender parity exists for those pursuing leadership roles in the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1097/PRS.0000000000008527
  42. Comput Biol Med. 2021 Nov 24. pii: S0010-4825(21)00863-5. [Epub ahead of print]140 105069
      Despite remarkable progress in disease diagnosis and treatment, coronary heart disease (CHD) remains the number one leading cause of death worldwide. Many practical challenges still faced in clinical settings necessitates the pursuit of omics studies to identify alternative/orthogonal biomarkers, as well as to discover novel insights into disease mechanisms. Albeit relatively nascent as compared to the omics frontrunners (genomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics), omics beyond the central dogma (OBCD; e.g., metabolomics, lipidomics, glycomics, and metallomics) have undeniable contributions and prospects in CHD research. In this bibliometric study, we characterised the global trends in publication/citation outputs, collaborations, and research hotspots concerning OBCD-CHD, with a focus on the more prolific fields of metabolomics and lipidomics. As for glycomics and metallomics, there were insufficient publication records on their applications in CHD research for quantitative bibliometrics analysis. Thus, we reviewed their applications in health/disease research in general, discussed and justified their potential in CHD research, and suggested important/promising research avenues. By summarising evidence obtained both quantitatively and qualitatively, this study offers a first and comprehensive picture of OBCD applications in CHD, facilitating the establishment of future research directions.
    Keywords:  Bibliometrics; Coronary heart disease; Glycomics; Lipidomics; Metabolomics; Metallomics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compbiomed.2021.105069
  43. PLoS One. 2021 ;16(12): e0261091
      More voices are calling for a quicker transition towards clean energy. The exploration and exploitation of clean energy such as wind energy and solar energy are effective means to optimise energy structure and improve energy efficiency. To provide in-depth understanding of clean energy transition, this paper utilises a combination of multiple bibliometric mapping techniques, including HistCite, CiteSpace and R Bibliometrix, to conduct a systematic review on 2,191 clean energy related articles obtained from Web of Science (WoS). We identify five current main research streams in the clean energy field, including Energy Transition, Clean Energy and Carbon Emission Policy, Impact of Oil Price on Alternative Energy Stocks, Clean Energy and Economics, and Venture Capital Investments in Clean Energy. Clearly, the effectiveness of policy-driven and market-driven energy transition is an important ongoing debate. Emerging research topics are also discussed and classified into six areas: Clean Energy Conversion Technology and Biomass Energy Utilisation, Optimisation of Energy Generation Technology, Policy-Making in Clean Energy Transition, Impact of Clean Energy Use and Economic Development on Carbon Emissions, Household Use of Clean Energy, and Clean Energy Stock Markets. Accordingly, more and more research attention has been paid to how to improve energy efficiency through advanced clean energy technology, and how to make targeted policies for clean energy transition and energy market development. This article moves beyond the traditional literature review methods and delineates a systematic research agenda for clean energy research, providing research directions for achieving low-carbon development through the clean energy transition.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0261091
  44. J Nanobiotechnology. 2021 Nov 29. 19(1): 399
      With the growing demands for personalized medicine and medical devices, nanomedicine is a modern scientific field, and research continues to apply nanomaterials for therapeutic and damaged tissue diagnosis. In this regard, substantial progress has been made in synthesizing magnetic nanoparticles with desired sizes, chemical composition, morphologies, and surface chemistry. Among these materials, nanomagnetic iron oxides have demonstrated promise as unique drug delivery carriers due to cancer treatment. This carrier could lead to responsive properties to a specific trigger, including heat, pH, alternative magnetic field, or even enzymes, through functionalization and coating of magnetic nanoparticles, along with biocompatibility, good chemical stability, easy functionalization, simple processing, and ability to localize to the tumor site with the assistance of external magnetic field. Current studies have focused on magnetic nanoparticles' utilities in cancer therapy, especially for colorectal cancer. Additionally, a bibliometric investigation was performed on the public trends in the field of the magnetic nanoparticle to drug delivery and anticancer, which represented progressing applications of these carriers in the multidisciplinary zones with a general view on future research and identified potential opportunities and challenges. Furthermore, we outline the current challenges and forthcoming research perspective for high performance and fostering advanced MNPs in colorectal cancer treatment.
    Keywords:  Anticancer drugs; Bibliometric analysis; Colon cancer; Drug-delivery; Magnetic nanoparticles
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s12951-021-01150-6