Identifying the Research Trends and Subfields of Blockchain Technology

Over the last years, extensive research has been done in the field of blockchain technology and there are a growing number of areas to which blockchain is being applied, creating broad knowledge in this field. Classifying the subfields and identifying new topics and research trends in the area of blockchain would be of significant help to researchers. The present study aims to review and categorize studies on blockchain technology, identify subfields, and achieve a coherent view of its research process. using bibliometric analyses. The data used in this research has been collected from 423 articles in the Scopus database. Then, the bibliographic coupling analysis and keyword co-occurrence have been performed.According to the findings of this study, researches on blockchain technology are divided into 5 clusters: 1. Computer systems, 2. Financial sciences, 3. Smart contracts, 4. Data management and authentication, and 5. Electronic cash. In recent years, topics such as machine learning, trust, deep learning, risk assessment, edge computing, Ethereum, and consensus have drawn the attention of the research community. This research provides a comprehensive classification of the main concepts and topics discussed in blockchain-related research, designated to help researchers in this field choose a line of research.