Citation Analysis and Mapping of Iranian’s Stem Cell Research Output

This study aims to map the research trends in the field of stem cell research in Iran by presenting a systematic and analytical bibliometrics approach based on data from the Web of Science database.  

In this study, we provide a visualization overview of the distribution of stem cell publications in Iran. The HistCite software was used to draw and analyze the historiographical maps, based on Global Citation Score (GSC) and Local Citation Score (LCS) in order to indicate the most frequent thematic trends. The accuracy of clustering and classification of scientific fields is enhanced by the incorporation of algorithms and main bibliometric analysis.  

A total of 5123 records were collected from the Web of Science database in 2020. The most prolific author had a GCS of 5890 and the most productive university earned GCS of 13677. “Cell Journal,” with 186 records contributed the highest number of publications. The highest cited document based on GSC had a score of 646 and the highest cited article based on LCS had a score of 71. We documented regular growth in outputs. In addition, the scientific maps based on LCS and GCS have been drawn. The prominent, distinguished areas of study revolve around differentiation, generation, proliferation, and the therapeutic use of stem cells as well as “genotoxicity in stem cells”, “mesenchymal stem cells” and “embryonic stem cells”.  Journal articles were the predominant document type.  

Research on stem cells is a biomedical venture with great scientific impact, and its development in Iran is undeniable. This study provides an overview and a framework for the weaknesses and strengths of Iranian research outputs on stem cells, representing the main clusters in scientific maps. We hope that our results help researchers to plan future studies and promote their research productions.