An analysis of research hotspots and trends on ticks and tick-borne diseases in western China based on bibliometrics

JIE Runda; ZHANG Niuniu; MA Yanran; ZHANG Bing

doi:10.19821/j.1671-2781.2025.02.007

Abstract：Objective To analyze the research hotspots and trends of ticks and tick-borne diseases in western China over the past 20 years,and provide reference for the decision-making of tick-borne disease surveillance,prevention,and treatment in western China.Methods The literature related to ticks in western China was retrieved from CNKI and Web of Science from January 2004 to June 2024,and the keywords,authors,etc.were visualized using CiteSpace 6.1.R6.Results The number of literature related to ticks and tick-borne diseases in both domestic and foreign countries increased year by year.The number of English literature was much higher than that of Chinese literature.The specific research areas mainly included ecological and taxonomic studies,epidemiological and diagnostic techniques/prevention and control measures studies,molecular biology and bioinformatics studies,etc.The overall direction of domestic and foreign research hotspots was consistent,focusing on the high-incidence diseases and reservoir hosts in western pastoral areas,but with different emphases.Conclusion The ecology of ticks,the epidemic distribution of tick-borne diseases,the early detection and targeted control of tick-borne diseases through reverse epidemiology,the study of tick-tick-borne-pathogen-host interactions using multi-omics,the discovery of protective antigens,and the establishment of sensitive detection methods are the future trends.The research hotspots and trends suggest that we should pay attention to border area quarantine and epidemic prevention,monitor the spread of tick-borne diseases,investigate the distribution of ticks in pastoral areas,identify new tick-borne microorganisms,and conduct interdisciplinary basic research.