Mapping knowledge landscapes and emerging trends of the biomarkers in melanoma: a bibliometric analysis from 2004 to 2022

BACKGROUND: Melanoma is a skin tumor with a high mortality rate, and early diagnosis and effective treatment are the key to reduce its mortality rate. Therefore, more and more attention has been paid for biomarker identification for early diagnosis, prognosis prediction and prognosis evaluation of melanoma. However, there is still a lack of a report that comprehensively and objectively evaluates the research status of melanoma biomarkers. Therefore, this study aims to intuitively analyze the research status and trend of melanoma biomarkers through the methods of bibliometrics and knowledge graph. OBJECTIVE: This study uses bibliometrics to analyze research in biomarkers in melanoma, summarize the field’s history and current status of research, and predict future research directions. METHOD: Articles and Reviews related to melanoma biomarkers were retrieved by using Web of Science core collection subject search. Bibliometric analysis was performed in Excel 365, CiteSpace, VOSviewer and Bibliometrix (R-Tool of R-Studio). RESULT: A total of 5584 documents from 2004 to 2022 were included in the bibliometric analysis. The results show that the number of publications and the frequency of citations in this field are increasing year by year, and the frequency of citations has increased rapidly after 2018. The United States is the most productive and influential country in this field, with the largest number of publications and institutions with high citation frequency. Caroline Robert, F. Stephen Hodi, Suzanne L. Topalian and others are authoritative authors in this field, and The New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of Clinical Oncology and Clinical Cancer Research are the most authoritative journals in this field. Biomarkers related to the diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of melanoma are hot topics and cutting-edge hotspots in this field. CONCLUSION: For the first time, this study used the bibliometric method to visualize the research in the field of melanoma biomarkers, revealing the trends and frontiers of melanoma biomarkers research, which provides a useful reference for scholars to find key research issues and partners.