History and trends in ecological stoichiometry research from 1992 to 2019: a scientometric analysis

Ecological stoichiometry (ES), as an ecological theory, provides a framework for studying various ecological processes, and it has been applied successfully in fields ranging from nutrient dynamics to biogeochemical cycling. Through the application of ES theory, researchers are beginning to understand many diverse ecological topics. The aim of this paper was to identify the main characteristics of ES, especially to clarify the evolution, and potential trends of this field for future ecological studies. We used CiteSpace software to conduct a bibliometric review of ES research publications from 1992 to 2019 extracted from the Web of Science. The results showed that the United States has been a major contributor to this field; approximately half of the top 15 academic institutions contributing to ES research were in the United States. Although the largest number of publications on ES were from China, the impact of these academic papers has thus far been less than that of the papers from other countries. Moreover, none of the top 15 authors or cited authors contributing to publications on ES from 1992 to 2019 were from China. ES research has developed rapidly and has changed from single-discipline ES studies to a multidisciplinary “auxiliary tool” used in different fields. Overall, ES shows great research potential and application value, especially for studies on nutrient cycling, ecosystem sustainability and biogeochemical cycling.