Abstract
Antioxidants are abundant in natural dietary sources, and the consumption of antioxidants has a lot of potential health benefits. However, there has been no literature analysis on this topic to evaluate its scientific impact in terms of citations. This study is aimed at identifying and analysing the antioxidant publications in the existing scientific literature. In this context, a literature search was performed with the Web of Science database. Full records and cited references of the 299,602 identified manuscripts were imported into VOSviewer for bibliometric analysis. Most of the manuscripts were published since 1991. The publications were mainly related to the categories biochemistry/molecular biology, food science technology, and pharmacology/pharmacy. These topics have been prolific since 1990 and before. Polymer science was prolific before, but its publication share declined in the recent two decades. Brazil, China, India, and South Korea have emerged as upcoming major contributors besides USA. Most prolific journals were Food Chemistry, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, Free Radical Biology and Medicine, and PLOS One. Clinical conditions with high citations included Alzheimer's disease, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and Parkinson's disease. Chemical terms and structures with high citations included alpha-tocopherol, anthocyanin, ascorbate, beta-carotene, carotenoid, curcumin, cysteine, flavonoid, flavonol, hydrogen peroxide, kaempferol, N-acetylcysteine, nitric oxide, phenolic acid, uric acid, vitamin C, vitamin E, selenium, and resveratrol. Citation patterns temporal analysis revealed a transition of the scientific interest from research focused on antioxidant vitamins and minerals into stronger attention focus on antioxidant phytochemicals (plant secondary metabolites).
Highlights
The publications were mainly related to the categories biochemistry/molecular biology, food science technology, and pharmacology/pharmacy
Antioxidants existed in many dietary natural sources such as vegetables, fruits, and beverages and dietary antioxidants such as flavonoids may help reduce the risk of mortality from coronary heart disease and incidence of myocardial infarction [1, 2]
The results presented above have highlighted two polyphenols, curcumin and resveratrol, with high citations in the recent two decades
Summary
Antioxidants existed in many dietary natural sources such as vegetables, fruits, and beverages and dietary antioxidants such as flavonoids may help reduce the risk of mortality from coronary heart disease and incidence of myocardial infarction [1, 2]. With the aging population and only a small proportion of the population has consumed daily the recommended amount of fruits and vegetables, there are great opportunities in improving the general health and against the degenerative diseases of aging by improving the diet [8, 9]. To the best of our knowledge, no such literature analysis has been published for antioxidant research. The aim of this study is to identify and analyse the antioxidant-related publications in the existing scientific literature.
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