Abstract
Purpose: We used bibliometric methods to evaluate the global scientific output of research on Piezo channels and explore the current status and trends in this field over the past decade. Methods: Piezo channel-related studies published in 2010–2020 were retrieved from Web of Science. The R bibliometrix package was used for quantitative and qualitative analyses of publication outputs and author contributions. VOSviewer was used to construct networks based on co-authorship of countries/institutions/authors, co-citation analysis of journals/references, citation analysis of documents, and co-occurrence of keywords. Results: In total, 556 related articles and reviews were included in the final analysis. The number of publications has increased substantially with time. The country and institution contributing the most to this field was the United States and Scripps Research Institute, respectively. Ardem Patapoutian was the most productive author and ranked first among the cited authors, h-index, and m-index. The top cited reference was the article published by Coste B et al. in Science (2010) that identified Piezo1/2 in mammalian cells. The top journals in terms of the number of selected articles and citations were Nature Communications and Nature, respectively. The co-occurrence analysis revealed that Piezo channels are involved a variety of cell types (Merkel cells, neurons, endothelial cells, red blood cells), physiological processes (touch sensation, blood pressure, proprioception, vascular development), related ion channels (transient receptor potential, Gardos), and diseases (pain, distal arthrogryposis, dehydrated hereditary stomatocytosis, cancer), and pharmacology (Yoda1, GsMTx-4). Conclusion: Our bibliometric analysis shows that Piezo channel research continues to be a hotspot. The focus has evolved from Piezo identification to architecture, activation mechanism, roles in diseases, and pharmacology.
Highlights
Mechanotransduction, referring to the conversion of mechanical forces into electrochemical signals, plays a critical role in various forms of physiological or pathophysiological processes in mammalian cells, including touch, proprioception, hearing, pain, vascular development, and blood pressure regulation (Chalfie, 2009; Tsunozaki and Bautista, 2009)
Several MS ion channels have been identified according to the criteria proposed by Arnadóttir et al (2011), and include MS channels of large/small conductance (MscL/MscS), degenerin/epithelial sodium channel (DEG/ENaC) channels, TREK/TRAAK channels, transient receptor potential (TRP) channels, TMC1/2 channels, and Piezo channels (Jin et al, 2020)
We combined bibliometric analyses with network visualizations to characterize the current landscape of the Piezo channel research, analyzing the contributions of countries, institutions, journals, and authors to this emerging field, and predicting hot topics that will be of continued research interest in the coming years
Summary
Mechanotransduction, referring to the conversion of mechanical forces into electrochemical signals, plays a critical role in various forms of physiological or pathophysiological processes in mammalian cells, including touch, proprioception, hearing, pain, vascular development, and blood pressure regulation (Chalfie, 2009; Tsunozaki and Bautista, 2009). It has been controversially proposed that, for the TRP channel family, mechanical stimuli may not directly gate the ion channels by force, but instead may trigger second messenger signaling to activate downstream ion channels (Christensen and Corey, 2007; Gottlieb et al, 2008; Patel et al, 2010; Nikolaev et al, 2019). In this case, the ion channels are mechanosensitive but are not mechanically gated. The molecular identities of the MS channels in mammals largely remained elusive
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