Is autoimmunology a discipline of its own? A big data-based bibliometric and scientometric analyses.
Autoimmunology is a super-specialty of immunology specifically dealing with autoimmune disorders. To assess the extant literature concerning autoimmune disorders, bibliometric and scientometric analyses (namely, research topics/keywords co-occurrence, journal co-citation, citations, and scientific output trends - both crude and normalized, authors network, leading authors, countries, and organizations analysis) were carried out using open-source software, namely, VOSviewer and SciCurve. A corpus of 169,519 articles containing the keyword "autoimmunity" was utilized, selecting PubMed/MEDLINE as bibliographic thesaurus. Journals specifically devoted to autoimmune disorders were six and covered approximately 4.15% of the entire scientific production. Compared with all the corpus (from 1946 on), these specialized journals have been established relatively few decades ago. Top countries were the United States, Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, Italy, China, France, Canada, Australia, and Israel. Trending topics are represented by the role of microRNAs (miRNAs) in the ethiopathogenesis of autoimmune disorders, contributions of genetics and of epigenetic modifications, role of vitamins, management during pregnancy and the impact of gender. New subsets of immune cells have been extensively investigated, with a focus on interleukin production and release and on Th17 cells. Autoimmunology is emerging as a new discipline within immunology, with its own bibliometric properties, an identified scientific community and specifically devoted journals.
a Department of Medicine 'B' , Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|b Zabludowicz Center for Autoimmune Diseases, Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|c Sackler Faculty of Medicine , Tel-Aviv University , Tel-Aviv , Israel.
Abdulla
A
Watad
d School of Public Health Department of Health Sciences (DISSAL) , University of Genoa , Genoa , Italy.
Nicola Luigi
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8409-868X
NL
Bragazzi
e Padeh and Ziv Hospitals, Bar-Ilan Faculty of Medicine , Ramat Gan , Israel.
Mohammad
M
Adawi
a Department of Medicine 'B' , Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|b Zabludowicz Center for Autoimmune Diseases, Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|c Sackler Faculty of Medicine , Tel-Aviv University , Tel-Aviv , Israel.
Howard
H
Amital
b Zabludowicz Center for Autoimmune Diseases, Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|c Sackler Faculty of Medicine , Tel-Aviv University , Tel-Aviv , Israel.
Shaye
S
Kivity
a Department of Medicine 'B' , Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|b Zabludowicz Center for Autoimmune Diseases, Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|c Sackler Faculty of Medicine , Tel-Aviv University , Tel-Aviv , Israel.
Naim
N
Mahroum
b Zabludowicz Center for Autoimmune Diseases, Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|c Sackler Faculty of Medicine , Tel-Aviv University , Tel-Aviv , Israel.
Miri
M
Blank
b Zabludowicz Center for Autoimmune Diseases, Sheba Medical Center , Tel- Hashomer, Israel.|c Sackler Faculty of Medicine , Tel-Aviv University , Tel-Aviv , Israel.
Yehuda
Y
Shoenfeld
D000486:Allergy and Immunology; D001327:Autoimmune Diseases; D015551:Autoimmunity; D015706:Bibliometrics; D016208:Databases, Factual; D006801:Humans; D008490:Medical Informatics / Q000379:methods*; D012106:Research / Q000706:statistics & numerical data
Autoimmune disorders; Big Data; PubMed/MEDLINE; autoantibodies; autoimmunity; autoimmunology; bibliometrics; scientometrics