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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Immunol.
Sec. Cancer Immunity and Immunotherapy
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2024.1474869
This article is part of the Research Topic Understanding the interplay between Tumor Immune Microenvironment and Neoantigens for improved Immunotherapy View all articles

Global research trends in the tumor microenvironment of hepatocellular carcinoma: Insights based on bibliometric analysis

Provisionally accepted
Hongmin Han Hongmin Han Ziyin Zhao Ziyin Zhao Mingyang He Mingyang He *Ge Guan Ge Guan Junning Cao Junning Cao *Tianxiang Li Tianxiang Li *Bing Han Bing Han Bin Zhang Bin Zhang *
  • The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, Qingdao, Shandong Province, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Objective: This study aimed to use visual mapping and bibliometric analysis to summarize valuable information on the tumor microenvironment (TME)-related research on hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in the past 20 years and to identify the research hotspots and trends in this field.Methods: We screened all of the relevant literature on the TME of HCC in the Web of Science database from 2003 to 2023 and analysed the research hotspots and trends in this field via VOSviewer and CiteSpace.Results: A total of 2,157 English studies were collected. According to the prediction, the number of papers that were published in the past three years will be approximately 1,394, accounting for 64.63%. China published the most papers (n=1,525) and had the highest total number of citations (n=32,253). Frontiers In Immunology published the most articles on the TME of HCC (n=75), whereas, Hepatology was the journal with the highest total number of citations (n=4,104) and average number of citations (n=91). The four clusters containing keywords such as "cancer-associated fibroblasts", "hepatic stellate cells", "immune cells", "immunotherapy", "combination therapy", "landscape", "immune infiltration", and "heterogeneity" are currently hot research topics in this field. The keywords "cell death", "ferroptosis", "biomarkers", and "prognostic features" have emerged relatively recently, and these research directions are becoming increasingly popular.Conclusions: We identified four key areas of focus in the study of the TME in HCC: the main components and roles in the TME, immunotherapy, combination therapy, and the microenvironmental landscape. Moreover, the result of our study indicate that effect of ferroptosis on the TME in HCC may become a future research trend.

    Keywords: Hepatocellular Carcinoma, Tumor Microenvironment, Bibliometric, hotspots, Trends

    Received: 02 Aug 2024; Accepted: 13 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Han, Zhao, He, Guan, Cao, Li, Han and Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Mingyang He, The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, Qingdao, 266000, Shandong Province, China
    Junning Cao, The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, Qingdao, 266000, Shandong Province, China
    Tianxiang Li, The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, Qingdao, 266000, Shandong Province, China
    Bin Zhang, The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, Qingdao, 266000, Shandong Province, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.