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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Oncol.
Sec. Pharmacology of Anti-Cancer Drugs
Volume 15 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fonc.2025.1550016
This article is part of the Research Topic Enhancing Cancer Therapy: Integrating Plant-Derived Bioactives with Chemotherapy through Traditional Knowledge and Modern Advances View all articles

Bibliometric analysis of Rhein in the treatment of tumors

Provisionally accepted
Yi Yang Yi Yang 1*Lan Jiang Lan Jiang 2Qian Huang Qian Huang 2Zhongquan Shi Zhongquan Shi 1
  • 1 Chongqing Three Gorges Central Hospital, Chongqing, China
  • 2 Chongqing Three Gorges Medical College, Chongqing, China

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

    Rhein is an anthraquinone compound with a variety of biological activities. It has inhibitory effects on liver cancer, breast cancer, lung cancer, oral cancer, gastric cancer, and other cancers. However, a comprehensive bibliometric review of this field has not yet been published.Objective:This study aims to investigate and evaluate the current research trends and directions about the antitumour properties of rhein using bibliometric analysis.The literature related to rhein in cancer treatment from 2003 to 2023 was retrieved from the Web of Science core collection (WoSCC) database, and the annual number of publications, main authors, major institutions, keyword clustering, and keyword bursts were visually analyzed using CiteSpace 6.3.R1 software. To discuss the status quo, hotspots, and development trends of rhein research over the past 20 years.Results: A total of 220 articles were retrieved from the core collection database, and the number of articles related to treating tumors with rhein increased annually. Among them, Chung, Jing Gung have the highest number of articles in this field, but most researchers lack cooperation with each other. The institutions with the highest number of articles were the Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine (13 articles) and China Medical University (Taiwan) (13 articles). Research hotspots include the promotion of apoptosis, endoplasmic reticulum stress, inhibition of proliferation, drug resistance, and nanoparticles.Rhein exerts antitumor effects by inducing cell apoptosis, controlling metastasis, and inhibiting proliferation. However, owing to its poor water solubility, in recent years, functional modification of its functional groups or production of rhein nanoparticles to enhance its bioavailability and antitumor effects has become a hot research direction in the future.

    Keywords: Rhein, Cancer, bibliometric analysis, knowledge graph, Citespace

    Received: 22 Dec 2024; Accepted: 15 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Yang, Jiang, Huang and Shi. 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: Yi Yang, Chongqing Three Gorges Central Hospital, Chongqing, 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.