Conversion of organic wastes into biofuel by microorganisms: a bibliometric review

This paper presents a bibliometric research of scientific documents on biofuel production from organic wastes extracted from the Web of Science (WoS) database. Original research and conference proceeding articles published until 2022 year were considered, which resulted in 773 documents. The objective of the study was to track evolutionary nuances and emerging trends of the topic, as well as upgrade knowledge in the area and help formulate scientific policies. The work concentrated on the most productive countries, authors and journals, as well as authors’ keywords in documents relating to the biofuel conversion from biomass. The first paper on the field was published in 2004, and the publication number showed increasing trend with over 27% annual growth. The USA, followed by China demonstrated the highest publication and citation number. The thematic map analysis displayed the multidisciplinary nature of the topic, implying that the progress of several research domains is required for this technology. This is the first bibliometric review on biofuel from organic waste by microorganisms in the literature. The investigation results emphasize the need for further research in the area and also highlights the need for higher collaboration.