Advances on the Photoperiodic Regulation of Plant Flowering: A Bibliometric Study

Light is a crucial environmental factor for plant growth and development, and the light required for plant development on Earth mainly comes from solar radiation. Light not only affects the photomorphogenesis of plants as a trigger signal but also has an important influence on the whole development of plants. The study of photoperiod regulation of plant flowering is crucial in agricultural practice, as it directly affects plant variety selection, introductory adaptation, and yield stability. In this paper, we used the Bibliometrix package in R Studio, VOSviewer, and Citespace to bibliometrically and statistically analyze 3919 publications in the Web of Science core ensemble database from 2000 to 2023 and to explore the progress and trends in the study of photoperiodic regulation of plant flowering. Literature visualization techniques were used to analyze the annual quantitative distribution of the studies in the dataset, and co-occurrence analysis of collaboration between authors, co-occurrence analysis of collaboration between organizations, co-citation analysis, keyword co-occurrence analysis, and identification of topic evolution were also performed. The results show that the number of publications on photoperiodic regulation of plant flowering is increasing every year, showing a significant diversification and globalization trend in this research area. Growth, gene expression, and Arabidopsis thaliana are the most popular research areas in this field. Flowering gene networks and signaling pathways in the photoperiodic pathway, systems biology and multi-omics, environmental adaptation studies, and cross-species comparisons are current research hotspots. The thematic evolution suggests that environmental change, crop improvement and sustainable agriculture, light quality, and biological clock regulation may be foci of future research. This study reveals the research trends in photoperiodic regulation of plant flowering over the past 23 years and the areas where more research inputs are needed in the future, aiming to offer guidance for future research endeavors in the field of photoperiodic regulation of plant flowering.