Bibliometric analysis of the Santa Ines sheep breed

Santa Ines is the main Brazilian hair sheep breed. The importance of this breed has increased significantly in the last 20 years, even though lamb production in Brazil remains incipient. This study aims to characterize the bibliographic production of this sheep breed. Here, we presented a map of citations, co-occurrences of keywords, co-citations, and bibliographic coupling for studies on Santa Ines sheep. Data were obtained from Scopus (Elsevier) and analyzed via VOSviewer software and the SciVal platform (Elsevier). Several salient points are raised in the bibliographic mapping analysis. Research has focused on the areas of parasitology, alternative feedstuffs, and traditional quantitative genetics. Research groups are regionalized, with most research in the Northeastern region, with important groups in the Distrito Federal and São Paulo. There is little research on Santa Ines breed in other regions, such as Northern or Southern Brazil, although animals of this breed are raised in these regions. Research has plateaued in recent years. International collaboration is low, with most publications in Brazilian journals.