Research status and hotspot analysis of antibiotic resistance genes in wastewater treatment

Subject term searches were performed in the Web of Science database and CNKI database. CiteSpace 6. 1. R6 analysis was used to visualize the trend of the number of publications, the national institutions of publications, and the key research directions, etc. Knowledge science map was drawn to explore the current status, hotspot issues, and the development trend of antibiotic resistance genes(ARGs) in the field of wastewater treatment. The results showed that the number of research literature issued on ARGs in the field of wastewater treatment exhibited rapid growth. China's research in this field started late, but the number of articles issued was much higher than that of other countries, accounting for 37.166% of the total number of articles in Web of Science database, which was influential to a certain extent. Current research in this field was centered on antibiotics, host bacteria, treatment processes, pharmaceutical and swine wastewater, etc. Future research focus would be placed on the mechanisms of co-selection of environmental pollutants and ARGs, the correlation between resistance genes and microbial communities, environmental risks, and health risks.