A Scientometric Analysis of Research on Mealybugs and Its Control Measures

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-4904521/v1

A scientometric search was performed using the keyword “Mealybugs”. There are 1,898 documents related to mealybug research published between 1996 and 2022 in the Web of Science database. The first research question of this study concerns the authors of the most published papers in the field of mealybug research and their H-index generated using Histcite software. Daane, K.M. from the University of California, USA published 50 papers in the area of mealybug with highest H-index of 23, followed by Kaydan, M.B. with 40 papers and Miller, J.G. with 29 papers. The second research question was to identify the most cited authors and journals. Therefore, citation metrics were used and found the following authors: Daane,K.M., Baumann P, Gullan P.J. are among the top 20 authors in the field mealybug research. Additionally, the most cited journals are the Journal of Economic Entomology, Zootaxa and Florida Entomologist. Regarding the third research question, which addressed the most publishing countries on mealybugs, USA places first with highest publishing (531 records) followed by China (178 records). India places third with 152 records. Mealybug is an invasive alien species. Among mealybugs, the papaya mealybug, (Paracoccus marginatus) is recorded from the Oriental Region for the first time, where it was found in Indonesia (Java) and India (Tamil Nadu) in 2008 India (Muniappan et al., 2008). After that only mealybug research is growing up in India. Mealybugs are native to Central America, it spreads to the Caribbean region and South America in the 1990s; since then, it has been accidentally introduced to some islands in the Pacific region. Hence, a vast study on mealybug was reported from the country USA. Finally, this study addressed the most publishing institutions, various funding agencies of mealybug researches, conferences held in mealybug research, Research areas, Languages of publication and the document types. Bibliographic coupling of authors, Organization and countries are constructed using VOSviewer software. From that cluster form of results, we can able to visualize the networks of authors, organization from different countries work on mealybug research.

Mealybugs

Scientometric analysis

Bibliometrics

Histcite

VOSviewer.

Mealybug belongs to the insect group called scale insects, family: Pseudococcidae and order: Hemiptera. With approximately 300 genera and 2000 species, it is the largest family of scale insects and has been found in 35 locations in different ecological zones around the world. It exhibits wide variation in morphological characteristics, biological and ecological adaptability, making it a serious pest of almost all types of crops and plants (Ranjan, 2006). It is considered a serious pest of crops and the most difficult to control. They have piercing-sucking mouthparts and are called phloem feeders. They use their elongated mouthparts to suck fluids from the leaves and stem axils of plants (sap feeders), causing stunting, leaf yellowing and distortion by reducing photosynthetic activity. In addition, mealybugs secrete large amounts of honeydew, which makes plant parts sticky, attracting ants and creating a breeding ground for sooty mold (Abbas et al., 2010).

The life history of mealybugs varies by species and sex. Basically, female mealybugs go through four stages of development and, as adults, can lay up to 600 eggs, usually in a cotton-like egg sac on the underside of the body. The eggs hatch after 6 to 14 days and the first larvae (often called "crawlers") disperse to suitable feeding sites on new plant parts or hosts. They can only survive for about a day without feeding, and once they feed using a stylet, they are usually permanently anchored. The caterpillar stage is the most vulnerable and easily controllable stage of the mealybug's life (susceptible stage). Some mealybugs, like the long tailed mealybug, do not lay eggs but instead give birth to larvae in the form of active crawlers. Male mealybugs go through five instars and only feed during the first two. Adult males have no functional mouthparts, live only a day or two, and specialize in fertilizing females (Mani et al., 2012).

Mealybugs are not picky about their hosts and all species of orchid can be affected by mealybugs, especially when in cultivation (Ben-Dov et al., 2013). They are widespread in nature in almost all areas of tropical and subtropical regions, including greenhouses in temperate zones. It is found in the Nearctic, Neotropical Oriental, and Palearctic regions in addition to North America, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, New Zealand, and Australia. They proliferate via a variety of channels, such as air currents, ant movements, agricultural labourers, seeds, birds, rain, and water. The rapid spread from one country to another is most likely due to movement of mealybugs in trade (Daane et al., 2008).

Due to their propensity to hide in protected areas (such as the undersides of leaves or in bracts) and build thick colonies, mealybugs are challenging to manage with contact insecticides. Their waxy coatings also provide further defence from chemical sprays getting on them. It is hence regarded as a "Hard to kill pest." Additionally, mealybugs spread plant viruses and cause illness by disseminating badnavirses, including PYMV, TaBV, BSV, and CSSV (Subramanian et al., 2021). Mealybug also causes transmission for the grapevine leafroll-associated virus group, also known as GLRAV-1, GLRaV-3, and GLRaV-4LV (Sharma et al., 2015). These reports indicate the power of mealybugs on detoriation of plants and reducing agricultural yield. Hence research on mealybugs would helpful to get fruitful result to manage these problem pests. Further, the need of previous research findings on mealybug is important to identify research gaps for planning future research.

The research community has shown a great deal of interest in using scientometric approaches to assess the advancement of research in a particular topical area in recent years. Researchers can obtain comprehensive details about a certain study, including citations and the majority of published authors, universities, and research center collaborations, via this report (Konur, 2011; Ghaleb et al., 2022). Additionally, scientometric analysis is required to evaluate the caliber and validity of published papers as well as other kinds of publications in the particular field of study. Analyzing the efficacy of scientists working in diverse scientific fields using scientometric indicators—such as the quantity of citations in research publications, impact factor, Hirsch index, TGCS, etc.—is highly beneficial (Akhavan et al., 2016). In the present work, scientometric data on mealybug research has been evaluated.

Data Collection

Web of Science was the database used in this scientometric analysis. Clarivate is the current owner of it. We gathered information on studies on mealybugs and prevention strategies that were published between 1996 and 2022.

Scientometric Analysis

As a preliminary stage, a scientometric analysis was performed using the "histcite software" tool from the "Web of Science" database. This software is primarily useful for organizing the records. "Author," "country," "document type," "institution name," "language," "publication year," and "subject area" were the tools that were employed.

Using the Web of Science database's "create citation report" tool, a second stage of the scientometric study was carried out. Data on the "total global citations score," "average citations per item," "sum of the times cited," and "h-index" were recorded.

Using the tool "analyze the results," the papers citing the mealybug publications were examined as the third phase in the scientometric analysis process. As in the first stage, the cited publications were analyzed, and the pertinent data was compiled in a summary form. The impact of the initial research discovered in the first phase was evaluated using the data gathered from this procedure (Konur, 2011; Sivasekaran et al., 2021).

Analysis using bibliometrics

Networks of scientific publications, journals, researchers, research organizations, nations, keywords, or concepts can be created using VOSviewer. Co-authorship, co-occurrence, citation, bibliographic coupling, and co-citation connections are some of the ways that items in these networks are connected. Reference manager files (such as RIS, EndNote, and RefWorks files) and bibliographic database files (such as Web of Science, Scopus, Dimensions, Lens, and PubMed files) can be fed into VOSviewer in order to build a network.

Mealybug is a notorious pest which is affecting all kinds of plants. It is especially polyphagous, has good adaptation, and is easy to escape from pesticides. These pests are spreading over more nations and are now a problem for farmers everywhere. Hence the present study was aimed to undertake a scientometric analysis about mealybug research to know the depth of research on mealybugs. These records were collected using the keyword ‘mealybug’. There were 1898 records released in total between 1996 and 2022.

The most publishing authors

Table 1 displays the total number of records, TGCS, h-index, and the list of authors who have published the most. Of them, Daane, K.M. University of California, USA published the most research on mealybugs with 50 papers and an h-index of 23, followed by Kaydan, M.B. (40 papers), Millar, J.G. (29 papers), Shad, S.A. and Williams, D.J. (24 papers), and Franco, J.C. (23 papers). Further these published records research proves the management of mealybugs in agricultural areas utilising behavioural modulators (Pheromones). Mealybug sex pheromones are incredibly unique, which offers an opportunity for exploitation (Franco et al., 2022). The vine mealybug (VMB), Planococcus ficus (Hemiptera: Pseudococcidae), is a key insect pest of vineyards. The majority of the publications in vine mealybug were published by the most prolific author, Daane, K.M. The research findings are mainly focusing on mating disruption in VMB using pheromone-based trap captures. The grape mealybug, Pseudococcus maritimus, and the vine mealybug, Planococcus ficus, are the most common mealybug species in vineyards in the U.S. (Corcoran, et al., 2024). They feed on vine’s trunk, canes, leaves, or berry clusters. Due to its fast multiplication, cryptic nature, temperature tolerances and high population densities, it becomes a notorious pest in California. Hence Daane, K.M. made detailed study on this pest in management aspects.

Table – 1 Details of most publishing authors and Universities

S. No.	Authors	Details of Research Institute	Records	TGCS	h-index	Total Authors
1	Daane KM	University of California, Dept. of Env. Sci. Policy & Management, USA	50	1473	23	250
2	Kaydan MB	Biotechnology Development and Research Centre, Cukurova University, Turkey.	40	264	8	158
3	Millar JG	University of California, Riverside, Dept. of Entomology, USA.	29	588	14	121
4	Shad SA	Bahauddin Zakariya University, Dept. of Entomology, Multan, Pakistan.	24	379	11	99
5	Williams DJ	Natural History Museum, Dept. of Entomology, London, England	24	165	7	53
6	Franco JC	Univ Tecn Lisboa, Ctr Estudos Florestais, Inst Super Agron, Lisbon, Portugal.	23	312	11	131
7	Zhou AM	China Agri. University, Red Imported Fire Ant Research Centre, China.	23	239	10	112
8	Gullan PJ	University of California, Dept. of Entomology, Davis, USA.	22	899	14	66
9	Hu JS	University of California, Dept. of Entomology, Davis, USA.	22	423	13	103
10	Cooper ML	University of California, Dept. of Environment & Management, Berkeley, USA.	21	549	12	131
11	Mendel Z	Agriculture Research Org, Volcani Centre, Dept. of Entomology, Bet Dagan, Israel.	21	340	11	128
12	Watson GW	California Dept. of Food & Agriculture, Plant Pest Diagnostic Centre, Sacramento, USA.	21	354	7	93
13	Afzal MBS	Bahauddin Zakariya Univ, Fac Agr Sci & Technol, Dept. of Entomology, Multan, Pakistan.	20	298	11	88
14	Cloyd RA	Purdue University, Dept. of Entomology, W Lafayette, USA	20	454	9	55
15	Miller DR	USDA ARS, Systematic Entomology Lab, BELTSVILLE, USA.	20	363	9	57
16	Tabata J	National Agriculture & Food Res. Org, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan.	20	163	9	78
17	Chong JH	Univ. of Georgia, Dept. of Entomology, Griffin, USA.	18	284	10	44
18	Malausa T	UNSA, INRA, CNRS, UMR 1301, F-06903 Sophia Antipolis, France.	18	632	8	130
19	Sether DM	Univ Hawaii, Dept Plant Pathol, Honolulu, HI 96822 USA.	18	400	13	69
20	Tena A	Ctr Protecc Vegetal & Biotecnol, Unidad Asociada Entomology, Valencia, Spain.	18	245	8	84
Total			472	8824	236	2050

Most cited author

If an author published more research articles, automatically their articles are most viewed and cited by more authors. Table 2 displays the list of the top 20 most cited authors according to Total Local Citation Score (TLCS), Total Global Citation Score (TGCS), and Average Citation per Record (ACPR). With 50 records, Daane KM ranked first among them with an overall global citation score of 1473 and an average citation per record of 29.46. Gullan PJ (22 records) with 899 TGCS and 40.86 ACPR, and Baumann P (6 records) with 901 TGCS and 150.17 ACPR came next.

Table 2 - Most cited authors

S. No	Authors	Records	TLCS	TGCS	ACPR
1	Daane KM	50	829	1473	29.46
2	Baumann P	6	119	901	150.17
3	Gullan PJ	22	414	899	40.86
4	von Dohlen CD	4	67	779	194.75
5	McCutcheon JP	7	79	732	104.57
6	Malausa T	18	117	632	35.11
7	Millar JG	29	405	588	20.28
8	Germain JF	14	90	566	40.43
9	Cooper ML	21	220	549	26.14
10	Botton M	16	95	538	33.63
11	Cloyd RA	20	83	454	22.70
12	Walton VM	11	288	454	41.27
13	Almeida RPP	17	174	449	26.41
14	Husnik F	4	46	433	108.25
15	da Silva VCP	12	9	426	35.50
16	Hu JS	22	193	423	19.23
17	Bertin A	4	22	420	105.00
18	Bernardi D	3	1	400	133.33
19	Sether DM	18	187	400	22.22
20	Neuenschwander P	14	106	393	28.07
Total		312	3544	11,909	1217.38

ACPR – Average Citation per Records

Most publishing countries on mealybugs

Further the present study was done to find out which countries published the most articles about mealybugs. The USA published the greatest number of records (531 records) with 11804 TGCS, followed by China (178 records) with 1374 TGCS and India (152 records) with 1258 TGCS, as indicated in Table -3. Daane, K.M. produced several works addressing vine mealybug (Pseudococcus maritimus). This mealybug was originally identified in California in the mid-1990s. Since then, it has proliferated across the entire state, emerging as one of the notorious pests affecting vineyards. It is found in states including Washington, New York, Canada, and California. Pseudococcus longispinus was first identified as a citrus pest in California, but Planococcus ficus (Vine mealybug) is currently the most destructive vineyard mealybug in both California and Mexico (Daane et al., 2012). Similarly, Pseudococcus maritimus is the main mealybug pest in North America that affects vineyards in the USA. It is found from California to Canada, and from Washington to New York. Planococcus ficus is currently the most destructive vineyard mealybug in California and Mexico, while Pseudococcus longispinus was initially identified as a citrus pest in California. In North America, the first attempt at mating disruption was made against Planococcus ficus (Walton et al., 2006; Miller et al., 2002).

Table – 3 Most publishing countries on mealybugs

S. No	Country	Continents	Records	TLCS	TGCS	Authors
1	USA	North America	531	3608	11804	2216
2	China	Asia	178	443	1374	1020
3	India	Asia	152	519	1258	688
4	Brazil	South America	121	345	1253	578
5	UK	Europe	111	690	2280	462
6	Pakistan	Asia	102	577	1145	494
7	Italy	Europe	93	613	1759	482
8	France	Europe	83	375	1652	466
9	South Africa	Africa	83	437	1183	276
10	Australia	Australia	79	261	1117	389
11	Japan	Asia	67	348	1143	263
12	Spain	Europe	67	337	1159	322
13	Turkey	Europe	67	215	398	241
14	Israel	Asia	51	333	896	284
15	New Zealand	Australia	45	232	626	266
16	Mexico	North America	38	37	341	198
17	Canada	North America	35	191	902	162
18	Chile	South America	33	140	250	164
19	Colombia	South America	32	65	473	162
20	Iran	Asia	32	116	182	110
Total			2000	9882	31195	9243

Most Prolific journals publication on Mealybugs

Table 4 provides information on the journals along with their corresponding publishers. Out of these top 20, there are a total of 423 journals. Each journal's publisher, number of records, TLCS, and TGCS are listed below. The table reveals that Journal of Economic Entomology ranks highest (90 records) with 571 TLCS and 1266 TGCS. Followed by Zootaxa (77 records) and Florida Entomologist (60 records). Since mealybugs are economically important pests, the most of the researchers are interested to publish their findings in the Journal of Economic Entomology, published by Entomological Society of America, USA with the IF of 2.447 as 2021. Zootaxa publishes any aspect of systematic zoology, with a preference for large taxonomic works such as monographs and reviews. There are eight species of mealybugs worldwide and a large gap found on systematic study of mealybugs.

Table – 4 Prolific journals publication on Mealybugs (423 - journals)

S. No	Name of the Journals	Publishers	Records	TLCS	TGCS
1	Journal of Economic Entomology	Entomological Society of America, USA	90	571	1266
2	Zootaxa	Magnolia Press, New Zealand	77	387	624
3	Florida Entomologist	Florida Entomological Society, USA	60	277	571
4	Biological Control	Academic Press Inc. USA	51	451	1060
5	Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata	Wiley-Blackwell Pub. Ltd., UK	44	315	833
6	Phytoparasitica	Springer, Netherlands	42	217	456
7	Biocontrol Science and Technology	Taylor & Francis, UK	38	183	320
8	Crop Protection	Elsevier BV, UK	38	303	701
9	PLoS ONE	Public Library of Science, USA	35	0	921
10	African Entomology	Entomological Society of Southern Africa, SA	33	184	418
11	Environmental Entomology	Oxford University Press, USA	32	236	461
12	Biocontrol	Springer, Netherlands	26	129	354
13	Bulletin of Entomological Research	Cambridge University Press, UK	26	336	653
14	Phytopathology	Annual Reviews Inc. USA	25	186	475
15	Plant Disease	American Phytopathological Society, USA	24	231	557
16	Insects	MDPI, Switzerland	22	0	72
17	International Journal of Tropical Insect Science	Cambridge University Press, UK	20	12	32
18	Pest Management Science	John Wiley and sons Ltd., UK	20	86	377
19	Applied Entomology and Zoology	Springer Japan, Japan	19	109	146
20	Southwestern Entomologist	Southwestern Entomological Society, USA	19	26	47

Most publishing institutions

The top 20 research institutions worldwide that publish on mealybugs are displayed in Table 5. The University of California, Riverside's Department of Entomology was found to have the highest number of publications (65 records), followed by the University of California, Berkeley's Department of Environment (45 records). These findings indicate that there is a good global distribution of research in this field across numerous research institutes and higher education institutions. In North America, most of the future mealybug research concerns GLDs, such as determining the required treatment thresholds for mealybugs in order to reduce GLRaV spread. Connected to this is the development of better monitoring programs, using synthetic sex pheromones to determine the abundance and species of mealybugs (Daane et al. 2007).

Table – 5 Institution wise publication on mealybug

S. No	Institution	Records	TLCS	TGCS
1	University of California, Riverside, Dept. of Entomology	65	647	1070
2	University of California Berkeley, Dept. of Environment Science Policy & Management	45	460	1132
3	University of California, Dept. of Entomology	27	533	998
4	Agricultural Research Organization, Volcani Centre, Israel	26	203	489
5	Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture	24	80	234
6	Bahauddin Zakariya University, Faculty of Agricultural Science & Technology, Pakistan.	24	103	287
7	Cukurova University, Imamoglu Vocat. School, Turkey	21	65	111
8	Natural History Museum, Dept. of Entomology, USA	20	120	171
9	Huazhong Agricultural University, Collection of Plant Science & Technology, China	18	54	161
10	New Zealand Institute of Plant & Food Research Ltd	18	106	305
11	Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Facultad de Agronomía e Ingeniería Forestal, Chile	17	92	155
12	Institute of Plant Protection, Chinese Academy of Agriculture Science, China	16	33	97
13	California Department of Food and Agriculture, Plant Pest Diagnostic Centre, California	15	25	71
14	Agriculture Research Centre, Plant Protection Research Institute, Egypt	14	11	63
15	Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Science, Institute of Plant Protect & Microbiology, China	14	33	128
16	Zhejiang University, Institute of Insect Science, China	14	27	119
17	Kansas State University, Dept. of Entomology, USA	13	32	316
18	University of California, Davis, Dept. of Plant Pathology, USA	13	129	426
19	Punjab Agricultural University, Dept. of Entomology, India	12	44	61
20	South China Agricultural University, Red imported fire ant research Centre, China	12	48	103

Funding agencies to support mealybug researches

The top 20 funding agencies supporting mealybug researches are listed in the table 6. The National Natural Science Foundation of China, which supports basic research, nurtures talent for research, fosters international cooperation, and promotes socioeconomic development, ranked first with the most records—85. The European Commission, which is based in Europe, came in second with 49 records, and the United States Department of Agriculture, USA, came in third with 47 records.

Conferences held in the name of publications of mealybugs

Two records on the topic of mealybug were presented at the 13^th and 14^th International Symposium on Scale Insect Studies in Sofia, Bulgaria in 2013 and in Catania, Italy in 2016. Table-8 lists the research areas with the number of published records; of the 1898 total records, the maximum number of publications is from Entomology with 924 records, followed by Agriculture (320 records), Plant sciences (180 records), and Zoology (170 records). Table-7 lists the conferences held in the name of mealybug research along with their corresponding locations.

Table – 7 Conferences held in the name of publications of mealybugs

S. No	Name of the conferences	Records	Location
1	13^th International Symposium on Scale Insect Studies	2	Sofia, Bulgaria, 2013
2	14^th International Symposium on Scale Insect Studies	2	Catania, Italy, 2016
3	9^th International Symposium on Insect Plant Relationships	2	Gwatt, Switzerland, June 24-30, 1995
4	100^th Annual Meeting of the American Phytopathological Society	1	Minneapolis, MN, USA, Jul 26-30,2008
5	13^th International Plant Virus Epidemiology Symposium	1	Avignon, FRANCE JUN 06-10, 2016
6	225^th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society	1	New Orleans, LA MAR 23-27, 2003
7	230^th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society	1	Washington, DC AUG 28-SEP 01, 2005
8	241^st National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society	1	Anaheim, CA MAR 27-31, 2011
9	244^th National Fall Meeting of the American Chemical Society	1	Philadelphia, PA AUG 19-23, 2012
10	27^th Conference of the International Association of Agricultural Economists	1	Beijing, PEOPLES R CHINA AUG 16-22, 2009
11	29^th Congress of the International Society of Sugarcane Technologists	1	Chiang Mai, THAILAND DEC 05-08, 2016
12	5^th International Conference on Drosophila Heterochromatin	1	CORTONA, ITALY JUN 18-22, 2001
13	5^th International Conference on Serpentine Ecology	1	Siena, ITALY MAY 09-13, 2006
14	91^st Annual Congress of the Quebec Society for the Protection of Plants	1	ST JEAN RICHELIEU, CANADA JUN09, 1999
15	Annual Meeting of the American Phytopathological Society	1	Sacramento, CA JUN 27-29, 2012

Published records on Research areas in Mealybug

Table-8 shows the list of research areas with number of published records. Out of 1898 total records, maximum number of publications is from Entomology with 924 records followed by Agriculture (320 records), Plant sciences (180 records) and Zoology (170 records). Almost all the aspects of mealybug researches are going on specifically analysing diversity, effects on agricultural productivity, vector for spreading viral diseases in plants, control measures, etc.,

Table – 8 Research Areas

S. No	Research Areas	Records
1	Entomology	924
2	Agriculture	320
3	Plant Sciences	180
4	Zoology	170
5	Environmental Sciences Ecology	150
6	Biotechnology Applied Microbiology	133
7	Science Technology Other Topics	86
8	Biochemistry Molecular Biology	83
9	Genetics Heredity	69
10	Chemistry	64
11	Food Science Technology	63
12	Evolutionary Biology	45
13	Life Sciences Biomedicine Other Topics	44
14	Virology	42
15	Microbiology	36
16	Biodiversity Conservation	32
17	Cell Biology	15
18	Forestry	10
19	Pharmacology Pharmacy	9
20	Physiology	9

Language of publications on mealybug

The table-9 shows the main type of communication was English with maximum number of publications (1845 records). Other than English language, mealybug records published on Spanish (18 records), Portuguese (13 records), French (9 records), Japanese (8 records), Turkish (3 records) and German (2 records) languages.

Table – 9 Language of publications on mealybug

S. No	Languages	Records	TLCS	TGCS
1	English	1845	8657	27673
2	Spanish	18	12	38
3	Portuguese	13	30	82
4	French	9	5	22
5	Japanese	8	49	55
6	Turkish	3	4	6
7	German	2	1	2
	Total	1898	8758	27878

Document Types

Using the keyword ‘mealybug’, 1898 references were found in total. This table shows that the distribution of references by the type of document. Among these majority of the document published was articles with 1705 number of records followed by 90 reviews, 27 meeting abstracts and 23 editorial materials.

Table – 10 Types of documents publication on mealy bugs

S. No	Documents	Records	TLCS	TGCS
1	Articles	1705	8174	23452
2	Reviews	90	423	3338
3	Meeting Abstracts	27	5	8
4	Editorial Materials	23	43	128
5	Article; Proceedings Papers	14	56	174
6	Article; Early Access	13	0	1
7	Corrections	12	1	4
8	Letters	5	10	17
9	Review; Book Chapters	4	45	753
10	News Items	2	1	3
11	Biographical-Item	1	0	0
12	Correction, Addition	1	0	0
13	Editorial Material; Early Access	1	0	0
	Total	1898	8758	27878

Vos-viewer

VOS viewer is a software tool for constructing and visualizing bibliometric networks. These networks include journals, researchers, or individual publications, and they can be constructed based on citation, bibliographic coupling, co-citation, or co-authorship relations. VOS viewer also offers text mining functionality that can be used to construct and visualize co-occurrence networks of important terms extracted from a body of scientific literature. Here, bibliographic coupling of authors, organization and countries are given below.

Bibliographic coupling of Authors

There are 6 clusters of authors and co-authors formed in 216 items. The first cluster of Red colour have 51 authors, followed by the clusters indicates Green colour (48), Dark blue colour (46), Yellow colour (44), Violet colour (17) and Light blue colour (10) (Fig.1).

Bibliographic coupling of Organization

There are six clusters of bibliographic coupling of organization formed in 180 items. The first cluster of Red colour have 65 organizations, followed by the clusters indicate Dark blue colour (30), Green colour (28), Yellow colour (26), Violet colour (17) and light blue colour (14) (Fig.2).

Bibliographic coupling of countries

There are 6 clusters of bibliographic coupling of countries in 59 countries. The first cluster of Red colour have 21 organizations, followed by the clusters indicates Dark blue colour (13), Green colour (11), Yellow colour (9), Viloet colour (3) and Light blue colour (2) (Fig.3).

Outcomes of this study relating to the scientometric study of the research on ‘mealybug’ published and indexed in many fronts including the document type, authors with most citation, most publishing countries, journals, research areas and language of publications. The results moreover provided valuable evidence on the citations made to the papers on the ‘mealybug’ including, Total Local Citation Score, Total Global Citation Score and H-index. These data show the intensive research work is going on regarding “mealybugs”. In India, this pest is now becoming a most notorious pest in agriculture, causing severe loss to farmers. Hence undertaking more research on mealybug, and its control measure would pave the way to manage their pest for saving farmers from severe loss.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The authors acknowledge the Principal and the Management of Ayya Nadar Janaki Ammal College (Autonomous), Sivakasi for financial support under the Ayya Nadar Janaki Ammal Research Fund and research facilities provided to complete our work.

AUTHORS DECLARATION

The authors declare no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.

AUTHORS CONTRIBUTION

Conceptualization: (all authors), Methodology: (all authors), Formal analysis and Investigation: (K. Sivasekaran), Writing – original draft preparation: (T.Poornakala); Writing- review and editing: (P.Ponmanickam)

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Table 6 is not available with this version

A Scientometric Analysis of Research on Mealybugs and Its Control Measures

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Abstract

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INTRODUCTION

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Data Collection

Scientometric Analysis

Analysis using bibliometrics

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

CONCLUSION

Declarations

References

Table

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