Mapping Research on Microbial Fuel Cells in Wastewater Treatment: A Co-Citation Analysis

Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) are promising technologies, aiming at treating different types of industrial and domestic wastewater. In recent years, more and more publications focusing on wastewater treatment have been published. Based on the retrieval of publications from Web of Science Core Collection database, the new emerging trends of microbial fuel cells in wastewater treatment was evaluated with a scientometric analysis method from 1995 to 2020. All publications downloaded from (WOS) were screened by inclusion criteria, and 2233 publications were obtained for further analysis. Document co-citation and burst detection of MFCs in wastewater treatment were analyzed and visualized by software of CiteSpace. Our study indicated that “Environmental Science” is the most popular discipline, while the journal of Bioresource Technology published the greatest quantity of articles in the field of MFCs applied wastewater treatment. China and the Chinese Academy of Science are the most productive country and institution, respectively. “Azo dye” has become the new research topic, which indicates the application area and the development of MFCs. The performance of MFCs for wastewater treatment has been widely discussed. The findings of this study may ameliorate the researcher in seizing the frontier of MFCs in wastewater treatment.