Research trends and hotspots of nanomaterials in Alzheimer's disease: bibliometric analysis

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder with limited clinical treatment options. Nanoparticle technology offers promising new strategies for innovative diagnosis and therapy of AD. However, the rapid development of this field has not been accompanied by a systematic bibliometric analysis. This study applies bibliometric methods to comprehensively evaluate the development trends and prospects of nanoparticle applications in AD research.

Publications related to nanomaterials in AD were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection. Visualization and analysis were conducted using VOSviewer, CiteSpace, and the Bibliometrix package in R to identify research hotspots in the field.

A total of 2837 publications were included, involving 92 countries/regions, 2953 institutions, and 13,294 authors. China, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Xiao-Gang Qu were the most productive country, institution, and author, respectively. The Journal of Controlled Release was the most influential. Among them, Saraiva et al. (J Control Release 235:34-47, 2016) ranked first with 1069 citations, and their research highlights the great potential of nanoparticle drug delivery technology to cross the blood-brain barrier. Emerging keyword trends indicate a shift in research focus toward nasal delivery, extracellular vesicles, graphene quantum dots for diagnostics, and nanostructured lipid carriers for therapy.

Nanomaterial-based AD research is expanding rapidly. Current focus involves developing targeted nanoparticle systems to overcome the blood-brain barrier, mitigate Aβ pathology, and enable early diagnosis. Future work should prioritize mechanistic studies and clinical trials to translate potential into practical applications.