Global trends in phage-derived depolymerase research for anti-infective applications: a bibliometric analysis

Phage-derived depolymerases, primarily located in phage tail fiber and tail spike proteins, have emerged as promising antibacterial and antivirulence agents capable of degrading bacterial surface polysaccharides and thereby combating multidrug-resistant bacterial infections. Despite the growing volume of publications in this interdisciplinary domain, a systematic bibliometric synthesis of the global research landscape remains absent.

Publications indexed from 2010 to 2025 were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection (WOSCC) and Scopus on April 26, 2026. After deduplication and relevance screening, 326 records were retained. Bibliometric analyses and visualizations were performed using R with the bibliometrix package, VOSviewer and CiteSpace.

Annual publication output increased from 3 records in 2010 to 51 in 2025 and fitted an exponential growth model, indicating sustained expansion of the field. China and the United States were the most productive countries/regions, whereas Belgium and Poland showed the highest citation impact among leading contributors. The University of Wrocław and the Russian Academy of Sciences emerged as prominent institutional hubs. Keyword co-occurrence analysis identified three major thematic directions: phage discovery and genomic characterization, antibacterial and antibiofilm applications, and mechanistic or structural studies of depolymerase activity, with Klebsiella pneumoniae being the most frequently studied bacterial target.

This bibliometric analysis systematically maps the 16-year landscape of phage depolymerase-enabled anti-infective research, delineating the leading forces and thematic evolution that have shaped the field. These trends highlight promising avenues for mechanistic studies on the structural basis of depolymerase substrate specificity and preclinical research on formulation, safety, and manufacturing, supporting the translational development of depolymerase-related anti-infectives.