Research hotspots and frontiers in agricultural multispectral technology: Bibliometrics and scientometrics analysis of the Web of Science

Yali Zhang; Dehua Zhao; Hanchao Liu; Xinrong Huang; Jizhong Deng; Ruichang Jia; Xiaoping He; Muhammad Naveed Tahir; Yubin Lan

doi:10.3389/fpls.2022.955340

Research hotspots and frontiers in agricultural multispectral technology: Bibliometrics and scientometrics analysis of the Web of Science

Front Plant Sci. 2022 Aug 11:13:955340. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2022.955340. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Yali Zhang^{1

2}, Dehua Zhao^{1

2}, Hanchao Liu^{1

2}, Xinrong Huang^{1

2}, Jizhong Deng^{1

2}, Ruichang Jia^{1

2}, Xiaoping He³, Muhammad Naveed Tahir⁴, Yubin Lan^{2

5}

Affiliations

¹ College of Engineering, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, China.
² National Center for International Collaboration Research on Precision Agricultural Aviation Pesticide Spraying Technology, Guangzhou, China.
³ Department of Information Consulting, Library, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, China.
⁴ Department of Agronomy, Pir Mehr Ali Shah-Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan.
⁵ College of Electronic Engineering and College of Artificial Intelligence, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, China.

Abstract

Multispectral technology has a wide range of applications in agriculture. By obtaining spectral information during crop production, key information such as growth, pests and diseases, fertilizer and pesticide application can be determined quickly, accurately and efficiently. The scientific analysis based on Web of Science aims to understand the research hotspots and areas of interest in the field of agricultural multispectral technology. The publications related to agricultural multispectral research in agriculture between 2002 and 2021 were selected as the research objects. The softwares of CiteSpace, VOSviewer, and Microsoft Excel were used to provide a comprehensive review of agricultural multispectral research in terms of research areas, institutions, influential journals, and core authors. Results of the analysis show that the number of publications increased each year, with the largest increase in 2019. Remote sensing, imaging technology, environmental science, and ecology are the most popular research directions. The journal Remote Sensing is one of the most popular publishers, showing a high publishing potential in multispectral research in agriculture. The institution with the most research literature and citations is the USDA. In terms of the number of papers, Mtanga is the author with the most published articles in recent years. Through keyword co-citation analysis, it is determined that the main research areas of this topic focus on remote sensing, crop classification, plant phenotypes and other research areas. The literature co-citation analysis indicates that the main research directions concentrate in vegetation index, satellite remote sensing applications and machine learning modeling. There is still a lot of room for development of multi-spectrum technology. Further development can be carried out in the areas of multi-device synergy, spectral fusion, airborne equipment improvement, and real-time image processing technology, which will cooperate with each other to further play the role of multi-spectrum in agriculture and promote the development of agriculture.

Keywords: CiteSpace; NDVI; Web of Science; agriculture; multispectral; remote sensing.