Unveiling the anticancer potential of mangroves: A 2005−2024 bibliometric analysis

Context: Demographic forecasts suggest that new cancer cases may reach 35 million by 2050, underscoring the need for innovative, regionally tailored control strategies. Mangroves have yielded multiple potential anticancer compounds in recent years; however, no bibliometric investigation of their role has been conducted. Aims: To provide a bibliometric overview of research on anticancer activity from mangroves. Methods: Keywords related to anticancer activity and mangroves to search the Scopus database were used. VOSviewer and Biblioshiny were used for further analysis. Results: Eighty-seven studies on cancer-associated mangroves were identified, with an annual growth rate of 9.89%. Publications have increased since 2005, reaching a peak in 2020. The top five countries and organizations in productivity were China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand. The top five affiliations were Guangdong Medical University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Sun Yat-Sen University, Wuhan University, and Guangdong University of Technology. Wu X, Liu J, Basyuni M, and Tang X were the most prolific authors. Five primary study themes emerged: antineoplastic activity, mangroves, apoptosis, cell proliferation, and protein expression. Conclusions: Recent results indicate a growing interest in the anticancer potential of mangrove bioactive chemicals, which regulate multiple protein expression signaling pathways. This increase in study emphasizes the significance of mangrove bioactive compounds in cancer research.