Biochar application to soil under arid conditions: a bibliometric study of research status and trends

Abstract

Global scientific interest in biochar application to soils has dramatically increased in recent years. Nevertheless, most of the papers related to biochar impact on soil properties and functions were published under tropical and temperate regions, while the number of studies conducted on soils evolving in arid conditions is relatively limited. Against this backdrop, the present study aims to apply a bibliometric approach in order to analyze the research trends in the field of biochar application to soil under arid conditions over the period 2000–2017. Our analysis based on the WoS database, yielded in 53 articles, and revealed that scientific research on biochar-amended soils under arid conditions is a relatively recent field of research which started less than a decade ago. Although the number of publications has grown over the years, scientific production is still limited and evolves much slower than the one under humid environments. China, Iran, and USA are the leading research production in this field totalizing together over 50% of the total scientific production. In addition to Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt are the only MENA countries in the top 10 most productive countries contributing respectively to c.a. 10 and 5% of the total number of publications. The main topics addressed in the scientific literature under arid environments are related to soil fertility and productivity followed by greenhouse gas emissions and carbon sequestration in biochar-amended soils.