A global trend of fenton-based AOPs focused on wastewater treatment: A bibliometric and visualization analysis

Abstract

This study sought to detect the global characteristics and developments of Fenton-based advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) focused on wastewater treatment. Using bibliometric and visualization analysis via VOSviwer, CiteSpace, and HistCite software, it investigated and analyzed different aspects, including growth trends, country, journal, category, and keyword analysis, as well as citation-burst detection of references to 5,940 records ranging from 1990 to 2019 in the Web of Science Core Collection. It was concluded that wastewaters in the textile industries, pharmaceutical industries, phenol compounds, and landfill leachates were currently and would continue to be the most focused industrial effluents that can be treated efficiently by applying Fenton-based AOPs. The study also conducted an in-depth analysis based on four clusters through the 100 most-occurring keywords, containing textile wastewater, catalyst, photo-Fenton, and electro-Fenton, identifying the four most studied research topics of Fenton-based AOPs. Studies about innovative (nano) catalysts, electrocatalytic, and photocatalytic materials can provide new degradation possibilities and overcome the Fenton process’s drawbacks. The results of this bibliometric analysis can be helpful information for researchers and industry practitioners.