Exploring Global Research Trends in Mangrove Ecosystems: A Bibliometric Analysis of Key Issues and Future Directions (1996–2022)

Amid escalating global climate change and environmental degradation, mangrove ecosystems face challenges like rapid biodiversity loss, intensified human activities, invasive alien species, and recurrent natural disasters. This highlights the urgent necessity for more research and informed conservation strategies. Our study meets this need by using advanced bibliometric techniques to analyze mangrove research trends, evolution, and gaps from 1996 to 2022. It aims to bridge the knowledge gap by providing a comprehensive understanding of mangrove research dynamics, interdisciplinary integration, geographical distribution, and future research priorities. The study presents a thorough analysis of over 14,534 multidisciplinary scientific publications covering ecology, forestry, oceanography, and environmental management. Our findings, based on both quantitative and qualitative methods, show that: (1) The 26-year mangrove research is split into two phases: 1996–2008 as the initial exploration stage and 2009–2022 as the significant leap stage.in. The literature volume surged, especially in 2009 when the article count leaped from 32 to 543, signaling the start of rapid growth in mangrove research; (2) These studies reflect interdisciplinary integration, drawing from environmental science, marine/freshwater biology, ecology, oceanography, plant science, and molecular biology, with a particular emphasis on marine and freshwater biology, environmental science, and ecology; (3) China and the US lead, with 3,246 and 2,671 publications, making up 22.33% and 18.38%, respectively. India is third with 1719 publications (11.83%). Brazil, Australia, Germany, and others follow closely, jointly expanding mangrove research and deepening understanding of conservation management; (4) Current mangrove research centers on key areas like conservation, management, and restoration, climate adaptation, biodiversity, sediment analysis, and blue carbon assessment. In the future, we need to bolster mangrove research, focusing on climate change response, carbon cycle mechanisms, and exploring more potential emerging blue carbon. Socially, blue carbon management should be enhanced, along with mathematical modeling and prediction capabilities. Interdisciplinary and international collaborations must be deepened. This study combines traditional bibliometric review with modern visual analysis tools to conduct metrics-perspective network metrics, clustering, and visualization of the mangrove literature, showing its novelty. It offers the latest, in-depth insights, serving as a valuable reference for scholars, managers, and governments, facilitating sustainable management and advancing Nature-based Solutions.