Characteristics and trends of ocean turbulent mixing models research in 1990–2023 based on bibliometric analysis

Ocean turbulent mixing models (OTMMs) have become a popular research topic in recent years, and numerous related research papers have been published. Here, a bibliometric method was utilized to analyze 8411 papers from the Web of Science published from 1990 to 2023 and provide a comprehensive overview based on metrics, including the total publications, countries, institutions, journals, authors, keywords, and subject categories. The results revealed the following. (1) The number of published papers increased gradually, with the USA and China being the main research countries. However, citations per paper in China only accounted for 17.6 %, indicating that there is considerable room for improvement. Seven institutions with a citation per paper rate exceeding 50 % were from the USA, indicating its absolute authority and influence in this field. (2) Astrophysical Journal, Astronomy & Astrophysics, and Geophysical Research Letters were the core journals; Qiao Fangli, Xue Ming, and Madec Gurvan were the most representative authors; Model, turbulence, and circulation were the most frequent keywords; and Oceanography, Meteorology Atmospheric Sciences, and Environmental Sciences were the most important subject categories over the past 30 years. (3) OTMMs have evolved from simplified models to ultra-high degree-of-freedom numerical models with a faster operation speed, higher spatiotemporal resolution and more complete physical processes. Therefore, decreasing the bias of OTMMs in simulating the upper ocean is an international scientific frontier and long-term technical challenge for ocean and climate prediction. This is the first comprehensive visualization and analysis of this research hotspot and its trends.