Characteristics and trends in global tea research: a Science Citation Index Expanded-based analysis

A bibliometric approach to assess trends in global tea research using literature in the Science Citation Index Expanded database from 1991 to 2014 has been conducted. Articles were analysed by scientific output and research performances of countries and institutions. The distribution of keywords in the articles' titles, author-supplied keywords and KeyWords Plus as well as citation and publication trends of tea-related articles was used to evaluate the research trends. The research output devoted to tea science increased greatly after the year 2002 indicating a paradigm shift that demonstrated that researchers became increasingly keen on biochemical relevance of active compounds in tea in mitigating emergent health challenges over classical tea research.