Abstract
Onychophorans are worms of Cambrian origin that have unclear relationships with annelids, tardigrades and arthropods; they have their own phylum and are remarkable for capturing their prey with an adhesive net that forms in a fraction of a second, and for having species in which the young are fed through a placenta. There is no quantitative review of any trends in their study, so the purpose of this article is to review 150 years of onychophorology using bibliometric tools. We used the database Scopus, for the period 1876 through 2021, identified 538 valid articles about these worms, and analyzed them with the software VOSviewer, to identify countries, subjects and historical trends, as well as which fields need strengthening to understand and protect them. We found that, when corrected for country population size, the most productive countries are Sweden, Australia and Costa Rica; but by raw numbers, USA, Germany, and the UK have the most articles and citations in Scopus. Most work has been done on their Cambrian origin and phylogenetic relationships with other invertebrates; their geographic distribution; and their embryological development. Conservation, ecology and behavior have been neglected and offer the best chance for innovation. Some low-income countries are rich in onychophoran species and have the greatest urgency of conserving them, but lack the resources for this, opening opportunities for international collaboration.
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We thank Carolina Seas for her assistance with the manuscript.
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Guerrero-Casado, J., Monge-Nájera, J. Bibliometrics of velvet worm (Onychophora) research: geographic and historical trends over 150 years, and recommendations for future work. Biologia 78, 109–117 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11756-022-01221-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11756-022-01221-5
Keywords
- Scientometrics
- Study of Onychophora
- Scientific relationships among countries
- Historical trends in science
- Peripatus