Gaps in marine turtle research: a 32-year review

Sea turtles are a charismatic group of marine reptiles that are globally distributed, occupy unique ecological niches, and exhibit intra-specific variations in population sizes, reproduction, and morphology. Furthermore, the group is of great interest to conservation, since all seven species are under some threat category at the IUCN Red List. The present study conducted a bibliometric review using The Web of Science© database and the Marine Turtle Newsletter publications to do a gap analysis on marine turtle research over the past 32 years. The selected publications were classified and analyzed in several categories in order to understand the trends and gaps in the field of marine turtle research. Our results showed that the number of publications grew significantly across the decades, but species are not being studied equally. This difference leads us to focus our further analysis on the three less studied species, which showed promising new areas of research. We also discussed why the publications are highly concentrated in developed countries, and possible solutions, which can help developing countries to increase their research profile, since these countries host most sea turtle nesting sites. Finally, we suggested ways to fill other gaps currently present in marine turtle research. Keywords: bibliometric analysis, conservation, sea turtle, Testudines.海龟是一类极具魅力的海洋爬行动物类群，在全球范围内均有分布，占据独特的生态位，且在种群规模、繁殖特征与形态学性状上存在种内变异。由于全部7个海龟物种均被列入《国际自然保护联盟红色名录（IUCN Red List）》的受威胁等级范畴，该类群也是保护研究领域的重点关注对象。本研究依托Web of Science©数据库与《海龟通讯（Marine Turtle Newsletter）》期刊文献，针对过去32年间的海龟研究开展文献计量综述，以进行研究空白分析。研究团队对筛选出的文献进行多维度分类与分析，以期厘清海龟研究领域的发展趋势与现存研究缺口。结果显示，数十年来相关文献发表量呈显著增长态势，但不同海龟物种的研究关注度并不均衡。鉴于这一研究失衡现象，我们将后续分析聚焦于3种研究关注度较低的海龟物种，并从中发现了颇具潜力的全新研究方向。本研究还探讨了相关文献高度集中于发达国家的成因，并提出了可行的解决方案——鉴于绝大多数海龟筑巢栖息地均位于发展中国家，这些方案可助力发展中国家提升自身的研究影响力。最后，本研究提出了填补当前海龟研究领域其他现存空白的具体路径。 关键词：文献计量分析，保护生物学，海龟，龟鳖目（Testudines）