The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic aroused global public concern and became a major medical issue. This study aims to investigate the global research routine and trends of coronavirus over the last twenty years based on the production, hotspots, and frontiers of published articles as well as to provide the global health system with a bibliometric reference. The Web of Science core collection database was retrieved for coronavirus articles published from 1 January 2000 to 17 March 2020. Duplicates and discrete papers were excluded. Analysis parameters including time, regions, impact factors, and citation times were processed through professional software. A total of 9043 coronavirus articles originated from 123 countries and were published in 1202 journals. The USA contributed most articles (3101) followed by China (2230). The research was published in specialized journals including the Journal of Virology. Universities were the main institutions of science progress. High-impact articles covered fields of basic science and clinical medicine. There were two sharp increases in research yields after the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) outbreaks. International collaborations promoted study progress, and universities and academies act as the main force in coronavirus research. More research on prevention and treatment is needed according to an analysis of term density.
Keywords: COVID-19; MERS; SARS; SARS-CoV-2; bibliometrics; coronavirus.