Which were the most cited research reagents in the life sciences? (2024 update)

5

Min Read

In this blog:

  • Which were the most cited antibodies, cell lines, growth factors, bioactive small molecules and life science assay kits of 2023?
  • Which companies are supplying popular products?
  • What trends in research use can we see from this data?

At CiteAb, we use AI-driven data collection technology to amalgamate information from publications and vendors in order to understand product use and life science reagent market trends. 


We have just wrapped up our 2024 series on the ‘top 100 cited products’! This series covered five different research reagent types, uncovering the most used products in academic publications in 2023. 

Today, we give you a summary of the key trends we’ve picked up on during our analysis. If you’re interested in learning more about life science market leaders and changes in research reagent use, read on!

Plus, at the bottom of this blog you can download data on the top 20 antibodies, cell lines, assay kits, bioactive small molecules and growth factors.


Summarised: Most cited research products in the life science reagent market

Most cited reagent in 2023 across five reagent types

Below, we give you a quick overview of each analysis carried out in this series. We also share a link to the full dataset if you’d like to learn more and download the full top 100.

2023 RUO Antibody Market Trends: 

Download data on the top 100 cited RUO antibodies
  • 12 antibody vendors featured with products in the top 100
  • Cell Signaling Technology, Thermo Fisher Scientific and Abcam led
  • Seven new antibodies appeared in the top 100 
  • More secondary antibodies were cited and a quarter of the list were recombinant antibodies

Download the top 100 antibody dataset here.

2023 Life Science Assay Kit Market Trends:

Download data on the top 100 cited life science assay kits
  • 18 different companies featured with products in the top 100
  • Thermo Scientific, Promega and Beyotime Biotechnology led
  • Cell Proliferation and Viability, Nucleic acid Synthesis and Amplification kits garnered the most citations from researchers
  • R&D Systems supplied the most ELISA kits in the top 100

Download the top 100 assay kit dataset here.

2023 Cytokines and Growth Factors Market Trends: 

Download data on the top 100 growth factors
  • 11 different companies featured with products in the top 100
  • PeproTech, R&D Systems and Millipore Sigma topped the list
  • EGF and FGF products were widely cited by researchers

Download the top 100 growth factor dataset here.

2023 Bioactive Small Molecules Market Trends:

Download data on the top 100 cited bioactive small molecules
  • 10 different companies supplied products in the top 100
  • MilliporeSigma dominated the top 100, with Selleck Chemicals also featuring prominently
  • Thermo Fisher Scientific and MedChemExpress saw impressive growth
  • More cocktails appeared in the list, with 21 featuring in total

Download the top 100 bioactive small molecules here.

2023 Cell Line Market Trends:

Download data on the top 100 cited cell lines
  • The top three cell lines in the top 100 all grew in popularity: HEK293T, HeLa and HEK293
  • The Vero cell line saw a dip in popularity
  • Five new cell lines entered the top 100

Download data on the top 100 cell lines here.


Trends across all five markets

When we analysed these datasets, we found a number of common threads between the individual reagent markets.

Firstly, we noted that Thermo Fisher Scientific and MilliporeSigma fared well, demonstrating broad support for researchers across multiple product groups. They appeared in the top 100 list for bioactive small molecules, growth factors, life science assay kits and antibodies. 

We also saw a number of companies growing their citation counts significantly in different reagent markets. 

  • MedChemExpress and Thermo Fisher Scientific in the bioactive small molecule market
  • Abclonal, Proteintech and Beyotime Biotechnology in the antibody market
  • Illumina, BD Biosciences, Qiagen and R&D Systems in the assay kits market 
  • MedChemExpress, Novoprotein and Sino Biological in the growth factor market

Across all the datasets, we commented on new products entering the top 100. This goes to show that these markets are far from static, and that research needs are contantly evolving. It remains important to keep tracking these market trends for those in the industry!

Finally, we noticed that, even thought many new products are entering the top 100 list, the leading products broadly remained unchanged year on year. This demonstrates that they are well established research tools, trusted widely amongst the scientific community. 


Wrap up and life science reagent data download

We hope you’ve found the top 100 product series for 2024 interesting and insightful. We always enjoy diving into our data to produce this analysis, and taking a look back on how markets have changed.

You can download an exclusive dataset below detailing the top 20 products for each reagent type in our database to perform your own analysis on!  

Understanding how reagents are being used can help you to spot opportunities in your own portfolio, identify research needs and get a better grasp on markets of interest.  

If you’d like to learn more about how you can use this data to transform your product development projects, marketing & sales efforts, and perform more accurate market research, get in touch with the team here. 

We offer a variety of data packages to suit suppliers of all sizes, including a structured Market Insights report, custom datasets, and full database subscriptions.

And finally, if there’s a reagent type you’d like to see in next years top 100 product analysis – let us know! 

  • Rhys and the CiteAb team

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