As of 2026-09-11 · the last 10 years
Research intensity has climbed steadily to about 95% of the element's all-time peak, a level that has not been reached since 1974.
Research intensity ran from about 86% of the element's own all-time peak in 2016 to about 95% in 2026 — a steady climb, and the all-time peak (1974) lies before this window. Over the same span its share of research attention across all elements rose. Among the 118 elements, gallium has a larger-than-average research literature.
The number of papers involving the element rose from about 49,915 in 2016 to about 170,059 in 2025 (3.41x). That is faster than the literature as a whole grew over the same years, so the element gained ground in the wider body of research.
The dominant research community is Wide-Bandgap Semiconductors for Power Electronics and Ultraviolet Optoelectronics, where gallium is central to the work, appearing in about 66% of the community's papers. This group focuses on power devices, Schottky barriers, and light-emitting diodes, with gallium nitride and gallium oxide playing key roles. It accounts for about 55% of gallium's recent research, a share that has remained steady over the last decade. A 2018 review of Ga2O3 materials, processing, and devices, cited over 3,100 times, anchors this field, alongside a 2023 text on Principles of Power Electronics, cited over 1,300 times.
A second significant area is Gallium in CIGS and GaAs Thin-Film Photovoltaics, a subcommunity within broader solar cell engineering. Here, gallium is a minor presence in a much larger community, involved in about 9% of its papers. The work centers on copper indium gallium selenide and gallium arsenide absorber layers, buffer optimization, and tandem cell efficiency. This community represents about 5% of gallium's recent research, a share that has held steady. A 2024 study in Nature Energy on high-concentration silver alloying and gallium grading in CIGS cells, cited over 410 times, highlights recent progress in this niche.
A smaller, distinct cluster involves work on liquid metals, gallium nitrate, and gallium(III) compounds. This community, which accounts for about 4% of recent research, remains steady in share. It includes research on stretchable and soft electronics using liquid metals, with a 2017 paper in Advanced Materials cited over 1,700 times serving as a key reference.
Overall, the composition of gallium research has remained remarkably stable, with the wide-bandgap semiconductor community maintaining its lead and the photovoltaic and liquid metal niches holding their respective shares. The remainder of the literature, comprising about 35% of recent work, is distributed across other smaller communities.
For a deeper look at the current state of gallium research, see the Last 12 Months and Executive Brief reports.
What changed in the past year: new papers, shifting applications, emerging collaborators. See the momentum over a shorter window than the decade view.
Personal →See recent trends — Personal.
A by-topic status read of what changed and what's new — built for decision-makers, not search engines. Citation clusters, emerging applications, and the papers that matter most.
Professional →See the executive read — Professional.
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Showing Gallium's three strongest connections. Personal opens the slider and the whole 118-element graph.