Wild Boar Meat Quality Research Maps Its Path From Genetics to Nutrition

Wild boar meat has quietly become one of the most intriguing stories in modern food science, and a new global analysis of the research field reveals just how dramatically the science has evolved. In a comprehensive bibliometric study published in Food Science of Animal Resources, researchers mapped 423 scientific articles indexed in the Web of Science Core Collection, tracing more than six decades of work on the meat quality of Sus scrofa, the wild ancestor of the domestic pig. The results show a discipline that began as scattered, descriptive observations in the late 1950s and has matured into a sophisticated, internationally connected enterprise sitting at the intersection of animal genetics, meat science, and human nutrition.

The research team, led by Le Pham Tan Quoc of the Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City together with collaborators in Vietnam and Hungary, used RStudio with the Bibliometrix package and its Biblioshiny interface, complemented by VOSviewer for network visualization. Their search strategy combined the terms wild boar or Sus scrofa with meat quality, carcass traits, fatty acid, or nutritional composition, and after filtering to original research articles only, the team retained 423 publications for analysis. By applying performance indicators, co-authorship networks, keyword co-occurrence mapping, Multiple Correspondence Analysis, and thematic evolution analysis, the study addressed six core research questions covering publication growth, influential contributors, collaboration patterns, citation impact, dominant themes, and emerging trends.

The historical picture that emerges is striking. The first recorded publication appeared in 1959, but output remained sparse and sporadic through the 1960s and 1980s, when wild boar meat was treated largely as a side topic within wildlife and ecological research. From the mid-1990s, publication numbers began to climb as interest in alternative protein sources grew, and by 2003 the field recorded 18 papers in a single year, marking a transition toward systematic study. Advances in biochemical analytical methods, particularly for determining fatty acid composition, helped drive this shift, alongside rising consumer appetite for game meat as a natural, organic protein source and growing concerns about the environmental footprint of conventional livestock production.

Between 2006 and 2014, the field entered a phase of strong and relatively stable growth, with several years exceeding 20 publications. During this period, studies increasingly focused on the nutritional value, fatty acid profiles, and potential health benefits of wild boar meat compared with commercial pork. The expansion of wild boar populations across Europe also played a role, as wildlife managers sought productive uses for animals that increasingly required population control. From 2015 to 2024, output fluctuated but remained high, with research expanding into sensory quality evaluation, food safety, and the effects of hunting season, geographic region, and semi-wild production systems on meat characteristics.

Compared with intensively farmed pigs, wild boar meat generally shows lower fat content, firmer muscle structure, and higher protein levels. Its fatty acid profile contains higher proportions of polyunsaturated fatty acids, particularly omega-3 and omega-6 varieties, depending on natural feeding conditions and habitat. Quality assessment relies on indicators including pH, color, tenderness, water-holding capacity, fat-to-lean ratio, and sensory traits, while carcass characteristics such as weight, backfat thickness, and loin eye area reflect growth performance and processing potential. These parameters are significantly influenced by sex, age, hunting season, geographic location, and ecological conditions, which helps explain why the field spans so many disciplines and methodologies.

The author-level analysis revealed a highly specialized field shaped by a limited number of core research groups. Geldermann H leads productivity with 21 publications, followed by Bartenschlager H with 20 and Moser G with 16, and these three also top the citation rankings. Yet fractionalized counts, which reflect individual contribution within large collaborations, tell a subtler story: Razmaite V, with 15 publications, achieved the highest fractionalized value of 6.58, indicating a comparatively greater personal contribution, while Groenen M attained the highest average citations per article at 11.70. Journal of Animal Science and Meat Science dominate both productivity and citation impact, and the strong presence of Animal Genetics, Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics, and Genetics Selection Evolution underscores how tightly meat quality research is bound to quantitative genetics.

Geographically, China leads in total publications, with most classified as single-country publications reflecting strong domestic research capacity, while Germany ranks second with a notably higher proportion of internationally co-authored work. Poland and Italy also contribute substantially, largely through domestic output, and the United States shows a balanced distribution that positions it as a connecting hub in the global network. The authors attribute the strong European presence to high wild boar population densities, long-term pig genetics programs, and policy pressures linked to wildlife management, whereas China’s dominance reflects substantial national investment in agricultural and animal science research.

Perhaps the most compelling finding is the field’s intellectual evolution. Thematic mapping across three periods shows that early research centered on intramuscular fat, carcass traits, and lipid metabolism in domestic pigs, with comparative studies between wild boar and commercial breeds. The middle period from 2011 to 2018 diversified into species identification, skeletal muscle biology, and performance evaluation, while the most recent phase from 2019 to 2026 consolidates around genomic characterization, with terms such as candidate genes, genome-wide association studies, and differentiation between wild and domestic populations taking prominence. Overlay visualization confirms that genetic and genome-mapping terms dominated early periods, while fatty acids, genome scan analysis, and meat quality traits have become increasingly prominent in recent years.

Multiple Correspondence Analysis crystallized this structure into three conceptual pillars that together explain more than 81 percent of the dataset’s variance across two dimensions. The first cluster encompasses genetic improvement and production traits such as growth, quantitative trait loci, and backfat thickness; the second captures molecular genetics, including gene expression, linkage, and candidate gene identification; and the third groups meat quality and lipid characteristics, including muscle composition, fatty acids, and physicochemical properties. The spatial proximity of these clusters in the analysis suggests growing integration between genetics and meat science, even as each direction maintains its own specialized identity.

The study’s authors conclude that wild boar meat research has progressed from foundational studies of carcass traits and lipid metabolism toward advanced genomic and association-based approaches, increasingly framed by nutritional evaluation and the prospect of wild game meat as a sustainable protein source. They note that collaboration networks remain concentrated within specific clusters, leaving room for broader interdisciplinary and international cooperation. Future work, they argue, should integrate multi-omics approaches with meat quality assessment, compare wild and domestic populations more systematically, and probe the nutritional implications of wild boar meat for human health. As global demand for sustainable, nutrient-rich protein intensifies, this mapping of the field’s intellectual architecture offers researchers a clear framework for where wild boar science is likely to head next.

Subject of Research: Bibliometric mapping of global research on wild boar (Sus scrofa) meat quality, genetics, and nutrition

Article Title: Wild boar (Sus scrofa) meat quality research at the crossroads of genetics and nutrition: a global bibliometric mapping

Article References: Quoc, L. P. T., Hao, P. M., Quyen, P. T., Thuan, N. H. D., & Nguyen, L. L. P. (2026). Wild boar (Sus scrofa) meat quality research at the crossroads of genetics and nutrition: a global bibliometric mapping. Food Science of Animal Resources, 46(1), Article 86. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44463-026-00084-7

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1007/s44463-026-00084-7

Keywords: wild boar, Sus scrofa, meat quality, bibliometric analysis, carcass traits, fatty acid composition, animal genetics, nutrition, genome-wide association studies, game meat, science mapping, sustainable protein