The Relationship Between Artificial Intelligence and Critical Infrastructure Development : Bibliometric Analysis

Abstract

Currently, the priority direction of the national economy in the world’s countries is the formation of an appropriate system of protection and security of critical infrastructure, which is able to quickly respond to exogenous and endogenous threats and risks and flexibly adapt to new operating conditions using digital technologies and information systems. At the same time, in the last decade, the role of artificial intelligence as a powerful tool in the management system for the development of critical infrastructure will grow. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to identify the relationship between artificial intelligence and the development of critical infrastructure by characterizing the evolution of key patterns of scientific publications on this problem. To achieve this goal, a relevant sample of scientific articles was formed based on identifying periods of publication activity and bibliometric analysis of keyword matches to identify promising areas of research in this area. The formed sample of publications for the study includes 606 documents indexed by the international scientometric database Scopus for the period 2011-2025. Bibliometric analysis and visualization of its results were carried out using the VOSviewer software product. Based on the visualization maps, seven clusters were identified and characterized by the content coincidence of keywords in the publications and five stages of the evolutionary development of artificial intelligence technologies for the effective functioning of critical infrastructure. Based on the analysis of empirical data, the exponential growth of the number of publications on the selected issues was confirmed (the annual growth rate of the number of scientific papers on this topic is 23.5% for 2011-2024). The results of the analysis can be used in further research to substantiate and develop an algorithm of actions for rapid response to crisis phenomena and adaptation of the functioning of critical infrastructure facilities to new global challenges.