An analysis of the top patent publishing countries (See SI Fig. ), China was followed in descending order by Japan, Republic of Korea, the United States, the Russian Federation, and Germany. In the case of journal publications (See SI Fig. ), India is in 2 nd place followed by the United States, Brazil, Japan and Germany. To discover and illustrate topics found within our search we constructed cluster network diagrams for journals (Figure ) and patents (Figure ) which were constructed from the most common and relevant co-occurring concepts found by CAS analysts in this set of publications. The most common co-occurring concepts from our broader searches of fertilizers showed differences between journal and patent publications which probably reflects the more basic research typically found in journals as compared to the applied nature of patents. Topical clusters in the diagrams for journal articles indicate a focus on the effects of "fertilizers" on "plant growth", "soils" and biological responses in plant species such as "proteins" and "carbohydrates", often using "fertilizer experiments". Soil properties like "soil organic matter", "soil fertility", "soil moisture", and "electric conductivity" are also found in relation to fertilizers. Some journals discussing processes to remove nutrients from waste streams and to recover them for use as fertilizer are present as well, as we see smaller nodes on "wastewater", "phosphates", "nitrates", and "chemical oxygen demand" in a related cluster also going to "fertilizers" on the diagram. The larger nodes show that journals tended to focus on more basic experimental work in plant and soil responses to fertilizers and soil amendments, with bench scale and modeling studies of nutrient recovery from wastes and wastewater. Patent publication topics tended more toward the application of organic substances useful in fertilizers, formulations of traditional fertilizers with organic waste components, improved nutrient use efficiency with microbes, and processes to recover nutrients from wastes. Not surprisingly bio-waste-related topics such as "manure", "ashes", "bone meal", and "straws" are closely associated with "organic fertilizers" and "soil amendments", while "fermentation" with closely associated "microorganisms", and other processes like "drying" and "granulation" are the processes most closely associated with those topics. Fertilizerplant-soil experiments are still present in a small number of patents but not as many as in journals, reflecting the focus of patents on applications rather than discovery.