NEWS Umeå University has climbed around twenty places in this year's Shanghai Ranking – Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU). From 511th place last year to 488th place this year, among the 1,000 best-ranked universities in the world.
Tora Holmberg, Vice-Chancellor at Umeå University. Photo: Mattias Pettersson.
“It is, of course, gratifying that we are climbing the list, and I think that the researchers who have contributed to the increase in publications and citations should be proud of themselves. But we should not sit back and be satisfied; as an educational institution, we must do more to create good conditions for high-quality research with a significant impact", says Tora Holmberg, Vice-Chancellor at Umeå University.
The Academic Ranking of World Universities is the oldest of the international rankings and was launched in 2003. The ranking focuses on research rather than education, and the idea behind the Shanghai list is to identify the world's absolute top universities, with a focus on natural sciences and medicine. Among other things, it attaches great importance to publications in major journals such as Nature and Science, as well as publications in Web of Science journals – a platform that provides bibliographic information and citation data. Nobel Prizes and similar awards to alumni or current researchers also influence the list.
The top universities on the list are Harvard and Stanford, and the highest-ranked Swedish university is the Karolinska Institute, which is ranked 50th in the world.
If you would like to see the full list of all ranked universities, please visit the Academic Ranking of World Universities website.