The University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) has dominated the NPI (Nature Publishing Index) ranking of Chinese universities for the third consecutive years, according to the editors of the NPI 2013 Asia-Pacific published on March 27th. USTC ranks only second to the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS) among domestic institutes, 9th in Asia-Pacific area and 57th in globe top 100 (16 places higher than last year).  

It is reported that 37 academic papers from USTC were published in Nature in 2013, and the NPI is 15.91, with physics and chemistry holding significant advantages.

According to the ranking, the top 10 Chinese research institutes are CAS, USTC, Tsinghua University, Peking University, Genomics Company BGI, Nanjing University, Fudan University, Zhejiang University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University and the University of Hong Kong. Supplement editors predict China is "on pace to take over as the top Asia-Pacific contributor to the NPI in the next two or three years", as the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has knocked the University of Tokyo off the top of the NPI institutional rankings for the first time.

As a major indicator of strength in high quality basic research, the Nature Publishing Index 2013 Asia-Pacific is released on basis of publication output in Nature and the 17 Nature research journals.

Prof. LUO Xisheng, director of Department of Science and Technology (DST) of USTC said: “USTC is committed to the quality-oriented developmental strategy. And we encourage researchers and students to explore frontier science and technology, with a focus on original creation and interdisciplinary development. ” He said that the quantity of published paper of USTC increases steadily in recent years. Meanwhile, citation and Impact Factor and “extraordinary” papers are holding a high proportion.

According to statistics from DST, USTC has achieved a series of significant development in single-molecule science, quantum information science, material science, life science, earth science and engineer science in 2013. Nearly 100 papers were published in Science, Nature and its series, PNAS, Phys. Rev. Lett., Chem. Rev., J. Ame. Chem. Soc., Angew. Chem., Adv. Mater.Molecular Cell, Immunity, Earth-Sci. Rev., J. Fluid. Mech. and etc. At the same time, the citation of SCI papers of USTC is keeping Top 1 among C9 universities in recent 10 years.