2010 Academic Ranking of World's Research Universities Compiled by Shanghai Jiao Tong University. (August 16, 2010)

Shanghai Jiao Tong University has released its rankings for the world's top 500 research universities.

Once again Australia scored three in the top 100 -- with The University of Melbourne moving significantly up the rankings from 75 to 62 due significantly to Elizabeth Blackburn's award of a Nobel Prize, but Simon Marginson, Melbourne University's higher education professor believes Melbourne's performance was boosted not only by alumni prizes, but also a stronger citation performance for its academic papers, and articles in Science and Nature.

However, it's worth noting the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich (ETH) comes 23^rd in the rankings, while the state of California boasts 6 institutions in the top 20 and 10 universities in the top 50.

17 of Australia's 38 universities are ranked in the top 500.

The ARWU (Academic Ranking of World Universities) makes the point that:

Besides the overall ranking, the 2010 Academic Ranking of World Universities by Broad Subject Fields (ARWU-FIELD) and 2010 Academic Ranking of World Universities by Subject Field (ARWU-SUBJECT) are also published. These rankings list the world top 100 universities in five broad subject fields and in five selected subject fields, where the top 3 universities are:

• Natural Sciences and Mathematics – Harvard, Berkeley and Cambridge

• Engineering/Technology and Computer Sciences – MIT, Stanford and Berkeley

• Life and Agriculture Sciences – Harvard, UC San Francisco and MIT

• Clinical Medicine and Pharmacy – Harvard, UC San Francisco and John Hopkins

• Social Sciences – Harvard, Chicago and Stanford
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• Mathematics – Princeton, Berkeley and Harvard

• Physics – Harvard, MIT and Caltech

• Chemistry – Berkeley, Harvard and Cambridge

• Computer Science – Stanford, MIT and Berkeley

• Economics / Business – Harvard, Chicago and MIT

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