World University Rankings for physical sciences 2015-16: Asian institutions triumph

The 2015-16 university ranking for physical sciences, including maths, reveals Asian universities at the top of their game, in addition to the traditional US highlfliers.

November 18 2015
Physics teacher writing

Asian universities have collectively achieved a huge improvement in the 2015-16 Times Higher Education World University Rankings for physical sciences, released today.

More than half of Asia’s 15 universities in the top 100 for physical sciences are included for the first time this year.

These newly ranked institutions achieved an average position of 65, ranking on the whole significantly higher than the European, North American or Australian debutants in the 2016 table.

North American universities, including Caltech, Stanford and MIT, are still the best in the world for a physical sciences subject.

But the impressive result for Asia this year suggests that there are many opportunities to study maths, physics or chemistry at a world-leading institution in Singapore, China, Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea or Taiwan.


More on Asia's best universities


For the first time, two Asian universities feature in the top 30: the National University of Singapore and Peking University, China.

Although three Australian universities are among the best 100, Australian National University and the University of Melbourne both slipped out of the top 30 this year.

The University of Queensland fell out of the top 100, to be replaced by University of New South Wales at position 96.

Swiss, German and French institutions also feature prominently in the physical sciences ranking; each country has at least five institutions among the top 100 and at least two institutions in the upper half of the ranking.

Margret Wintermantel, president of the German Academic Exchange Service, DAAD, said: “German universities and research institutions have a long tradition of being at the forefront of research – especially in the physical sciences. There has always been a strong consensus that advances in science and research are an important key to innovation.”

Rank 2015-16

University

Country

1

California Institute of Technology

United States

2

Stanford University

United States

3

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

United States

4

University of California, Berkeley

United States

5

Princeton University

United States

=6

Harvard University

United States

=6

University of Cambridge

UK

8

University of Oxford

UK

9

Cornell University

United States

10

Carnegie Mellon University

United States

=11

University of California, Los Angeles

United States

=11

ETH Zurich – Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich

Switzerland

13

Yale University

United States

14

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Switzerland

15

University of Chicago

United States

16

Imperial College London

UK

17

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

United States

18

Columbia University

United States

19

National University of Singapore

Singapore

20

University of Toronto

Canada

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