Top Institutions Publishing In Nature - 2010

Below is a list of the top universities and institutions based on their publishing record in the journal ‘Nature’.  The ranking is simply based on the number of articles published in 2010 with one or more author affiliations to their institution.

1.   Harvard - 81

2.   Max Planck – 75

3.   C.N.R.S. – 57

4.   Stanford – 42

5.   N.I.H. – 40

6.   Caltech – 33

7.   Univ. Washington – 32

8.   U.C. San Francisco – 31

8.   U.C. Berkeley – 31

10. U.C.L.A. – 30

11. M.I.T. – 28

12. Cambridge – 27

13. Yale – 26

14. Oxford – 25

15. Columbia – 22

15. Univ. Tokyo – 22

18. N.Y.U. – 21

18. Washington Univ. – 21

20. Univ. Michigan – 20

20. Johns Hopkins – 20

20. Univ. Toronto – 20

20. Univ. Chicago – 20

24. Imperial Coll – 19

25. U.C. San Diego – 18

25. Maryland – 18

25. U. Penn.

29. LBL – 15

30. Univ. London – 14

31. RIKEN – 13

31. U.N.C. – 13

31. U.B.C. – 13

35. Cornell – 12

35. Duke – 12

35. Wisc – 12

35. U.C. Davis – 12

35. Northwestern – 12

Honorable Mentions:

*    Carnegie Mellon - 11

*    SCRIPPS – 11

*    U.C. Boulder – 9

*    Osaka – 8

*    Purdue – 8

*    U.C. Santa Barbara – 5

*    Gatech – 4

This report is partly in response to the Nature Publishing Index, which includes and weights equally, Nature sub-field journals.  While simply indexing the number of Nature publications already misrepresents the impact a university has on science, I feel that including the Nature sister journals exacerbates the problem.  While, Nature and Science sit at the top of the food-chain for non-field specific publications, the same cannot be said for the Nature field specific journals.  Including these smaller Nature publications in the index discourages publications in alternative, often better, field specific journals by rewarding people who have a thirst for the Nature name.  We may understand the vain desire for Nature regardless of its form, but let’s not offer any additional reward.