Samara University entered the World University Rankings by Subject THE for the first time

Samara National Research University is included for the first time in the World University Rankings by Subject made annually by the British edition Times Higher Education (THE). It makes up one of three most influential global university rankings – THE World University Rankings, and publishes a number of regional and special ratings as well.

The value of subject rankings is in the fact that they allow to get deeper information in comparison with the general ratings. 

In the published research THE World University Rankings 2018 by subject: Engineering and Technology the universities having extraordinary on the world level competences in the direction Engineering & Technology are evaluated. Samara University is in the group of universities sharing positions from 401 to 500 in this direction.

“Historically Samara University was formed as a branch university connected with strategic fields of the Russian economy. First of all this is aviation and space. Due to certain closeness of these directions the leading scientific schools and teams of our university have been oriented to Russian scientific journals, research and professional community. Participation in the Project 5-100 allowed Samara University to rethink the strategy of its development and reorient the work for advance of the results of their research at the international stage and make effective collaborations with foreign scholars. Due to the branch specialization of our university and the whole region in general, Engineering, Mathematics and Physics were developed the most dynamically here. And today we see how these directions begin to advance Samara University in the leading rankings by subject. It is important to emphasize that now our scholars not only lean on the unique experience and achievements of their predecessors. Today Samara University is leading actual researches the results of which are required among industrial partners, are published in prestigious journals and are actively cited by foreign colleagues. These are several key subject areas where the creation of rocket and space technologies, different biotechnical systems, perspective research in the field of optics and photonics, theoretical mechanics, chemistry, material science are included. The demand affects the volume of R&D – one of the criteria which are regarded by the experts of rating agencies. These are the units specialized in engineering spheres that bring in the consolidated budget of Samara University the greatest income” – Vladimir Bogatyrev, Vice-rector for Educational and Foreign Affairs, comments on the results of the rating research.

University ranking by subject Times Higher Education Subject Rankings is held in 12 directions and is published in five stages. Thus on 13 September the rating of universities in the directions of arts and humanities was issued for the first time, on 4 October the same was done in social sciences, business and economics, education, law, on 17 October - in engineering and technology, computer science, on 8 November – in life sciences, psychology, clinical, pre-clinical and health, on 27 November – in physical sciences (Physics). From 100 to 500 universities of the world are evaluated in each direction. While compiling ranking by subject in the direction "Engineering & Technology" the same 13 efficiency indicators as in the world institutional rating are used that are grouped in five directions: teaching (environment of education); research (volume, income and reputation); citations (influence of research); international interaction (employees, students and research); income from the industrial activity (transfer of knowledge). At the same time these indicators have another weigh with the aim of taking into account the specificity of a concrete scientific field. In the rating "Engineering and Technology" there are 500 world universities which lead education in the following directions of study: General Engineering, Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Civil Engineering, Chemical Engineering. So that the university is regarded while compiling the subject rating in the direction "Engineering & Technology" it must have at least 250 publications in this scientific field for the last 5 years. Apart from this not less than 5% of university employees must work in the field of Engineering and Technology. Let us remind that formerly Samara University was included in the subject ranking of another leading rating agency - QS World University Rankings by Subject in the direction “Physics and Astronomy”. The university was included in the group from 451 to 500 places.