On December 29th, 2022, the Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (ISTIC) held an online press conference in Beijing to release the statistical results for compiled data of Chinese scientific and technological papers in 2021.

In 2021, the paper output of HUST kept a good momentum of steady growth, the relevant data reported as follows: In 2021, a total of 7,552 international scientific and technological papers indexed by SCI (Science Citation Index Expanded) were published by scholars of HUST as the first author and the first author affiliation, making HUST continue to rank 5th among Chinese higher education institutions. The number of papers increased by 613 compared with the previous year. The 43,965 papers of HUST indexed by SCI from 2012 to 2019 were cited 954,248 times, ranking 4th among universities nationwide, which was 1 place higher than the previous year. In the year of 2021, 9 papers from HUST were indexed by Science, Nature, Cell, and PNAS, with HUST ranking 10th among Chinese universities.

HUST continues to rank within top 5 in the rankings of “High-level International Journal Papers-Universities” released by ISTIC. The top 5 universities are Zhejiang University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Tsinghua University, Sun Yat-sen University and Huazhong University of Science and Technology. In the rankings of medical institutions with more papers indexed by China’s Outstanding Scientific and Technological Papers in 2021, Tongji Hospital and Wuhan Union Hospital, affiliated with Tongji Medical College, ranked 5th and 9th respectively.

5,390 papers from HUST were indexed by China's Outstanding Scientific and Technological Papers, making HUST 6th among Chinese universities. 1,976 journal articles from HUST were indexed by SCI top 1/10 journals of Impact Factor papers, with the university ranking 6th in China. According to SCI, HUST’s scientific and technological scholars published 1,361 international collaborative papers as the first author, and HUST ranks 8th among the universities in China.

In 2021, a total of 2,985 papers from HUST were indexed by Chinese Scientific and Technological Papers and Citation Database (CSTPCD), with HUST ranking 8th among Chinese universities; 3,997 scientific and technological papers from HUST were indexed by Engineering Index (Ei), with HUST ranking 10th among Chinese universities; 364 papers from HUST were indexed by Conference Proceedings Citation Index - Science (CPCI-S), with HUST ranking 12th in China.

ISTIC adopts scientometric methods to select papers published in various disciplines, whose quality is above the average level of its field internationally, and papers that rank in the top 10% of its field domestically. The papers selected constitute the database of outstanding scientific and technological papers in China. Since 1987, ISTIC has been undertaking the statistical analysis of the number and impact of papers published by Chinese scientists at home and abroad, and regularly reveals the status and trend of scientific and technological papers published in China every year. On this basis, it expands to the statistical analysis of the output of Chinese patents, sci-tech periodicals, academic books and other fields.

Written by: Hu Zhenxiang

Edited by: Peng Yumeng