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Berkeley again is top U.S. public university in new ARWU rankings

By Public Affairs

UC Berkeley is again the No. 1 U.S. public university in the Academic Rankings of World Universities, an assessment of 500 top institutions around the globe by ShanghaiRanking. The 2017 rankings were published today.

Berkeley maintained its place in the top five universities worldwide, though it moved from third place in the 2016 rankings to fifth place this year in a shuffle of the schools in the 3-4-5 slots.

Berkeley by field

Natural sciences (1)
Social sciences (3)
Life and agricultural sciences (7)
Engineering (8)

Berkeley by subject (top 10)

Chemistry (1)
Electrical and electronic engineering (1)
Physics (2)
Earth sciences (2)
Computer science and engineering (2)
Materials science and engineering (2)
Economics (3)
Statistics (3)
Biotechnology (3)
Transportation science and technology (3)
Ecology (4)
Energy science and engineering (4)
Nanoscience and nanotechnology (4)
Sociology (4)
Automation and control (5)
Environmental science and engineering (6)
Civil engineering (8)
Instruments science and techology (9)
Chemical engineering (10)
Mining and mineral engineering (10)

And in the ARWU’s rankings of broad fields of study, Berkeley is the top university in the world in natural sciences, which encompass physics, mathematics, chemistry, earth sciences and ecology.

Overall, the top 10 universities in the new rankings are the same as last year’s, with slight variations in position. Harvard is again the top university overall, followed by Stanford in second place, Cambridge in third, MIT in fourth and Berkeley in fifth. Next come Princeton, Oxford, Columbia, California Institute of Technology and the University of Chicago.

Berkeley leads four University of California campuses that made the top 25 on the new list, which also includes UCLA (12), UC San Diego (15) and UCSF (21).

The ARWU rankings evaluate universities in five broad areas of academic study, focusing on the sciences and social sciences but leaving out the humanities, a broad part of Berkeley’s mission.

First place in the world in natural sciences, Berkeley also place third globally for social sciences, seventh for life and agricultural sciences and eighth for engineering. Lacking a medical school, Berkeley wasn’t ranked in the fifth broad field, medical sciences.

Within those fields, 52 subjects were evaluated. Berkeley was ranked the best in the world in chemistry and electrical and electronic engineering.

The campus took second place globally for physics, earth sciences, computer science and engineering and materials science and engineering; and third place in economics, statistics, biotechnology and transportation science and technology.

Altogether, Berkeley placed in the top 10 in 20 of the 52 subjects ranked (see chart).

The complete 2017 rankings can be viewed on the ARWU website.

A PDF of the subject rankings can be downloaded from the ARWU website.