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Subfield · Chemical Engineering

Bioengineering research

Bioengineering is a subfield of Chemical Engineering. Science Explorer counts 110k research works in it since 1950. 9.9% of them reached the world's top 10% most cited for their field and year.

In short: application of biology and engineering to create useful products.

Research works
110k
fractional, since 1950
In the world top 10%
11k
per year above
Top-10% rate
9.9%
share of its works in the world top 10%
Topics
1
Growth, 2018-21 → 2022-25
+10%
the tick is no change
Largest producer
China
46% of the 10 largest, 2022-now
Bioengineering

Which countries lead Bioengineering research?

On research quality in 2022-now, China, the United States and South Korea rank highest in Bioengineering. By volume, China and India publish the most (4.8k and 1.6k works in 2022-now).

By research quality, 2022-now

  1. 1 China #1 all time 1.43× citation excellence · 1.18× journals · 100% breadth 15.0% top 10% · 4.5k works
  2. 2 United States #2 all time 0.79× citation excellence · 1.55× journals · 100% breadth 8.2% top 10% · 1.2k works
  3. 3 South Korea #6 all time 1.23× citation excellence · 0.93× journals · 100% breadth 13.6% top 10% · 490 works
  4. 4 United Kingdom #4 all time 0.99× citation excellence · 1.45× journals · 100% breadth 9.6% top 10% · 261 works
  5. 5 Germany #3 all time 0.72× citation excellence · 1.39× journals · 100% breadth 6.1% top 10% · 377 works
  6. 6 India #11 all time 0.86× citation excellence · 0.43× journals · 100% breadth 7.4% top 10% · 1.6k works
  7. 7 Taiwan #20 all time 0.99× citation excellence · 0.73× journals · 100% breadth 8.9% top 10% · 263 works
  8. 8 France #7 all time 0.54× citation excellence · 1.24× journals · 100% breadth 5.0% top 10% · 297 works
  9. 9 Spain #8 all time 0.77× citation excellence · 0.99× journals · 100% breadth 7.0% top 10% · 207 works
  10. 10 Italy #17 all time 0.87× citation excellence · 0.67× journals · 100% breadth 7.4% top 10% · 306 works

The track on each row is that row's top-10% rate. The ranking itself is the quality score, which compares the rate with what each place's own topics predict, adds its share of papers in the Nature Index journals, and counts output and breadth too.

Of 17 countries ranked in Bioengineering. Ranked on the quality score for 2022-now; the bracket is the all-time rank.

All countries ranked in Bioengineering

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 China 4.8k works
  2. 2 India 1.6k works
  3. 3 United States 1.3k works
  4. 4 Japan 542 works
  5. 5 South Korea 511 works
  6. 6 Germany 396 works
  7. 7 Russia 342 works
  8. 8 Iran 328 works
  9. 9 Italy 320 works
  10. 10 Türkiye 309 works

How concentrated that is

The same countries as shares of everything the list above accounts for. A node where two countries do two thirds of the work and one spread evenly across twelve read alike as a ranking and not at all alike here.

China: 45.8%India: 15.7%United States: 12.2%Japan: 5.2%6 others listed: 21.1%46%largest
China4,776 · 45.8%India1,638 · 15.7%United States1,274 · 12.2%Japan542 · 5.2%6 others listed2,205 · 21.1%

Shares of the rows listed above, not of the whole node.

Which institutions lead Bioengineering research?

Chinese Academy of Sciences (China) ranks first in Bioengineering on research quality in 2022-now, followed by Jilin University and Northeastern University.

By research quality, 2022-now

  1. 1 Chinese Academy of Sciences China · Beijing · #1 all time 16.4% top 10% · 267 works
  2. 2 Jilin University China · Changchun · #9 all time 18.4% top 10% · 69 works
  3. 3 Northeastern University China · Shenyang · #44 all time 27.1% top 10% · 82 works
  4. 4 Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique France · Paris · #3 all time 4.6% top 10% · 144 works
  5. 5 Russian Academy of Sciences Russia · Moscow 2.5% top 10% · 111 works

The track on each row is that row's top-10% rate. The ranking itself is the quality score, which compares the rate with what each place's own topics predict, adds its share of papers in the Nature Index journals, and counts output and breadth too.

Of 5 institutions above the floor of 40 fractional works in Bioengineering.

Top 100 Bioengineering institutions

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 Chinese Academy of SciencesChina 280 works
  2. 2 Centre National de la Recherche ScientifiqueFrance 148 works
  3. 3 Russian Academy of SciencesRussia 115 works
  4. 4 Northeastern UniversityChina 88 works
  5. 5 Jilin UniversityChina 71 works
  6. 6 Zhejiang UniversityChina 57 works
  7. 7 Tianjin UniversityChina 56 works
  8. 8 Xi'an Jiaotong UniversityChina 51 works
  9. 9 Harbin Institute of TechnologyChina 49 works
  10. 10 Cairo UniversityEgypt 48 works

Who are the leading researchers in Bioengineering?

Counting only their work in Bioengineering, Joseph Wang, Allen J. Bard and Otto S. Wolfbeis have the most papers in the world top 10% for their subfield and year beyond the 10% expected.

  1. 1 Joseph Wang United States · #2,364 worldwide overall 50.3 of 147 papers here in the top 10%
  2. 2 Allen J. Bard United States · #5,016 worldwide overall 39.2 of 94 papers here in the top 10%
  3. 3 Otto S. Wolfbeis Germany · #88,868 worldwide overall 38.9 of 110 papers here in the top 10%
  4. 4 Tong Zhang China · #45,050 worldwide overall 33.2 of 75 papers here in the top 10%
  5. 5 Wilhelm Simon Switzerland · #111,029 worldwide overall 31.1 of 93 papers here in the top 10%
  6. 6 Peng Sun China · #13,942 worldwide overall 26.7 of 62 papers here in the top 10%
  7. 7 Ernö Pretsch Switzerland · #77,970 worldwide overall 26.4 of 61 papers here in the top 10%
  8. 8 Eric Bakker Switzerland · #125,965 worldwide overall 32.6 of 131 papers here in the top 10%
  9. 9 Jong‐Heun Lee South Korea · #47,229 worldwide overall 23.6 of 46 papers here in the top 10%
  10. 10 Alan Graham MacDiarmid United States · #19,515 worldwide overall 21.4 of 46 papers here in the top 10%

Ranked on their work in Bioengineering alone: how many more of their papers here reached the world top 10% for their subfield and year than the 10% expected, among 421,506 ranked researchers with a paper here. Each paper counts once, so many strong papers outrank one famous one, and a long record of ordinary papers does not climb. Identities come from OpenAlex author disambiguation, which occasionally merges or splits people.

Top 100 Bioengineering researchers

What are the most cited papers in Bioengineering?

The most cited paper in Bioengineering is "Electrochemical Photolysis of Water at a Semiconductor Electrode" (Akira Fujishima, Kenichi Honda, 1972), with 34,145 citations. Next come "Signaling Recognition Events with Fluorescent Sensors and Switches" (6,988) and "Solitons in Polyacetylene" (6,857).

Most cited papers
#PaperReleasedCitations
1 Electrochemical Photolysis of Water at a Semiconductor Electrode Akira Fujishima, Kenichi Honda · Nature Jul 1972 34,145
2 Signaling Recognition Events with Fluorescent Sensors and Switches A. Prasanna de Silva, H. Q. Nimal Gunaratne, Thorfinnur Gunnlaugsson et al. · Chemical Reviews Review Aug 1997 6,988
3 Solitons in Polyacetylene W. P. Su, J. R. Schrieffer, Alan J. Heeger · Physical Review Letters 18 Jun 1979 6,857
4 A SPECTROPHOTOMETRIC METHOD FOR MEASURING THE BREAKDOWN OF HYDROGEN PEROXIDE BY CATALASE Roland Frank Beers, Irwin W. Sizer · Journal of Biological Chemistry Open access Mar 1952 6,791
5 Nanowire Nanosensors for Highly Sensitive and Selective Detection of Biological and Chemical Species Yi Ping Cui, Qingqiao Wei, Hongkun Park et al. · Science 17 Aug 2001 5,805
All 100 most cited papers, with filters and sorting

Where is Bioengineering research done?

The largest centres of Bioengineering research in 2022-now are Beijing (China), Shanghai (China), Seoul (South Korea) and Wuhan (China).

Largest cities, 2022-now

  1. 1 BeijingChina 599 works
  2. 2 ShanghaiChina 330 works
  3. 3 SeoulSouth Korea 219 works
  4. 4 WuhanChina 195 works
  5. 5 NanjingChina 195 works
  6. 6 TokyoJapan 184 works
  7. 7 Xi'anChina 173 works
  8. 8 TianjinChina 167 works
  9. 9 HangzhouChina 166 works
  10. 10 GuangzhouChina 165 works
See Bioengineering on the map

Bioengineering research by country

The best places for Bioengineering research inside each country, with that country's researchers and world standing.

Where is the best place to study Bioengineering?

Among universities, judged by research, Jilin University, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and Nanjing University score highest, combining standing in the field's ranking, citation excellence, specialisation, size, growth and international reach. Research strength is one signal when choosing where to study; it does not measure teaching.

0%10%20%30%mean 16.92%fractional works in this field (log) →share of work in the world top 10% →Hunan UniversityJilin UniversityNanjing UniversityÉcole Polytechnique …
above the meannear itbelow it

One dot per university in the first ten of the table below, at the default weights. The upper left is the interesting corner: small places doing unusually strong work.

Standingthis field's institution ranking, three quarters all time and a quarter 2022-now
50%
Citation excellenceshare of its work in the world top 10%, 2022-now and all time averaged
20%
Specialisationhow much of its work is in this field, counted up to 10× the world share
5%
Sizeits output in this field, on a log scale
15%
Growthoutput growth, counted from -20% to +20%
5%
Internationalshare of its work with a co-author abroad
5%
Each slider sets a weight; the share it gets of the score is beside it.
#UniversityScoreRank in field (all time)Top 10%SpecialisationWorksGrowth
1Jilin UniversityChina 76.1#2 (#9)18.2%4.8×70 -1.0%
2École Polytechnique Fédérale de LausanneSwitzerland 67.1- (#2)4.9%3.2×17 -46.3%
3Nanjing UniversityChina 64.8- (#5)15.9%2.4×28 +15.8%
4Hunan UniversityChina 63.2- (#6)26.9%2.0×18 +66.1%
5University of Chinese Academy of SciencesChina 62.8- (#7)16.0%2.0×41 +16.9%
6Northeastern UniversityChina 59.5#3 (#44)25.6%7.8×88 +104.1%
7ETH ZurichSwitzerland 57.6- (#4)8.9%1.4×12 -42.7%
8Chongqing UniversityChina 53.7- (#16)21.3%2.7×38 +11.6%
9Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyUnited States 53.1- (#10)18.4%2.0×18 -27.3%
10Tsinghua UniversityChina 52.3- (#15)13.1%1.5×45 +10.2%

Universities only. The score blends standing (50%), citation excellence (20%), size (15%), specialisation (5%), growth (5%), international reach (5%), 2022-now; growth compares 2018-21 with 2022-25 and counts up to +20%, since a jump from a small base is mostly noise. Standing is the score in this field's institution ranking, three quarters over all time and a quarter 2022-now; excellence averages the two windows too. Four years alone undercount fields such as AI, where many conference and arXiv papers from 2022 on carry no affiliation in the data.

Every institution in Bioengineering, country by country

Is Bioengineering research growing?

Output in 2022-2025 was 10% higher than in 2018-2021, peaking in 2024. The fastest-growing topics are Analytical Chemistry and Sensors.

still counting19801990200020102020
grewheldshrank

The same series as a ribbon: one cell per year, darker for more. The line above answers how much; this answers when.

Its share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share: all of science grows. This is Bioengineering as a percentage of every work published that year, 0.071% in 2024.

still counting0.10%0.20%0.30%Bioengineering0.063% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works of Bioengineering over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

Year by year.

still counting5%10%15%Bioengineering9.7% in 2025200020102020

Of each year's works in it, the share that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. A field is the world for its own topics, so there is no other line to hold it against.

Which topics inside it are moving

Growth and decline on one axis around a shared zero. Two lists side by side hide the thing that matters: whether the growth dwarfs the decline, or the other way round.

What does Bioengineering include?

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Who leads Bioengineering, on Science Explorer

A card with the countries and institutions that lead Bioengineering, for a post or a slide.

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1200 × 630 PNG, sized for social posts, drawn from the latest snapshot.

The leading institutions' badges5Each links to that institution's page and updates with every snapshot

Discussion

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