Science Explorer Map
Interactive view
Trends

What is rising in science

Where research is growing fastest, how the balance between the sciences has shifted since 1970, and which institutions and countries are climbing. Every trend links to the page that explains it.

What are the fastest-growing research topics?

Measured by output from 2005–09 to 2015–19, among topics with at least 300 works, Online Learning Methods and Innovations, Educational Methods and Outcomes and Employee Performance and Leadership grew fastest (+20464%, +12728% and +11565%).

  1. 1 Online Learning Methods and Innovations Education · Social Sciences +20464% 26k works
  2. 2 Educational Methods and Outcomes Education · Social Sciences +12728% 46k works
  3. 3 Employee Performance and Leadership Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management · Business, Management and Accounting +11565% 26k works
  4. 4 STEM Education Education · Social Sciences +11271% 48k works
  5. 5 Educational Methods and Impacts Education · Social Sciences +6404% 53k works
  6. 6 Educational Curriculum and Learning Methods Education · Social Sciences +6150% 61k works
  7. 7 Blockchain Technology in Education and Learning Information Systems · Computer Science +5822% 43k works
  8. 8 Healthcare Quality and Satisfaction General Health Professions · Health Professions +5790% 29k works
  9. 9 Multimedia Learning Systems Information Systems · Computer Science +5638% 37k works
  10. 10 Local Governance and Development Geography, Planning and Development · Social Sciences +5380% 26k works
  11. 11 Child Development and Education Education · Social Sciences +5049% 27k works
  12. 12 Student Stress and Coping Developmental and Educational Psychology · Psychology +5044% 11k works

How has the balance of science changed?

Since 1970, Social Sciences gained the most share of all research (+6 points by 2025), while Life Sciences lost the most (−7 points).

Life Sciences: 13% in 2024Physical Sciences: 40% in 2024Health Sciences: 23% in 2024Social Sciences: 25% in 2024Social Sciences25% (+6 pts)Health Sciences23% (+4 pts)Physical Sciences40% (−4 pts)Life Sciences13% (−7 pts)19801990200020102020
Life Sciences13%Physical Sciences40%Health Sciences23%Social Sciences25%

Each band is one domain’s share of the year’s fractional works; the four always add to 100%. The latest, partial year is left off.

How much research does the world publish?

The record holds 5.9M works for 2025, 4.7× as many as in 2000. Growth is the rule rather than the exception: a field that holds steady is losing share.

2M4M6MAll research5.5M in 202419801990200020102020

Fractional works per year in the record. The latest, partial year is left off.

Which fields of science are growing fastest?

Energy output grew 38% from 2018–21 to 2022–25, the most of the 26 fields, followed by Computer Science and Business, Management and Accounting. Physics and Astronomy changed least (+2%). All research grew 17% over the same years.

  1. Energy+38%
  2. Computer Science+35%
  3. Business, Management and Accounting+31%
  4. Psychology+23%
  5. Engineering+22%
  6. Agricultural and Biological Sciences+20%
  7. Dentistry+20%
  8. Environmental Science+20%
  9. Social Sciences+19%
  10. Nursing+19%
  11. Chemical Engineering+18%
  12. Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics+18%
  13. Decision Sciences+18%
  14. Health Professions+17%
  15. Materials Science+14%
  16. Economics, Econometrics and Finance+14%
  17. Medicine+13%
  18. Mathematics+13%
  19. Neuroscience+12%
  20. Immunology and Microbiology+12%
  21. Veterinary+8%
  22. Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology+8%
  23. Chemistry+7%
  24. Arts and Humanities+5%
  25. Earth and Planetary Sciences+3%
  26. Physics and Astronomy+2%
← shrinkingno changegrowing →

Change in fractional works, 2022–25 against 2018–21: the last four complete years against the four before them.

Which institutions are climbing fastest?

Comparing each institution's research-quality rank in 2022–now with its all-time rank, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Tsinghua University and Sichuan University have climbed furthest among the world's top 400.

  1. 1 University of Chinese Academy of SciencesChina · Beijing #82 → #3 up 79
  2. 2 Tsinghua UniversityChina · Beijing #36 → #2 up 34
  3. 3 Sichuan UniversityChina · Chengdu #180 → #11 up 169
  4. 4 Shanghai Jiao Tong UniversityChina · Shanghai #94 → #6 up 88
  5. 5 Zhejiang UniversityChina · Hangzhou #74 → #5 up 69
  6. 6 Peking UniversityChina · Beijing #75 → #7 up 68
  7. 7 Chinese Academy of SciencesChina · Beijing #10 → #1 up 9
  8. 8 Central South UniversityChina · Changsha #134 → #14 up 120
  9. 9 Sun Yat-sen UniversityChina · Guangzhou #140 → #15 up 125
  10. 10 University of Science and Technology of ChinaChina · Hefei #92 → #10 up 82
  11. 11 Wuhan UniversityChina · Wuhan #139 → #17 up 122
  12. 12 Huazhong University of Science and TechnologyChina · Wuhan #126 → #16 up 110

Rank on research quality over all time, then in 2022–now. A climb means the recent work is stronger than the record as a whole.

Which countries are rising in science?

Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan stand higher in 2022–now than over all time on research quality, the largest moves among the top 60 countries.

  1. 1 Saudi Arabia #31 → #15 up 16
  2. 2 Egypt #39 → #23 up 16
  3. 3 Pakistan #41 → #25 up 16
  4. 4 Indonesia #40 → #27 up 13
  5. 5 Türkiye #28 → #17 up 11
  6. 6 United Arab Emirates #52 → #41 up 11
  7. 7 Macau #65 → #55 up 10
  8. 8 Hong Kong #27 → #18 up 9
  9. 9 Bangladesh #48 → #39 up 9
  10. 10 Jordan #58 → #49 up 9

Rank on research quality over all time, then in 2022–now. A climb means the recent work is stronger than the record as a whole.

Which small institutions punch above their weight?

Size is not quality. These institutions publish at most half as much as the typical ranked institution, yet more of their papers reach the world’s top 10% most cited than anywhere else that size. Perimeter Institute, Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (United States) lead.

Size against quality

Every ranked institution, by output and by its share of work in the world’s top 10%. The upper left is where the gems are.

0%20%40%60%mean 24.1163%fractional works (log) →share in the world top 10% →Chinese Academy of Sciences: 58k, 27.1%Tsinghua University: 40k, 27.2%University of Chinese Academy of Sciences: 34k, 27.9%Harvard University: 25k, 28.6%Zhejiang University: 41k, 26.1%Shanghai Jiao Tong University: 44k, 25.5%Peking University: 32k, 25.5%Stanford University: 24k, 25.5%University of Oxford: 26k, 26.7%University of Science and Technology of China: 25k, 25.2%Sichuan University: 35k, 25.8%Massachusetts Institute of Technology: 13k, 27.8%Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique: 39k, 18.7%Central South University: 34k, 27.7%Sun Yat-sen University: 32k, 25.8%Huazhong University of Science and Technology: 32k, 25.8%Wuhan University: 25k, 29.3%National University of Singapore: 20k, 29.6%Xi'an Jiaotong University: 33k, 24.8%ETH Zurich: 14k, 30.1%University College London: 28k, 26.3%University of Cambridge: 22k, 25.0%Fudan University: 23k, 25.1%Harbin Institute of Technology: 34k, 24.5%University of Hong Kong: 18k, 31.2%Beijing Institute of Technology: 25k, 23.7%Nanyang Technological University: 17k, 32.2%Nanjing University: 16k, 26.3%Nankai University: 14k, 28.7%Yale University: 20k, 21.8%Cornell University: 20k, 23.6%University of California, Berkeley: 17k, 21.8%University of California San Diego: 17k, 22.3%Northwestern Polytechnical University: 24k, 27.7%University of Michigan: 28k, 21.5%University of Pennsylvania: 19k, 23.5%Shandong University: 25k, 23.8%University of California, Los Angeles: 19k, 21.7%Hong Kong Polytechnic University: 18k, 35.6%Princeton University: 8,823, 28.4%Tianjin University: 24k, 22.6%University of Toronto: 29k, 21.9%Beihang University: 23k, 25.4%Imperial College London: 18k, 24.6%Zhengzhou University: 18k, 25.2%South China University of Technology: 22k, 24.6%Jilin University: 20k, 26.2%University of Washington: 21k, 22.8%Columbia University: 17k, 23.1%Chongqing University: 22k, 25.6%Johns Hopkins University: 22k, 22.5%Hunan University: 14k, 28.9%Jiangsu University: 15k, 30.3%Southern University of Science and Technology: 11k, 28.1%Tongji University: 26k, 24.4%California Institute of Technology: 4,861, 27.5%City University of Hong Kong: 12k, 31.8%University of Electronic Science and Technology of China: 23k, 21.3%Shenzhen University: 15k, 27.3%Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College: 20k, 22.4%Soochow University: 16k, 23.0%Xiamen University: 15k, 25.4%École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne: 8,507, 25.1%Southeast University: 28k, 23.4%Dalian University of Technology: 20k, 23.0%Chinese University of Hong Kong: 14k, 29.1%UNSW Sydney: 17k, 26.8%Howard Hughes Medical Institute: 1,663, 49.8%Washington University in St. Louis: 14k, 20.9%Northwestern University: 14k, 23.6%University of Science and Technology Beijing: 16k, 22.3%Monash University: 17k, 28.7%The University of Tokyo: 25k, 15.7%The University of Queensland: 17k, 27.4%The University of Melbourne: 20k, 26.2%Technical University of Munich: 16k, 23.1%University of Copenhagen: 14k, 26.5%The University of Sydney: 20k, 24.9%University of Chicago: 16k, 19.2%University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign: 18k, 21.9%New York University: 16k, 22.3%Beijing Normal University: 14k, 28.3%University of Wisconsin–Madison: 19k, 21.5%Qingdao University: 11k, 27.9%University of California, San Francisco: 13k, 22.4%Shanghai University: 15k, 20.8%University of Manchester: 16k, 23.2%Saveetha University: 20k, 16.6%King Saud University: 19k, 25.0%King's College London: 15k, 25.2%University of British Columbia: 20k, 22.7%The University of Texas at Austin: 17k, 21.9%Pennsylvania State University: 20k, 21.6%Hong Kong University of Science and Technology: 7,983, 30.7%Lanzhou University: 12k, 26.0%University of Zurich: 11k, 27.2%Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory: 5,264, 22.2%Duke University: 14k, 21.4%University of Edinburgh: 15k, 23.6%University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: 35k, 9.6%Beijing University of Chemical Technology: 8,934, 24.2%Fuzhou University: 12k, 22.7%Zhejiang University of Technology: 11k, 24.6%Brigham and Women's Hospital: 8,998, 24.0%Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München: 13k, 21.1%China Agricultural University: 11k, 35.5%East China Normal University: 10k, 25.9%KU Leuven: 18k, 22.9%King Abdullah University of Science and Technology: 5,747, 28.3%University of California, Irvine: 12k, 21.1%Inserm: 12k, 20.8%The Ohio State University: 19k, 19.3%Purdue University West Lafayette: 20k, 17.7%University of Florida: 21k, 18.1%Utrecht University: 11k, 28.8%China University of Geosciences: 9,408, 30.0%University of Pittsburgh: 15k, 19.5%Nanchang University: 9,905, 26.4%Nanjing University of Science and Technology: 17k, 19.5%Aarhus University: 15k, 23.1%Sapienza University of Rome: 23k, 19.1%Massachusetts General Hospital: 12k, 20.9%McGill University: 15k, 22.2%University of Minnesota: 15k, 20.9%Northeastern University: 18k, 23.1%Wuhan University of Technology: 17k, 20.0%Vellore Institute of Technology University: 20k, 20.3%University of Bologna: 16k, 23.3%University of Southern California: 15k, 21.4%Guangdong University of Technology: 11k, 23.2%University of California, Davis: 15k, 20.3%University of Amsterdam: 11k, 30.8%Texas A&M University: 15k, 21.5%National University of Defense Technology: 16k, 20.3%Carnegie Mellon University: 8,353, 25.5%Yangzhou University: 11k, 27.1%The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center: 11k, 17.8%Georgia Institute of Technology: 13k, 20.7%Weizmann Institute of Science: 2,932, 28.1%Delft University of Technology: 14k, 25.1%Heidelberg University: 11k, 21.5%East China University of Science and Technology: 10k, 22.0%University of Maryland, College Park: 11k, 23.2%Uppsala University: 11k, 24.8%Jiangnan University: 12k, 27.4%University of Alberta: 18k, 20.2%Seoul National University: 16k, 20.0%University of Colorado Boulder: 7,887, 23.9%Zhejiang Normal University: 5,936, 27.0%University of Birmingham: 12k, 25.5%China University of Mining and Technology: 16k, 24.7%Emory University: 14k, 17.7%Guangxi University: 12k, 25.6%University of California, Santa Barbara: 6,553, 23.4%Yonsei University: 15k, 20.9%Universität Hamburg: 11k, 20.9%University of Padua: 16k, 22.5%Henan University: 7,040, 26.9%Nanjing Forestry University: 9,377, 31.3%University of Glasgow: 12k, 23.7%National Institutes of Health: 5,456, 23.9%Jinan University: 9,231, 27.8%Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey: 13k, 20.3%Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology: 8,378, 23.1%Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology: 9,577, 23.6%Kyoto University: 15k, 15.1%The University of Adelaide: 8,742, 26.2%Ghent University: 11k, 25.0%Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai: 9,818, 18.1%Xidian University: 15k, 23.5%Ningbo University: 11k, 24.5%Nanjing Tech University: 10k, 21.8%University of Bristol: 11k, 23.6%Michigan State University: 15k, 21.0%University of Waterloo: 11k, 20.9%Tel Aviv University: 11k, 19.7%University of Exeter: 8,473, 27.6%University of Vienna: 9,931, 22.9%University of Groningen: 10k, 29.4%Southwest Jiaotong University: 16k, 23.2%Technical University of Denmark: 11k, 20.0%China University of Petroleum, East China: 9,727, 21.7%University of Leeds: 11k, 24.2%Guizhou University: 11k, 26.3%University of Oslo: 9,996, 27.1%Westlake University: 2,616, 29.7%Karolinska Institutet: 8,930, 26.3%Broad Institute: 1,576, 36.9%South China Normal University: 7,237, 23.5%Sungkyunkwan University: 11k, 21.4%University of Virginia: 11k, 18.7%King Khalid University: 7,533, 27.1%University of Milan: 13k, 21.2%Beijing University of Technology: 15k, 20.7%Kunming University of Science and Technology: 12k, 20.7%Arizona State University: 14k, 22.5%Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences: 1,957, 31.1%Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs: 9,122, 36.5%Hainan University: 8,971, 26.8%University of Arizona: 13k, 17.5%Boston University: 9,881, 22.9%University of Liverpool: 10k, 22.6%Politecnico di Milano: 15k, 21.9%Sorbonne Université: 10k, 15.9%University of Johannesburg: 13k, 26.4%University of Naples Federico II: 12k, 25.1%University of Calgary: 13k, 20.8%University of Basel: 5,684, 25.4%Norwegian University of Science and Technology: 11k, 25.8%University of Tübingen: 7,736, 23.7%Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics: 18k, 21.2%University of Shanghai for Science and Technology: 8,973, 21.7%North Carolina State University: 11k, 20.3%Southwest University: 11k, 26.4%Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures: 1,594, 27.4%RWTH Aachen University: 15k, 15.3%King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals: 7,157, 26.2%North China Electric Power University: 14k, 17.1%Johns Hopkins Medicine: 7,682, 23.6%Donghua University: 7,520, 24.2%Ocean University of China: 10k, 25.6%Southern Medical University: 7,293, 27.1%University of Helsinki: 12k, 25.0%University of Macau: 6,657, 33.0%Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz: 6,150, 22.3%Australian National University: 10k, 23.9%Korea University: 11k, 23.7%Northwest A&F University: 8,066, 39.6%King Abdulaziz University: 11k, 23.0%Lovely Professional University: 10k, 19.3%Northeast Agricultural University: 5,419, 41.9%China Medical University: 6,507, 28.5%West China Hospital of Sichuan University: 7,824, 25.4%Lund University: 12k, 24.7%University of Technology Sydney: 9,208, 29.4%Universidade de São Paulo: 36k, 10.8%RMIT University: 7,274, 31.2%Université Paris Cité: 8,571, 18.4%Tohoku University: 13k, 13.9%Nanjing Medical University: 10k, 22.7%Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam: 7,879, 28.7%University of Geneva: 6,801, 24.4%University of Bern: 8,455, 24.6%University of Nottingham: 11k, 22.0%University of Florence: 11k, 21.5%ShanghaiTech University: 3,798, 23.9%Université Paris-Saclay: 7,841, 18.2%Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg: 9,512, 18.1%Hefei National Center for Physical Sciences at Nanoscale: 1,410, 32.1%University of Utah: 13k, 17.8%Universiti Sains Malaysia: 11k, 20.9%Hefei University of Technology: 11k, 21.5%Leiden University: 6,881, 28.5%University of Göttingen: 5,574, 25.5%University of Warwick: 9,224, 22.7%Nanjing Normal University: 7,007, 24.2%University of Lisbon: 13k, 22.3%Freie Universität Berlin: 7,916, 20.9%University of Sheffield: 10k, 23.3%Stockholm University: 6,568, 28.8%Hebrew University of Jerusalem: 8,159, 22.2%University of Münster: 7,024, 20.6%National Institute for Materials Science: 3,342, 13.2%Capital Medical University: 12k, 20.3%Qatar University: 5,964, 31.1%Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China: 6,577, 28.0%University of Auckland: 11k, 24.7%Argonne National Laboratory: 4,016, 19.5%Radboud University Nijmegen: 8,511, 26.0%Queen Mary University of London: 8,157, 25.0%Durham University: 7,305, 24.7%Anhui University: 9,437, 20.6%Cairo University: 16k, 15.5%Karlsruhe Institute of Technology: 11k, 17.8%Rice University: 4,528, 23.9%Universitat de Barcelona: 11k, 20.1%Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen: 3,790, 29.8%National and Kapodistrian University of Athens: 10k, 21.8%University of Southampton: 9,633, 21.8%University of Bonn: 6,890, 23.2%Northwest University: 5,832, 23.4%Vanderbilt University: 8,230, 21.0%Virginia Tech: 11k, 20.6%University of Illinois Chicago: 10k, 19.2%KTH Royal Institute of Technology: 7,559, 23.1%Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics: 1,948, 27.5%The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center: 7,540, 18.7%University of Lausanne: 6,982, 24.3%Khalifa University of Science and Technology: 4,984, 28.5%Western University: 11k, 21.1%Qingdao University of Science and Technology: 7,607, 21.8%McMaster University: 11k, 20.1%Wageningen University & Research: 7,493, 35.2%Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin: 7,302, 25.1%University of Gothenburg: 8,016, 27.3%Google (United States): 3,783, 27.4%Hangzhou Normal University: 4,345, 26.5%Institute of Physics: 1,757, 23.1%Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center: 6,624, 19.7%University of Freiburg: 7,225, 21.0%Harvard UniversityUniversity of Chines…Tsinghua UniversityChinese Academy of S…Zhejiang University
above the meannear itbelow it

One dot per institution in the world ranking, 2022–now.

  1. 920 Perimeter Institute Canada · Waterloo · #623 all time 50.5% top 10% · 500 works
  2. 68 Howard Hughes Medical Institute United States · Chevy Chase · #15 all time 49.8% top 10% · 1.7k works
  3. 700 Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (United States) United States · Redwood City · #1613 all time 45.3% top 10% · 416 works
  4. 855 Changsha Medical University China · Changsha · #3330 all time 45.0% top 10% · 533 works
  5. 646 Education University of Hong Kong Hong Kong · Tai Po · #1618 all time 44.5% top 10% · 3k works
  6. 823 State Key Laboratory of Biotherapy · Chengdu · #1899 all time 41.9% top 10% · 736 works
  7. 415 Center for Life Sciences China · Beijing · #1096 all time 41.7% top 10% · 1.1k works
  8. 459 Lebanese American University Lebanon · Beirut · #2093 all time 41.3% top 10% · 2.3k works
  9. 889 University of Business and Technology Saudi Arabia · Jeddah · #3315 all time 40.6% top 10% · 2k works
  10. 947 State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying Mapping and Remote Sensing China · Wuhan · #1385 all time 39.3% top 10% · 1.2k works

The track on each row is that row’s top-10% rate. The tick is the world’s rate in this record, 16.5%; teal is above it, red below. The ranking itself is the composite score, which the rate is only one part of.

Where is each country unusually focused?

Every country has a field it puts far more of its research into than the world does. The strongest concentrations among the top 60 research countries:

  1. 1 HungaryGeography, Planning and Development 40.2× the world’s share
  2. 2 UkraineAnatomy 27.2× the world’s share
  3. 3 ItalyIndustrial relations 22.2× the world’s share
  4. 4 RussiaFuel Technology 16.3× the world’s share
  5. 5 NigeriaLibrary and Information Sciences 15.2× the world’s share
  6. 6 EgyptLeadership and Management 13.4× the world’s share
  7. 7 PolandLinguistics and Language 13.0× the world’s share
  8. 8 TürkiyeMuseology 11.0× the world’s share
  9. 9 South KoreaLeadership and Management 10.8× the world’s share
  10. 10 ChileGeneral Social Sciences 10.7× the world’s share
  11. 11 ArgentinaGeneral Social Sciences 10.6× the world’s share
  12. 12 IndonesiaHuman Factors and Ergonomics 10.0× the world’s share

The ratio of the field’s share of the country’s research to its share of the world’s, 2022–now; fields with at least 200 works.

Which research topics are shrinking?

Not every topic grows. Among topics with at least 300 works, these published less in 2015–19 than in 2005–09. A shrinking topic is not always a dying one: the same work can move to a newer topic under a different name.

  1. 1 Higher Education and Teaching Methods Information Systems · Computer Science −87% 87k works
  2. 2 Advanced Computational Techniques and Applications Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science −85% 89k works
  3. 3 Evaluation and Optimization Models Safety, Risk, Reliability and Quality · Engineering −85% 33k works
  4. 4 Industrial Technology and Control Systems Control and Systems Engineering · Engineering −84% 67k works
  5. 5 Environmental Quality and Pollution Ecology · Environmental Science −82% 27k works
  6. 6 Simulation and Modeling Applications Control and Systems Engineering · Engineering −82% 60k works
  7. 7 Environmental and Agricultural Sciences Water Science and Technology · Environmental Science −82% 32k works
  8. 8 Blasting Impact and Analysis Building and Construction · Engineering −80% 3.3k works

Follow what is rising

One finding a day from the record, the same for every reader. Subscribe to the daily discovery feed in any feed reader, or follow any field, place or institution with the star on its page: it then waits for you on the home page. How every trend here is measured.