Each year, the Nature Index ranks countries based on their high-quality research achievements. The Nature Index allows countries to be ranked based on three key metrics by counting the number of authors’ articles in their indexed journals.
These three criteria are:
1- Article count or AC means the number of articles published in journals regardless of the number of authors
- Fractional count or FC calculates the share of each author in the writing of an article. The total fractional score of an article is equal to one
- Weighted fractional count or WFC, which assigns a weighted number. The weight fraction number of the modified version is the fraction number.
In the 2020 rankings, the number of articles in 82 journals which published by Nature quality was measured.
The top ten institutions and universities in the world according to this index are China (3 cases), USA (3 cases), France (1 case), Germany (2 cases) and United Kingdom (1 case).
Also among the West Asian countries, the top ten institutions and universities are from the Occupied Territories (6 cases), Saudi Arabia (1 case), Iran (1 case) and Turkey (2 cases).
In Iran, the top ten institutions and universities based on the Nature Index ranking, respectively include:
- Basic Sciences Research Institute 2- Shahid Beheshti University 3- Sharif University of Technology 4- Tarbiat Modares University 5- Ferdowsi University of Mashhad 6- Shiraz University 7- Maragheh Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Center 8- Mazandaran University 9- Shahroud University of Technology 10-Azad University.
The articles of the faculty members of the Faculty of Physics, the Laser and Plasma Research Institute and the Environmental Science Research Institute were included in this ranking.