2018 tables: Countries/territories - physical sciences

The 2018 tables are based on Nature Index data from 1 January 2017 to 31 December 2017.

Table criteria

# Country/territory Share 2016 Share 2017 Count 2017 Change in Adjusted Share 2016-2017*
1 United States of America (USA) 5,071.73 5,008.79 7,543 -2.4%
2 China 2,547.47 2,869.57 4,310 11.3%
3 Germany 1,605.00 1,571.58 3,150 -3.2%
4 United Kingdom (UK) 1,031.19 1,024.10 2,380 -1.9%
5 Japan 994.88 967.59 1,700 -3.9%
6 France 812.42 751.16 1,745 -8.6%
7 South Korea 631.88 621.15 1,078 -2.9%
8 Italy 514.32 495.26 1,244 -4.8%
9 Switzerland 462.27 484.81 1,259 3.6%
10 Spain 420.60 413.39 1,122 -2.9%
11 Canada 360.10 376.96 854 3.4%
12 India 298.41 332.02 614 9.9%
13 Netherlands 304.00 309.85 808 0.7%
14 Singapore 230.49 264.84 481 13.5%
15 Australia 289.49 257.63 672 -12.1%
16 Russia 248.79 251.23 862 -0.2%
17 Israel 229.58 238.72 537 2.7%
18 Sweden 164.19 189.16 595 13.8%
19 Taiwan 159.74 157.53 481 -2.6%
20 Brazil 138.81 141.06 516 0.4%
21 Austria 114.08 137.71 449 19.3%
22 Belgium 148.29 123.38 381 -17.8%
23 Denmark 119.40 115.26 385 -4.6%
24 Poland 109.36 98.13 515 -11.3%
25 Chile 53.32 70.29 268 30.3%
26 Finland 67.85 67.50 241 -1.7%
27 Czech Republic 45.48 64.66 325 40.5%
28 Iran 68.71 58.04 170 -16.5%
29 Saudi Arabia 53.97 52.92 154 -3.1%
30 Argentina 43.04 51.92 167 19.2%
31 Portugal 45.59 47.97 267 4.0%
32 Ireland 52.13 45.28 238 -14.2%
33 Greece 35.65 33.55 237 -7.0%
34 Pakistan 24.83 32.57 144 29.6%
35 Turkey 36.31 31.53 227 -14.2%
36 Mexico 31.99 30.43 194 -6.0%
37 Norway 29.73 28.74 177 -4.5%
38 South Africa 22.92 24.22 170 4.4%
39 Hungary 25.78 21.12 203 -19.0%
40 Slovenia 20.28 20.43 127 -0.5%
41 New Zealand 15.33 15.82 125 2.0%
42 Ukraine 15.73 14.36 202 -9.8%
43 Thailand 10.32 12.11 127 16.0%
44 Croatia 8.88 10.47 121 16.5%
45 Romania 13.37 10.39 184 -23.2%
46 Estonia 7.63 10.16 86 31.6%
47 Luxembourg 9.61 9.25 30 -4.9%
48 Armenia 6.02 6.95 173 14.0%
49 Colombia 12.59 6.37 209 -50.0%
50 Slovakia 5.18 6.23 99 18.8%

Footnote

Each year, the Nature Index publishes tables based on counts of high-quality research outputs in the previous calendar year. Users please note:

  1. The data behind the tables are based on a relatively small proportion of total research papers, they cover the natural sciences only and outputs are non-normalized (that is, they don’t reflect the size of the country or institution, or its overall research output).
  2. The Nature Index is one indicator of institutional research performance. The metrics of Count and Share used to order Nature Index listings are based on an institution’s or country’s publication output in 82 natural-science journals, selected on reputation by an independent panel of leading scientists in their fields.
  3. Nature Index recognizes that many other factors must be taken into account when considering research quality and institutional performance; Nature Index metrics alone should not be used to assess institutions or individuals.
  4. Nature Index data and methods are transparent and available under a creative commons licence at nature.com/nature-index/.

The Nature Index database undergoes regular updating, corrections, adjustment of institutional hierarchies, and removal of retracted papers and thus the live website can differ from the frozen annual tables.

*The change in adjusted Share accounts for the small annual variation in the total number of articles in Nature Index journals. Share values have been adjusted to 2021 levels to calculate the percentage change. For more information on the adjustment, please see the Adjusted metric explainer.