Montana State recognized for international scientific impact

BOZEMAN — Montana State University has once again been named among the top universities in the world for its scientific impact and collaboration.

The university earned a spot on the CWTS Leiden Ranking for 2022, which ordered the 1,318 universities in the world with the largest contributions to international scientific journals. The ranking is done by the Centre for Science and Technology Studies, or CWTS, at Leiden University in the Netherlands. MSU is ranked 163 out of the top 202 universities in the U.S. included on the list.

The ranking is based on universities’ scientific contributions published in scholarly journals, as well as the impact those scientific findings have on the international community. Impact is measured by the number of times the research is cited in subsequent journal articles.

MSU’s overall publication impact rank was 956, with 1,317 published articles appearing in the citation database during the 2017-2020 period used in the latest ranking. Close to a tenth of those articles were among the top 10% of papers cited in their respective fields, signifying their high impact.

Additionally, MSU researchers collaborated on 3,180 publications, more than a third of which involved researchers in other countries. That indicates a significant level of international collaboration and positions MSU in that category among research institutions much larger in size, according to Alison Harmon, MSU vice president of research and economic development.

“This latest Leiden ranking is a reflection of the global importance and impact of our work,” Harmon said, noting that MSU’s strategic plan, “Choosing Promise,” sets goals for increasing international scholarship as part of the university’s effort to improve lives and society through research. “It’s also a reflection of our talented faculty across a wide range of disciplines.”

According to Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost Robert Mokwa, MSU's ongoing inclusion in the rankings is a point of pride for the university's research community.

“Recognitions based on outputs and impact, like the Leiden Ranking, signal that our research and creative solutions to challenging problems are making a difference and improving lives,” Mokwa said. “I am proud of our faculty and staff for their efforts in educating and training students for exciting careers and for providing the state new opportunities with emerging and important sectors that contribute to Montana’s economy. We are humbled and appreciate greatly this recognition for our creative, innovative and hard-working faculty.”

MSU tallied an all-time high for total research expenditures in 2020-2021, totaling $193 million. This marks a 16% increase over the previous year’s expenditures reported to the National Science Foundation and adds to more than a decade of research expenditures topping $100 million.

The Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education also classified MSU as one of 279 universities in the U.S. with “high” or “very high” research activity and one of only two universities that also have an enrollment profile that is majority undergraduate.

The Leiden Ranking is based on a leading bibliographic database, the Web of Science. More information, including the full list, is available at the Leiden Ranking website, leidenranking.com.