Poland among the Rising Stars in a ranking by Nature

In a recently published “Nature Index 2016 Rising Stars” report, Poland has been listed first among the “rising stars of science.” This term is applied to countries whose position in the Nature Index tables has improved dramatically over the past four years.

In the years 2012-2015, Poland’s contribution to the “Nature” index has increased by 34 per cent. The magazine underscores that such a major leap was possible thanks to the creation of the National Science Centre in 2011, an agency which fosters basic research, and the reform of its applied-science counterpart, the National Centre for Research and Development;  both institutions have become pillars of the competitive-grant-based system of funding science. The magazine also mentions the considerable significance of EU funds for the advancement of science in Poland.

Among the 100 “rising stars” with the best quality of research (Top 100 institutions), two Polish universities have been listed: Jagiellonian University (placed 69^th) and the University of Warsaw (96^th). It should be noted that in the ranking of countries from Southern and Eastern Europe (Top 25 institutions/South East Europe), of the 25 research institutions listed as many as 8 are Polish, 3 of which are in the top ten. Jagiellonian University has been ranked first, the University of Warsaw third, and the National Centre for Nuclear Research tenth. Other institutions included in the ranking are the AGH University of Science and Technology, the University of Wrocław, Polish Academy of Sciences, Marie Curie-Skłodowska University and Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań.