DENTON (UNT), Texas — A recently published list of the world’s top researchers has reinforced the University of North Texas’ reputation as a world-class Tier One research university.

Forty-six UNT researchers were included in the ranking of the world’s most cited researchers and those who are among the top 2% of more than six million scientists worldwide within their specialty areas throughout their careers. Fifty-one researchers were among the top 2% for a single year – 2019. The ranking method is based on standardized citation metrics developed by a group of scientists led by John P.A. Ioannidis, a statistician at Stanford University. The study was published in the Public Library of Science Biology journal: “Updated science-wide author databases of standardized citation indicators.”

“The number of UNT researchers on this list is indicative of our strength as a Tier One research university on the rise,” UNT Vice President for Research Mark McLellan said. “The impact of research conducted at UNT goes beyond just the number of citations. Researchers at UNT are solving some of the biggest problems of our world today.”

The impact of scientific research is often measured by citations – how many times a researchers’ work is cited by another scientific paper. Ioannidis’ study resulted in the creation of the ranking by analyzing data collected from 1996 to 2019, covering more than six million scientists in 22 major fields and 176 subfields.

Ioannidis and his colleagues created a comprehensive database of more than 100,000 of the most-cited scientists across all scientific fields, the top researchers who have authored at least five scientific papers. This top 2% were assigned a composite citation score or “c-score” based on standardized citation indicators, which include numbers of citations, a commonly used metric known as “h-index” which reflects an individual’s research output, co-authorship and a composite indicator for career-long impact. The study is considered by many as a more holistic method of judging the impact of a researcher’s work compared to use of a single metric.

The following UNT researchers were included in the ranking of the world’s top contributors to their fields of science:

• Materials Science and Engineering: 
  • Career Index: Rajiv Mishra, Witold Brostow, Andrey Voevodin, Zhenhai Xia, Raj Banerjee, Wonbong Choi, Narendra Dahotre, Francis D'Souza, Song Fu, Hanchen Huang, Xinrong Li, Saraju Mohanty, Vish Prasad, Robert Renka, Cheng Yu and Jincheng Du 
  • Annual Index: Rajiv Mishra, Zhenhai Xia, Witold Brostow, Raj Banerjee, Wonbong Choi, Andrey Voevodin, Diana Berman, Tom Scharf, Narendra Dahotre, Hyunsook Do, Francis D'Souza, Jincheng Du, Elias Kougianos, Xinrong Li, Saraju Mohanty, Sheldon Shi, Hua Sun, Qing Yang, Cheng Yu, Xiaohua Yuan and Samir Aouadi  
• Chemistry: 
  • Career Index: Tom Cundari, Shengqian Ma, Paul Bagus, Francis D’Souza, William Acree, David Hrovat and Weston Bordon (emeritus)
  • Annual Index: Shengqian Ma, Bill Acree, Paul Bagus, Francis D’Souza, Tom Cundari, Weston Bordon (emeritus) and Mohammad Omary
• Biological Sciences: 
  • Career Index: Richard Dixon, Jyoti Shah, Warren Burggren, Vladmir Shulaev, Kent Chapman, Guenter Gross (Emeritus) and Thomas Beitinger (retired)
  • Annual Index: Richard Dixon, Vladimir Shulaev, Jyoti Shah, Warren Burggren, Kent Chapman, Feng Chen and Thomas Beitinger (retired)
• Computer Science and Engineering:
  • Career Index: Saraju Mohanty, Song Fu and Robert Renka (Emeritus)
  • Annual Index: Saraju Mohanty, Hyunsook Do, Xiaohui Yuan and Qing Yang
• Physics: 
  • Career Index: Marco Nardelli, Jingbiao Cui, Paolo Grigolini and Zhibing Hu (deceased)
  • Annual Index: Marco Nardelli and Jingbiao Cui
• Psychology: 
  • Career Index: Richard Rogers, Edward Watkins and Trent Petrie
  • Annual Index: Adriel Boals, Richard Rogers, Craig Neumann, Joshua Hook and Edward Watkins
• Mechanical Engineering: 
  • Career Index: Hanchen Huang, Vish Prasad and Cheng Yu
  • Annual Index: Cheng Yu and Sheldon Shi
• Political Science: 
  • Career Index: Idean Salehyan and Paul Hensel
  • Annual Index: Idean Salehyan and John Ishiyama
• Electrical Engineering: 
  • Career Index: Xinrong Li
  • Annual Index: Xinrong Li, Hua Sun and Elias Kougianos
• Merchandising and Digital Retailing: 
  • Career Index: Bugao Xu
  • Annual Index: Bugao Xu and Kiseol Yang 
• Educational Psychology:
  • Career Index: Robin Henson 
  • Annual Index: Robin Henson
• Management:
  • Career Index: Jeremy Short
  • Annual Index: Jeremy Short
• Information Technology and Decision Sciences: 
  • Career Index: Dan Kim
  • Annual Index: Dan Kim
• Learning Technologies: 
  • Career Index: Tom Parsons
  • Annual Index: Tom Parsons
• Geography and the Environment: 
  • Career Index: Paul Hudak
  • Annual Index: Steve Wolverton
• Kinesiology: 
  • Career Index: David Hill
• Mathematics: 
  • Career Index: Mariusz Urbanski
• Music Education:
  • Annual Index: Sean Powell