Pompeu Fabra University has become the number one institution in the general research classification of Spanish university centres with an impact rate of 1.56. Moreover, as regards areas of study, it holds first position in two of the four areas considered in the 2010 Scimago Institutions Report (Sir) in Spain.

In particular, aside from holding first position in the general classification for Spain, UPF holds a leading position in health sciences and social sciences and humanities, whilst being second for life sciences just behind the University of Lleida. 51 Spanish universities are listed in this classification (out of a total of 78), 48 are State universities and three are private.

The SCImago ranking analyses the relevance, impact and repercussion of scientific publications from 2833 research institutions (universities, agencies, hospitals, companies and so on). This year's edition included institutions that have achieved excellence in research according to the impact of their scientific output on a global scale.

In the international classification, the top five universities are American: Rockefeller, Harvard, MIT, Stanford and California. Their impact rates range from 2.28 to 2.44. UPF holds position 611 in this classification.

UPF has the highest impact rate among Spanish universities

UPF, with 2295 major publications produced between 2004 and 2008, only accounts for a small degree of the overall global publication volume of articles compared to larger universities. Nonetheless, these publications are noteworthy when it comes to the number of times they are cited. For this reason, UPF has achieved the highest impact rate in Spain: 1.56. In the classification of Catalan universities it is followed by UB (1.41), UAB (1.35), URV (1.35) and UdL (1.35).

The SIR impact rate is calculated by assigning the value 1 to the average number of times a publication is cited for every area of knowledge. Thus, value 2 shows that a publication has been cited twice as often as normal. In order to determine the general average value, the values obtained from each publication are weighted taking into consideration the volume of publications in each field.

The SCImago group is involved in the development of tools for analysing scientific information by using the Scopus d'Elsevier database which comprises 80% of scientific output worldwide. The SCImago group is formed by experts from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and the universities of Granada, Alcalá de Henares, Carlos III of Madrid, Extremadura, Oporto (Portugal), La Plata (Argentina) and Pontífica Universidad Católica de Valparaiso (Chile).