Center for Clinical and Translational Science

The Rockefeller University ranks highly in a survey of academic institutions that sheds light on
the impact their research is having on innovation.

By examining how research articles are cited in patents owned by third parties—informed by and
citing academic work—rather than those held by institutions themselves, the Nature Index 2017
Innovation ranking shows the influence of research on the development of products and services.

Rockefeller receives the second to highest placement, surpassed only by The Scripps Research
Institute. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology comes in third.
 
The ranking is based on the so-called normalized Lens influence metric, which considers an
institution’s output between 1980 and 2015 cited in patent literature, and the value of the patents as perceived by the applicants.

Earlier this year, Rockefeller was singled out as the top biomedical research institution worldwide in terms of scientific impact by U-Multirank and CWTS Leiden.