Based on over 15,000 subjective survey responses from senior academics worldwide, the rankings also reveal East Asian institutes making strong progress – although China’s rise has “stalled” for now. Australia also has two new top 100 entrants and its other representatives have improved their position.

There was no change in the top three from 2012’s rankings with Harvard University, USA, topping the list followed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA, and the University of Cambridge, UK. The University of Oxford, UK knocked Stanford, US, from fourth place after leap-frogging the University of California, Berkeley, which continues in fifth place. Stanford fell to sixth position.

“Spending cuts are clearly having a serious negative effect on the US’s standing and ability to compete”

Reflecting results from 2012, those remaining in the top ten included Princeton University, USA, the University of California, Los Angeles, the University of Tokyo (Japan) and Yale University, USA.

The US dominated the top 100, but falls by public universities reduced its share to 43 representatives from 44 last year and 45 the year before. Phil Baty, editor of the Times Higher Education Rankings said: “Spending cuts are clearly having a serious negative effect on the nation’s standing and ability to compete in an increasingly competitive global market.”

Similarly, the UK’s showing in the top 100 fell to nine institutions from an overall high of 12 in 2011. Australia, however, moved ahead of Japan and the Netherlands to have six representatives in the top 100, up from four last year.

Australia moved ahead of Japan and the Netherlands to have six representatives in the top 100, up from four last year

Baty added that serious government investment in East Asian countries was beginning to bear fruit. Japan continues to lead Asia with five top 100 universities despite Kyoto University slipping out of the top 20. Other leaders in the region emerged with the National University of Singapore climbing to 22nd, Seoul National University (Korea) entering the top 50 at 41st and the University of Hong Kong (China) taking 36th position up from 39th last year.

Only institutions from mainland China didn’t reflect the improvements, Tsinghua University falling to 35th from 30th last year and Peking to 45th from 38th.

Baty told The PIE News: “China has stalled and we can’t put our finger on it… It was a bit of a surprise. Obviously it has a huge drive towards globalising and attracting international students and faculty, but it is probably on a slightly earlier part of the journey than the other countries in the region.”

India is the only BRIC nation not represented on the table while Russia’s Lomonosov Moscow State University took 50th place and Brazil’s University of Sao Paulo continues in the 61-70 band.

The rankings are based on 16,639 responses from academics in 144 countries. Respondents were invited to nominate no more than 15 of the best institutions in their narrow field of expertise, based on their experience and knowledge.