Expert panel praises KTH

KTH Vice President Björn Birgisson, who has been in charge of the evaluation project named the KTH Research Assessment Exercise 2012 (RAE2012), says: “KTH is the first seat of learning in Scandinavia and also one of the first in the world to have included in its evaluation how its research impacts society from an economic and a social perspective.”

The RAE2012 evaluation shows that more than half of the institute’s research base is judged to have an “outstanding impact on and engagement with society,” which the Swedish government emphasised in its Research and Innovation bill from 11 October 2012 as being essential in its future priorities for universities and colleges.

The Chemistry & Materials Science research field receives the highest evaluations in virtually every sub-category and the panels of experts rate parts of the Biotechnology research field as a Swedish flagship that could become Sweden’s answer to CERN.

The assessment also shows that the research work carried out within more than half of the 47 research areas that were evaluated is of such high quality that it can be regarded as “world-leading”.

RAE2012 also indicates that KTH researchers are successful in getting their research findings published in scientific publications and that the impact of these publications is growing with the citation rate having risen from 1.18 in 2004 to 1.42 in 2010.

In 2008, KTH carried out a similar assessment to ensure that its research was competitive on an international scale and for future research strategies to be developed from a global perspective. As part of the latest Research Assessment Exercise in 2012, more than 100 international experts from universities as well as trade and industry visited KTH in June to evaluate 47 of the institute’s research areas.

You can find additional information about RAE2012 here .

For more information, contact Björn Birgisson: Tel: 08-790 87 02; e-mail: bjornbir@kth.se or Susanna Pehrson: Tel: 08-790 82 39; e-mail: pehrso@kth.se