STU Agricultural Sciences Enters ESI Global Top 1% for the First Time — 15th Discipline to Achieve This Milestone

Agricultural Sciences Enters Global Top 1%

Clarivate has released the latest Essential Science Indicators (ESI) data, showing that STU’s Agricultural Sciences has entered the global top 1% for the first time, becoming the university’s 15th ESI top-1% discipline. STU now ranks 40th among Chinese universities and 6th among Guangdong provincial universities in total ESI top-1% disciplines.

ESI is an authoritative evaluation system based on Web of Science data, measuring global research performance by publication and citation metrics. It is widely recognized as a key indicator of international academic excellence, updated bimonthly.

Discipline Highlights

In the ESI classification, “Agricultural Sciences” encompasses a broad range of fields including aquaculture, forestry, food science, nutrition, and related biochemistry and molecular biology. STU has developed distinctive strengths aligned with eastern Guangdong’s tropical and subtropical environment, particularly in aquatic genetic breeding, marine species development, algae biology, and food safety.

Research Achievements

STU has built a “learning-research-production-application” four-dimensional collaborative model for new agricultural talent, focusing on marine crab, shellfish, and algae breeding:

• Developed 2 national-level aquatic new varieties and multiple new strains, with cumulative deployment exceeding 1 million mu (≈165,000 acres), generating over ¥3 billion in direct economic value and creating 50,000+ jobs
• Professor Zheng Huaiping’s team bred the “Nan’ao Golden Scallop” with annual output of ~¥2 billion, now exported to Malaysia
• Professor Chen Weizhou’s team developed Gracilaria “2007,” with cumulative output exceeding ¥800 million
• Professor Ma Hongyu’s team achieved breakthroughs in mud crab artificial breeding

Interdisciplinary Drive

In recent years, STU has promoted cross-disciplinary integration between agriculture, life sciences, and biomedicine through its “medicine-engineering integration, science-medicine intersection” strategy, driving high-quality publications and academic influence across the emerging “aquatics–biology–food–environment–health” interdisciplinary chain.

Source: STU Alumni Association WeChat Account (View original)