The seven-year wait was worth it. The research assessments published last December provide a telling insight into the state of research in British universities — and the new data has triggered some of the biggest shifts that our university league table has seen in the past dozen years.

Our rankings are based on a calculation of the average result attained by research teams across the 159 institutions that took part in the 2008 research assessment exercise (RAE). Work was graded 4* (world-leading), 3* (internationally excellent), 2* (internationally recognised), 1* (nationally recognised) or unclassified.

Taking the top three categories together, 87% of the research work submitted to assessors was considered to be internationally recognised, 17% in the top category, with 37% internationally excellent and 33% internationally recognised.

The London School of Economics recorded the biggest proportion of world-leading research submitted (34.9%), followed by Cambridge (32%) and Oxford (31.8%).

When the results are averaged out, Cambridge narrowly edged out Oxford in our research rankings (see table, left). However, the degree to which Oxford narrowed the gap with Cambridge was instrumental in it finishing at the top of our league table once all other indicators are taken into account. And Oxford also took the lion’s share of central research funding — amounting to £118.9m and £5m more than Cambridge — when grants driven by the RAE outcomes were announced in March.

Several universities finished well above their overall ranking in the research table. Manchester was sixth in the UK for research but 26th overall, largely due to poor student satisfaction scores. Essex ranked ninth in the UK for research, but finished 46th overall.

Professor Colin Riordan, vice-chancellor of the University of Essex, makes clear the connection he believes exists between high-quality research and teaching. Essex ranks eighth in the UK for teaching quality in official ratings. “Students at Essex are taught by top-class scholars and researchers, many of them national experts consulted by government, industry and the media,” he says.

“As creators of knowledge, they train students to think, challenge and become knowledge creators in turn.”

Many modern universities (those created from the polytechnics in 1992) have seen significant improvements in their latest research ratings. The leading five are the University of the Arts London, Brighton, De Montfort, Portsmouth and Westminster. They all entered large numbers of staff for assessment and contain some of the leading academics in the UK, if not the world, in specific fields. So, 60% of the media and communications research entered by Westminster was rated 4*, a proportion bettered by just one subject (museum studies at Leicester) in the British higher education system.

At Brighton — our only modern University of the Year winner — 65% of a huge art and design submission, comprising more than 70 full-time equivalent staff, was rated 4* and 3*.

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