UNC Research Facts and Rankings
Research at UNC has doubled over the past 15 years, firmly establishing Carolina as one of America’s top-ranked research universities.
More than 150 faculty at UNC are members of the National Academies & prestigious learned societies
// UNC Research, 2021
2 Nobel Laureates
// Royal Swedish Academy of Science
21st most cited university in the world
// CWUR, 2019
// UNC RAMSeS, 2021
$645 million in multi-investigator projects
$514 million in multi-department projects
$350 million in multi-school projects
More than 800 postdoctoral fellows
// UNC Office of Postdoctoral Affairs, 2021
20th in the nation for the total number of postdoctoral fellows
// Survey of Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering, 2019
6th in the US for federally funded health sciences research
// HERD Survey, 2020
The National Institutes of Health is UNC’s largest federal funder, awarding more than $538M in 2021
// UNC RAMSeS, 2021
1st in the nation for federally funded social and behavioral science research and development
// COSSA, 2021
5th among the nation’s Schools of Public Health for NIH funding
// BRIMR, 21
13th in the US for privately sponsored clinical trials
// HERD Survey, 2020
$45 million in annual clinical trials research
// HERD Survey, 2020
$64 million in annual R&D from private industry sponsors
// UNC RAMSeS, 2021
// HERD Survey, 2020