Sector index · Industry and infrastructure · 2026
Aircraft, propulsion, aviation systems and the aerodynamics of flight vehicles. Work on the aerodynamics of trains and road vehicles is placed in Mobility.
Provisional: only 17 universities are eligible in this sector, so positions move more with small changes in evidence. Ranked universities have at least 20 verified industry works in this sector (2021-2025). Score: volume 30%, reach 25% (company groups with 2+ joint works), repeat partnerships 25% (3+ works over 2+ years) and network influence 20%, each as a percentile within this sector's pool of 17.
| # | University | Country | Score | Works | Partners | Leading partners |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Beihang University | China | 94.1 | 113 | 12 | Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC)STATE-OWNED |
| 2 | Nanjing University of Science and Technology | China | 82.9 | 61 | 12 | China North Industries Group CorporationSTATE-OWNED, Inner Mongolia Electric Power, Inner Mongolia Electric Power Survey & Design Institute |
| 3 | Beijing Institute of Technology | China | 82.8 | 60 | 15 | China Aerospace Science and Industry CorporationSTATE-OWNED, China Academy Of Machinery Science & TechnologySTATE-OWNED, China North Industries Group CorporationSTATE-OWNED |
| 4 | Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics | China | 80.4 | 75 | 9 | Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC)STATE-OWNED, Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED |
| 5 | Northwestern Polytechnical University | China | 78.2 | 82 | 8 | Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC)STATE-OWNED |
| 6 | Shanghai Jiao Tong University | China | 68.5 | 62 | 9 | Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, China North Industries Group CorporationSTATE-OWNED |
| 7 | Xi'an Jiaotong University | China | 62.9 | 58 | 7 | Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Dongfang Electric CorporationSTATE-OWNED, Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED |
| 8 | Harbin Institute of Technology | China | 60.3 | 48 | 9 | China Aerospace Science and Industry CorporationSTATE-OWNED, Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC)STATE-OWNED |
| 9 | Imperial College London | United Kingdom | 50.0 | 40 | 5 | Rolls-Royce, Airbus, Mitsubishi Electric |
| 10 | Harbin Engineering University | China | 41.5 | 28 | 5 | China State ShipbuildingSTATE-OWNED, China Shipbuilding Industry CorporationSTATE-OWNED, China Electronics Technology Group CorporationSTATE-OWNED |
| 11 | Cranfield University | United Kingdom | 25.7 | 25 | 4 | Rolls-Royce, Boeing, Mitsubishi Electric |
| 12 | University of Oxford | United Kingdom | 25.4 | 28 | 3 | Rolls-Royce, Mitsubishi Electric, First Light Fusion |
| 13 | University of Cambridge | United Kingdom | 23.2 | 24 | 4 | Rolls-Royce, Siemens, Siemens Energy |
| 14 | Southwest Jiaotong University | China | 22.2 | 20 | 5 | China Railway GroupSTATE-OWNED, CRRCSTATE-OWNED, CCCC Highway ConsultantsSTATE-OWNED |
| 15 | Zhejiang University | China | 19.3 | 24 | 4 | Commercial Aircraft Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Windey Energy Technology Group Co. |
| 16 | Technical University of Munich | Germany | 17.4 | 20 | 4 | Airbus, MTU Aero Engines, Siemens |
| 17 | Tsinghua University | China | 15.0 | 24 | 4 | Aero Engine Corporation of ChinaSTATE-OWNED, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC)STATE-OWNED, China North Industries Group CorporationSTATE-OWNED |
Leading partners: up to three company groups with the most joint works in the sector. State-owned enterprises are marked; a partner whose name is withheld is not listed.
Funded partnerships (reported, not scored). 113 UK and EU projects starting 2021 to 2025 (27 UKRI, 86 Horizon) involve a cohort university and a company group whose main sector, by its verified joint works, is this one (111 universities): most often Deep Blue, Ingenieria Y Economia Del Transporte, MTU Aero Engines, Reaction Engines, HIT09. Sources: UKRI Gateway to Research harvested 4 Oct 2026; CORDIS bulk files of 2026-10-12 (latest record update 2026-06-10). Funded partnerships cover UK (UKRI Gateway to Research) and EU (Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe, CORDIS) projects starting 2021 to 2025 only. They are reported, never scored, and a funder record outside these two sources is not visible here.
Advanced Control and Stabilization in Aerospace Systems; Aerodynamics and Acoustics in Jet Flows; Aerodynamics and Fluid Dynamics Research; Aeroelasticity and Vibration Control; Aerospace Engineering and Applications; Aerospace Engineering and Control Systems; Aerospace Engineering and Energy Systems; Aerospace and Aviation Technology; Air Traffic Management and Optimization; Biomimetic flight and propulsion mechanisms; Bladed Disk Vibration Dynamics; Computational Fluid Dynamics and Aerodynamics; Electromagnetic Launch and Propulsion Technology; Energetic Materials and Combustion; Fluid dynamics and aerodynamics studies; Guidance and Control Systems; Plasma and Flow Control in Aerodynamics; Turbomachinery Performance and Optimization
Open data
The full Aerospace and Aviation ranking (rank, university, country, score, sector works, partners and leading partners) as an Excel workbook. Every other index is in the all-indices workbook.
Released under CC BY 4.0: reuse freely with attribution to the Industry Collaboration Index, Global Research Partnerships. How it is measured.