Four University of Tartu researchers among the world's most influential

Professor of Microbiomics Elin Org works at the Institute of Genomics where her research group mainly studies the relationships between gut microbiota and complex diseases. They aim to assess the role of the microbiome in the prevention or early detection of diseases, to find connections between the microbiome and different stages of diseases, and to study the effect of the microbiome on drug efficacy. Several articles of Elin Org have been published in the influential journal Nature Genetics.

Professor Leho Tedersoo and Associate Professor Mohammad Bahram work together on research in soil microbiology and biodiversity. Tedersoo focuses on fungi and aspects of global biogeography. This year, Tedersoo received the Advanced Grant of the European Research Council to create a new system for DNA-based classification of microscopic fungi. Bahram, who is based at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, studies soil microorganisms and their functionality. Their research aims to find out how to use soil resources sustainably in times of climate change, and to propose environmentally sound solutions for land-use change and biodiversity enhancement.

The research focus of Frank Witlox, Visiting Professor of Human Geography at the University of Tartu, is on the analysis of travel behaviour, sustainable mobility, urbanisation and urban logistics. Some of Witlox’s research has been published under other universities.

The list of Highly Cited Researchers also includes a researcher who launched his career at the University of Tartu – Sten Anslan, former research fellow of metagenomics of fauna at the University of Tartu and current Academy Research Fellow at the University of Jyväskylä.

How is the impact assessed?

“The citability of a scientific article is an important indicator of the international impact of a researcher’s work. The more an article has been cited by other researchers, the broader the impact of the research on the advancement of new knowledge,” explained Kalmer Lauk, Analyst of Research and Development at the University of Tartu.

The list, which is based on one of the world's largest scientific databases Web of Science, included 6,868 of the most influential researchers of the past 11 years (2014–2024). The list is based on data from the Web of Science’s analytics tool Essential Science Indicators (ESI), which aggregates 1% of the world’s most cited publications. ESI groups research publications into 21 fields of research.

However, the compilers of the list did not analyse all the scientific articles that made it among the most cited publications, but only those with authors representing no more than 30 institutions. “In addition, anomalies related to self-referencing and plagiarism as well as general research ethics are considered. The checking process is long and thorough,” explained Lauk.

Based on the cleansed data, a threshold is set by Clarivate for each field to determine how many researchers from that field are shortlisted. The shortlisted researchers are assessed based on the number of their most cited publications. All in all, it takes almost half a year to analyse the data.

Other Estonian researchers on the list are Professor and Academician Ülo Niinemets from the Chair of Plant and Crop Science of the Estonian University of Life Sciences and Adjunct Professor in Marketing Linda D. Hollebeek from Tallinn University of Technology.

See Clarivate’s Highly Cited Researchers.