14/03/2011
The Australian National University (ANU) is a public teaching and research university located in Canberra, Australia. ANU was established by an act of the Parliament of Australia on 1 August 1946 and ranks among the top 100 universities in the world.
The University currently has the highest ranking for universities in Australia. It is also one of the highest ranked universities in Asia and the Southern Hemisphere according to several compilations, including the Academic Ranking of World Universities, the Times Higher Education World University Rankings and the QS World University Rankings (the latter two were amalgamated as the THE-QS World University Rankings until 2010). The Australian National University is the second highest ranked university outside North America and Britain, after ETH Zurich.
The QS World University Rankings consistently ranks the Australian National University highly. In 2010 it was ranked first in Australasia and twentieth in the World, one below McGill University, one above King's College London. It has dropped three places since the 2009 THE-QS World University Rankings (in 2010 Times Higher Education World University Rankings and QS World University Rankings parted ways to produce separate rankings) where it came seventeenth globally.
ANU is a member of several university alliances and cooperative networks, including the Group of Eight, the Association of Pacific Rim Universities, the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy and the International Alliance of Research Universities.
ANU includes five Nobel laureates among its staff and alumni.
