Data appendix
The indicator set with its sources, the source registers, the licences of every kind of material and the formats of the edition.
Contents
- ·Edition home
- ·Executive summary
- 1Science is where the frontier is made
- 2Key findings
- 3Systems and sectors at baseline
- 4Risks and capability
- 5Loss of trust in the research record during a fast-moving emergency
- 6Readings from the other desks
- 7The 2027 agenda
- 8Systems in depth
- AMethodology
- BData appendix
- CReferences and record
- ·Complete edition, for print
B.1The indicator set
| Indicator | Value | Unit | Year | State | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Global R&D expenditure | 3.48 | USD trillion | 2024 | Reported | 1 |
| R&D expenditure, China | 1.028 | USD trillion | 2024 | Reported | 1 |
| R&D expenditure, United States | 1.009 | USD trillion | 2024 | Reported | 1 |
| R&D intensity, world (UNESCO) | 1.92 | % of GDP | 2023 | Reported | 2 |
| R&D intensity, world (World Bank) | 2.60 | % of GDP | 2023 | Reported | 3 |
| R&D intensity, Sub-Saharan Africa | 0.38 | % of GDP | 2023 | Reported | 2 |
| Researchers per million, world | 1,486 | per million | 2023 | Reported | 2 |
| Researchers per million, Sub-Saharan Africa | 88 | per million | 2023 | Reported | 2 |
| Researchers per million, Northern America | 5,006 | per million | 2023 | Reported | 2 |
| Women among researchers (headcount) | 31.4 | % | 2023 | Reported | 2 |
| Scientific articles worldwide | 3.5 | million | 2024 | Reported | 1 |
| Articles with international co-authors | 22 | % | 2024 | Reported | 1 |
| Patent applications by residents | 2,702,600 | applications | 2024 | Reported | 3 |
| Patent applications by non-residents | 1,022,400 | applications | 2024 | Reported | 3 |
| arXiv submissions | 284,486 | submissions | 2025 | Reported | 5 |
| Journal articles registered with Crossref | 6,673,658 | works | 2025 | Reported | 6 |
| Retraction notices registered with Crossref | 7,632 | notices | 2025 | Reported | 6 |
| Exascale systems on the TOP500 list | 5 | systems | 2026 | Reported | 4 |
| Objects launched into outer space | 4,510 | objects | 2025 | Reported | 21 |
| Protein Data Bank entries | 262,922 | entries | 2026 | Reported | 22 |
B.2Global source register
The governed source set behind this edition. Each source keeps its authority, coverage, cadence and role; categories describe origin, not truth.
Domains bound by the register
- FIN
- DAT
- TRD
- GOV
- AIC
- INF
- BIO
- HLT
- MIN
- CLI
| Source | Category | Coverage | Period | Cadence | Role |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NSB Indicators 20261 | national statistics agency | global and US | 2024 | biennial | R&D, output, talent |
| UNESCO Institute for Statistics2 | UN agency | global | 2023 | annual | capacity |
| World Bank indicators3 | intergovernmental agency | global | 2023 to 2024 | annual | R&D, articles, patents |
| TOP500 list4 | research project | global | 2026 | twice a year | exascale |
| arXiv statistics5 | preprint server | global | 2025 | monthly | preprint volume |
| Crossref API6 | DOI registration agency | global | 2025 | continuous | integrity, volume |
| AI Index Report 20268 | university institute | global | 2025 | annual | AI and compute |
| RCSB Protein Data Bank22 | open archive | global | 2026 | weekly | structures |
| GBIF23 | open data network | global | 2026 | continuous | species records |
| WHO guidance framework18 | UN agency | global | 2022 | one-off | dual-use research |
B.3Regional reading: science and engineering across ten clusters
Map plates follow with the regional Baseline Editions, when boundary sources and public-safe resolutions are bound. This page gives the regional reading in table form and ranks no region.
| Region | Principal hazards | Systems most exposed | Baseline evidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| North America | largest researcher density; business-led R&D | universities, industry, national laboratories | researchers per million2; US R&D share 29%1 |
| South America | low R&D intensity; growing output | universities, public institutes | R&D intensity 0.57% for Latin America and the Caribbean2 |
| Europe | public programmes; shared facilities | universities, CERN, EuroHPC | Horizon Europe24; JUPITER Booster4 |
| Eurasia | regional data thin in the sources opened | academies, institutes | regional statistics (not bound) |
| Middle East and North Africa | rising intensity in Northern Africa and Western Asia | universities, new institutes | R&D intensity and density2 |
| Africa | lowest researcher density | universities, networks | Sub-Saharan Africa 88 per million2 |
| South Asia | large output growth; low density | universities, institutes | India 7% of articles1; density 3472 |
| East Asia | fastest rise in spending and output | industry, universities, national centres | China 30% of R&D1; LineShine4 |
| ASEAN | rising intensity from a low base | universities, industry | South-Eastern Asia 1.03%2 |
| Oceania-Pacific | high density in Australia and New Zealand; thin in islands | universities, observatories | density in Australia and New Zealand2 |
B.4Facility card: Future Circular Collider study
- facility
- accelerator
- long-lead
- international
- Systems in view
- research infrastructure, civil engineering, funding, data
- Defining events
- feasibility study published in spring 202519
- Couplings
- INF → DAT data; INF → FIN cost; FIN → INF schedule
- Capability evidence
- a four-year study with national authorities and a preferred layout chosen from about 100 variants19
- Gaps
- funding commitments; competing proposals
- Agenda items
- F-04
The proposed ring has a circumference of 91 km and the estimated cost with four interaction points is CHF 15 billion over about 12 years [19].
SCALE
Ring and cost
Siting follows geology, connection to existing accelerators and social and environmental limits, with about one third of the cost in civil engineering [19].
SITING
Civil engineering
The study feeds the European Strategy for Particle Physics under the mandate of the CERN Council; this edition takes no view on the decision [19].
DECISION
Staged process
B.5How countries appear in the science and engineering edition
Countries enter the science and engineering edition through the research chapters of their own national editions, on one card grammar. They are read against peer distributions and thresholds, never ranked.
| Card field | What it shows | Source |
|---|---|---|
| WEFH+B state | each core system against peer distribution bands | national edition |
| Couplings | the national dependency matrix | national edition |
| Risk objects | the national risk portfolio | national edition |
| Capability rungs | the national capability ladder | national edition |
| Evidence age | oldest and newest source dates | national source register |
Editions in the 2026 Baseline programme
26national
countries and unions
10regional
clusters
16global
flagship and sector
20frontier
technology reports
How to read a country card
- Each system is shown against the distribution of its peers, with thresholds where they exist
- Couplings and risk objects come from the country’s own national edition
- Capability rungs record evidence, not a judgement of institutions
- Evidence age is printed, so older national data are visible as such
| Wave | Countries and unions | State |
|---|---|---|
| W0 | Canada | ISSUED |
| W1 | United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, European Union, Switzerland | PLANNED |
| W2 | Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Türkiye, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, South Africa, Senegal, Kenya, African Union, India, China, Republic of Korea, Indonesia, Singapore, Australia | PLANNED |
B.6Licences
| Material | Licence |
|---|---|
| Text | CC BY 4.0 |
| Data | on the licence of each source; Nexus tables CC BY 4.0 |
| Figures | Nexus figures CC BY 4.0; third-party as credited |
| Maps | boundary source and licence printed on each plate |
| Metadata | CC0 1.0, as Zenodo publishes it |
| Third-party data, figures and text | The source’s own licence, credited where it is used; never relicensed |
| Nexus-authored text, tables and figures: CC BY 4.0 (SPDX CC-BY-4.0). Map plates print their boundary source and licence. | |
B.7Formats and provenance
| Format | Kind | State | What it is | Identifier |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Web edition | HTML | On this site | Draft in stewardship review; every value resolves to its source. | NR-SECTOR-SCIENCE-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-v1.0.0 |
| Print edition | At release | A4 portrait · screen, print and archival PDF, signed with the web edition at release. | NR-SECTOR-SCIENCE-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-v1.0.0 | |
| Indicator data | CSV · JSON | On this site | 20 indicators with unit, year, status and source; the machine-readable copy ships with the evidence bundle at release. | NR-SECTOR-SCIENCE-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE data release v1 |
| Figures | SVG · PNG | On this site | 4 on the web edition: headline figure, figure 1.3, coupling instrument, capability ladder. | FIG-SECTOR-SCIENCE-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE-* |
| Slides | Not recorded | No slide deck is recorded for this edition. | ||
| Evidence brief | HTML · PDF | Not recorded | No evidence brief is recorded for this edition. | |
| Dataset with DOI | DataCite | At release | Concept and version DOI are minted at deposit; none is recorded yet. |
Provenance
- Edition pack
- The edition’s content pack (JSON), from which the print and web editions are built
- Evidence cut
- DC-SECTOR-SCIENCE-GLOBAL-2026-B0, closed 30 September 2026
- Reproducibility
- sourced values cited; analytical values reproducible from stated parameters
- Self-check
- 14 of 23 at evidence close; a fail on any item blocks release
- Review
- five passes scheduled before release (in Annex C)
- Publisher of record
- The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI) for the Nexus Consortium
- Corrections
- Registry correction pathway; upheld corrections are published as notices with a new version
Notes
Numbers are the edition’s reference numbers, so a note reads the same in every chapter. The full list, with every source and its licence, is in Annex C. Annex C, references
- 1NSB (ed.), Science and Engineering Indicators 2026: The State of U.S. Science and Engineering (NSB-SEP-2026-1), May 2026, National Science Board and National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, US National Science Foundation, Alexandria. Full PDF opened; global R&D, publications, collaboration, venture investment, semiconductor and doctoral-degree figures read from the text. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 2UNESCO Institute for Statistics (ed.), UIS data API, data version 20260507 (February 2026 data release): indicators EXPGDP.TOT, RESDEN.INHAB.TFTE and FRESP.THC, world and regional aggregates. UNESCO, Montreal. Data pulled and read. Observation year 2023. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 3DATA VINTAGE AFTER CLOSE: World Bank (ed.), World Development Indicators API (series updated 2026-10-08, after the 30 September evidence close; cited as the position at access): GB.XPD.RSDV.GD.ZS, SP.POP.SCIE.RD.P6, IP.JRN.ARTC.SC, IP.PAT.RESD, IP.PAT.NRES, world values. World Bank, Washington. Data pulled and read. Observation year 2023 (patents 2024, researchers 2020). Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 5POST-CLOSE, context only: arXiv (ed.), Monthly submissions statistics (monthly CSV, 1991 to November 2026; annual totals summed by the editors). Cornell University, Ithaca. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 6Crossref (ed.), Crossref REST API, work counts by type and publication year and counts of retraction notices (update-type filter), queried live on the access date. Crossref, Oxford. Counts are subject to later registration. Observation year 2025 (series 2015 to 2025). Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 4TOP500 project (ed.), TOP500 list, 67th edition, June 2026 (release text read in full for the leading systems). TOP500, Prometeus GmbH. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 21Our World in Data (ed.), Yearly number of objects launched into outer space (data compiled from the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs, CSV read). Global Change Data Lab, Oxford. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 22RCSB Protein Data Bank (ed.), Current holdings, list of entry identifiers (262,922 entries counted by the editors on the access date). Research Collaboratory for Structural Bioinformatics. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 8Stanford HAI (ed.), The 2026 AI Index Report, overview page with the ten top takeaways. Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI, Stanford. Page read; the report PDF was not opened. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 23GBIF (ed.), GBIF API, occurrence count and counts by year (3,890,294,224 records on the access date; 305,893,347 dated 2025). Global Biodiversity Information Facility, Copenhagen. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 18WHO (ed.), Global guidance framework for the responsible use of the life sciences: mitigating biorisks and governing dual-use research, 174 pages, 2022. World Health Organization, Geneva. Publication page and overview read; the full text was not opened. Observation year 2022. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 24European Commission (ed.), Horizon Europe, programme page (indicative funding of EUR 93.5 billion for 2021 to 2027 after the mid-term review). European Commission, Brussels. Page read. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
- 19CERN (ed.), Future Circular Collider, feasibility study page (results published in spring 2025: 91 km ring, estimated cost CHF 15 billion). CERN, Geneva. Page read. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back