Recently, according to the updated ESI data, the engineering discipline of JMU has ascended the top 1% of ESI for the first time, which is the second one following the discipline of Botany and Zoology. The threshold level of the top 1% of engineering disciplines in the current ESI is said to be 3233 citations. As to JMU, there are totally 450 SCIE/SSCI papers cited 3420 times, with an average of 7.60 citations per paper, and 3 highly cited papers. These papers are distributed in 17 colleges, among which 4 colleges boast the number of papers and citations accounting for over 10% of the total number of papers.

ESI, known as Essential Science Indicators, is an analytical database established by Clarivate Analytics to collect and analyze academic literature included in Web of Science (SCIE/SSCI) databases and the references cited in them. ESI enables researchers to systematically and purposefully analyze international scientific and technical literature to learn more about the development and impact of some eminent scientists, research institutions (or universities), countries (or regions) and academic journals in a certain discipline; meanwhile, the research managements are able to search the basic data which might influence decision-making and analysis as well.