Universities in China and Singapore dominated the top five places of the first Asia-Pacific University Ranking 2017 published by the London-based magazine, Times Higher Education.

According to THE, the rankings reflect the region's growing strength in the higher education sector.

Peking University took second place, while Tsinghua University is in fourth.

The National University of Singapore topped the rankings.

The only university to appear in the top five outside of Asia is the University of Melbourne in third place and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore rounds up the top five.

Two higher education institutions from Hong Kong also feature in the top 10. This includes University of Hong Kong at sixth place followed by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in seventh.

The ranking features just over 200 universities from 13 different nations.

Simon Marginson, director of the Centre for Global Higher Education at the University College London Institute of Education, told Times Higher Education: "The Asia-Pacific region is the most dynamic in the higher education world. In terms of students and research and development activity, it is larger than Europe and the UK, and one day it will become as important as the US and Canada."

While Japan is the most-represented country on the list with 69 universities, China is in second place with 52 institutions. Other countries with a strong presence include Australia, South Korea and Thailand.

Marginson said: "In China, higher education enrolments grew astonishingly in the first decade of this century, and research outputs continue to rise by 15 percent a year. China now has the largest number of students and the largest number of academics of any nation in the world."

He noted that the achievements from the world's second-largest economy in the physical sciences and engineering are clear.

"If the indicator is the number of published papers in the top 10 percent of their research field by citation rate, then in mathematics and complex computing China has surpassed the US. China has six of the world's top 15 universities in these fields, while the US has five," he said.

The universities are judged in five areas - teaching, research, citations, international outlook and industry income.

Contact the writer at boleung@mail.chinadailyuk.com