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Harvard University lost its top spot for the first time in eight years in a global ranking of higher education institutions, being overtaken by the California Institute of Technology.

Another California institution, Stanford University, tied with Harvard for second spot in the annual table compiled by the London-based Times Higher Education, with data supplied by Thomson Reuters Corp. The University of Oxford climbed to fourth from sixth last year, beating the University of Cambridge at sixth. Princeton University came fifth.

Harvard, the world’s richest university, has topped the rankings since they were started in 2004.  A 16 percent increase in research funding for Caltech helped it leapfrog Harvard in the Times Higher table, said Phil Baty, editor of the rankings.

“The difference between Harvard and Caltech last year was minuscule,” Baty said in a telephone interview. “What’s happened this year is Caltech has seen a significant increase in its research income. A 16 percent increase, it’s quite significant in tipping the balance over in its favor. Harvard had an increase as well, but it was more in line with sector averages.”

The rankings are based on a survey that gauges universities across five areas, including industry income, teaching, citations, research and international outlook. More than 17,500 academics were surveyed and 50 million citations analyzed and compared with the world average for this year’s rankings.