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Radar

Detecting and imaging objects with radio waves, from synthetic-aperture imaging to phased arrays.

China leads radar research, with 77.0% of the 10% most cited papers published 2021–2025; the United States is second with 2.9%.

Added 14 October 2026. Its top papers were checked for relevance by AI, but its keywords and topic list have not yet been reviewed by hand.

CN
FirstChina77.0%
US
SecondUnited States2.9%
26.5×lead, by share of the 10% most cited papers, 2021–2025

Standings

1CNChina77.0%2–3USUnited States2.9%2–3GBUnited Kingdom2.8%4ITItaly2.7%5–6KRSouth Korea2.2%5–6DEGermany2.1%7–9INIndia0.6%7–9SGSingapore0.6%7–9AUAustralia0.5%10–15FIFinland0.5%

Share of the 10% most cited papers, 2021–2025; 600 papers. Source: OpenAlex, pulled 18 October 2026. Method

Year by year

China

020406080100% China 79.6%

Everyone else, on a larger scale

0510% 20212022202320242025 South Korea 4.4%United Kingdom 3.4%Italy 2.4%Germany 2.2%United States 1.0%

Share of the 10% most cited papers published in each year. Source: OpenAlex, pulled 18 October 2026. Method

Inside the field

Always the top 10%Pilot

Each paper sorted into one sub-area by an AI model reading its title and abstract, then credited as usual. On 200 hand-labelled papers it chose the same sub-area, or a defensible second, 92% of the time.

Sub-areaPapersFirstSecondThird
SAR ship detection141CNChina90.0%KRSouth Korea2.1%GBUnited Kingdom0.9%
SAR and ISAR target recognition and classification114CNChina88.2%GBUnited Kingdom2.7%ITItaly1.7%
SAR and ISAR imaging algorithms76CNChina76.7%KRSouth Korea7.9%GBUnited Kingdom3.9%
MIMO radar waveforms, beamforming and direction finding66CNChina70.1%ITItaly4.5%KRSouth Korea3.0%
Integrated sensing and communication (dual-function radar)55CNChina58.8%GBUnited Kingdom9.8%USUnited States6.1%
Target detection, tracking and clutter suppression49CNChina72.0%ITItaly10.6%BEBelgium4.1%
Automotive and millimetre-wave radar28USUnited States27.2%CNChina21.4%DEGermany14.4%

Share of each sub-area's papers in the top 10%. Source: OpenAlex, pulled 18 October 2026. Method

Earlier and recent

The same top 10%, split into 2021–2023 and 2024–2025.

FallingRising2021–20232024–2025Change
CNChina 73.2%81.5%+8.4 pts
USUnited States 3.8%1.8%−2.1 pts
GBUnited Kingdom 3.2%2.4%−0.9 pts
ITItaly 3.6%1.7%−1.9 pts
KRSouth Korea 1.9%2.6%+0.7 pts
DEGermany 2.8%1.2%−1.6 pts
INIndia 0.7%0.5%−0.2 pts
SGSingapore 0.5%0.6%+0.1 pts

Greyed rows rest on fewer than five papers of credit in one period.

Share of the 10% most cited papers: 329 papers in 2021–2023, 271 in 2024–2025. Source: OpenAlex, pulled 18 October 2026. Method

2026 so far: a different count

Not the most cited papers: every 2026 paper matched so far (994), and a paper counts in full for each country on it. This year's papers are too new to rank by citations, so these shares cannot be compared with the ones above.

  1. CNChina80.3%of 2026 papers have an author here
  2. USUnited States3.1%of 2026 papers have an author here
  3. KRSouth Korea2.5%of 2026 papers have an author here
  4. GBUnited Kingdom2.3%of 2026 papers have an author here
  5. DEGermany2.2%of 2026 papers have an author here

Who cites the top papers

How much more often a country's top papers are cited from home than its size predicts. Expected is the country's share of all papers in the field; the bar is the excess, in percentage points. Home citers include authors citing their own earlier work.

HomeExpectedExcess
CNChina 81.2%77.4%+3.8

Based on up to 100 of each country's most cited single-country papers in the top 10%. Source: OpenAlex, pulled 18 October 2026. Method

Behind the share

Institutions with the most credit

  1. 1CNNational University of Defense Technology10.2%
  2. 2CNUniversity of Electronic Science and Technology of China10.1%
  3. 3CNXidian University8.3%
  4. 4CNBeijing Institute of Technology2.5%
  5. 5CNChinese Academy of SciencesGovernment lab2.3%
  6. 6CNNanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics2.2%
  7. 7CNAerospace Information Research Institute2.1%
  8. 8CNNorthwestern Polytechnical University2.0%
  9. 9??State Key Laboratory of Complex Electromagnetic Environment Effects on Electronics and Information SystemResearch facility1.9%
  10. 10CNSoutheast University1.5%

Share of the top 10%. Institutions across all 45 technologies

Who does the work

SectorAllCNUSGB
Universities88.8%
93.0%
83.4%
100.0%
Research facilities5.3%
2.1%
5.1%
0%
Government labs3.2%
3.7%
1.2%
0%
Companies1.3%
1.1%
7.4%
0%

Share of credit by type of institution, overall and for the three leading countries.

Across borders

19.8% of the top 10% have authors in more than one country.

  1. CNGBChina with United Kingdom22
  2. CNUSChina with United States15
  3. CNITChina with Italy13
  4. CNSGChina with Singapore13
  5. CNHKChina with Hong Kong11

Most frequent pairings, by number of shared papers.

The papers behind the numbers

The five most cited papers this definition catches. If one looks out of place, the definition needs work.

  1. 726citations
  2. 580citations
  3. Deep Learning Meets SAR: Concepts, models, pitfalls, and perspectives
    IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 2021DENL
    357citations
  4. Optimal Transmit Beamforming for Integrated Sensing and Communication
    IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology, 2023CN
    349citations
  5. 292citations

More in communications and sensing

The most technologically advanced countries, and is China ahead of the US?

How this technology is defined

A paper counts if its title or abstract matches the search below. Articles in core journals and proceedings only; retracted papers are excluded.

"synthetic aperture radar" OR "MIMO radar" OR "phased array radar" OR "radar target" OR "radar detection" OR "over-the-horizon radar" OR "radar imaging"

and its main topic in OpenAlex is one of: Advanced SAR Imaging Techniques; Radar Systems and Signal Processing; Direction-of-Arrival Estimation Techniques; Advanced Antenna and Metasurface Technologies. The topic check removes papers that only mention the technology.

Papers matched, 2021–2025
5,975
In the top 10%
600
In the top 1%
63
Countries with credit
41
Credit with no known country
3.2%
Every one of the 779 most cited papers was checked for relevance; 14 were left out as not about radar

The most cited of those left out:

  • Manipulations of multi-frequency waves and signals via multi-partition asynchronous space-time-coding digital metasurface89 citations
  • Polarization-Selective Bifunctional Metasurface for High-Efficiency Millimeter-Wave Folded Transmitarray Antenna With Circular Polarization88 citations
  • Multifunctional Orbital Angular Momentum Generator With High-Gain Low-Profile Broadband and Programmable Characteristics79 citations
  • A Wide-Angle Coverage and Low Scan Loss Beam Steering Circularly Polarized Folded Reflectarray Antenna for Millimeter-Wave Applications76 citations
  • 3-D Manipulation of Dual-Helical Electromagnetic Wavefronts With a Noninterleaved Metasurface56 citations
  • Frequency‐Multiplexed Holographic‐Reflective Coding Metasurface for Independent Controls of Surface Wave and Spatially Propagating Wave39 citations
  • Extremely Wideband Metamaterial Absorber Using Spatial Lossy Transmission Lines and Resistively Loaded High Impedance Surface37 citations
  • A Low-Complexity DOA Estimation Algorithm for Distributed Source Localization32 citations
  • Novel Folded Reflectarray and Transmitarray Antenna Generating Long Nondiffractive Bessel Beams Carrying OAM With Integrated Feed24 citations
  • An Optimized Phase-Controlled Metasurface-Based Low-Profile Folded Transmitarray (FTA) Antenna15 citations
  • Broadband Continuous Integer- and Fractional-Order Multimode OAM Beam Generator via a Metasurface15 citations
  • Achromatic Multibeam Diffraction Based on Phase Gradient Metasurfaces15 citations

Definition version 0.5, pilot. It is a plain text file: copy it, change it, rerun it.

Read the method