Facts and figures

The State of Israel has nine universities¹ with the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology being the oldest, founded in 1912 under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, thirty-six years before the state of Israel was founded. Technion welcomed its first class in 1924 and initially provided training in architecture and civil engineering before extending its research programmes to life sciences, computer science, nanotechnology and energy, amongst other fields of study².

With 50.3% of 25–64-year-olds having attained tertiary education, Israel ranks as one of the highest countries among OECD and partner countries. International doctoral graduates in the field of natural sciences, mathematics and statistics account for 45.5% of the total number of doctoral graduate students, compared to an OECD average of 22.8%³.

4,928 patents were granted to Israeli residents in 2023⁴. 

Life scientists in Israel have access to several sources of research funding. The main governmental funder is the Israel Science Foundation (ISF), itself funded by the Council for Higher Education (CHE), which is the official authority for higher education in Israel.

Researchers may apply to other Israeli governmental agencies, such as the Israel Cancer Research Foundation (ICRF), or binational funds from U.S.-Israel and Germany-Israel cooperation agreements. International funding can be accessed through grants from Horizon 2020 projects, Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions as well as EMBO.