Five universities from Australia, led by the University of Melbourne, have been included in the latest Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), released on Wednesday, a feat to be considered five years after the country decided to invest heavily into a world-class university system.

Of the 39 Australian universities included in the list, which tallied 500, five institutions were in the top 100, including University of Melbourne at 57, the Australian National University at 64, the University of Queensland at 90, the University of Sydney at 93, and, the University of Western Australia at 96.

Moreover, of the 39 total, 19 were listed under the top 500, putting Australia with the fourth most successful higher education system globally.

"Clearly it's a result of the investment over the past five years. The test is not just Melbourne's performance, although I'm immensely thrilled, but universities like Griffith which are doing so well. That is being fostered by investment, facilities and people," Glyn Davis, vice-chancellor of the University of Melbourne, said in The Australian.

"We are well on our way to becoming a world-class system," he added.

The ARWU rankings, compiled by the Shanghai Jiao Tong University, have been measured as the most reliable of the dozens of international university league tables. Launched since 2003 by the Shanghai Jiao Tong University, the tally should be viewed as "more than a list," according to Tony Sheil, rankings analyst and deputy director of research policy at the Griffith University.

"There is enough rankings data in circulation that universities can use this information strategically for benchmarking and planning," he said in The Australian. "The Chinese universities are very adept at this using the data to set strategic targets.

"As a result, greater China now has 42 universities on the top 500, up from 19 in 2003, becoming the second-ranked nation ahead of the UK."

While he commended Australian universities favourable inclusion in the list, he stressed the country's academic institutions should all the more work harder, rather than be complacent just because of the list.

"(They) demonstrate that the additional research funding provided by successive governments since 2001 has paid off handsomely."

"There is no looking back and no minister responsible for higher education would wish to be at the helm should these results decline."

The ARWU is the most watched of the global rankings. Its publication marks the start of rankings season. Rivals Times Higher Education and QS are expected to publish in the coming weeks.

Ranked as top ten in list were Harvard University; Stanford University; the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; the University of California, Berkeley; the University of Cambridge; the California Institute of Technology; Princeton University; Columbia University; the University of Chicago; and the University of Oxford.

The US remained dominant in the rankings, which are based on research capacity, with 17 of the top 20 universities and 53 of the top 100.

The rankings use six mainly research-based measures to score institutions, including: alumni and staff winning Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals; highly-cited researchers according to Thomson Scientific; articles published in Nature and Science; articles indexed in Thomson Reuters' Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Sciences Citation Index; and per capita performance based on the size of an institution.

The complete list can be viewed here - http://www.shanghairanking.com/ARWU2012.html