Like proud parents, Jews around the world have long kvelled about the fact that Israel punches far above its weight when it comes to Nobel Prizes.

But now it's official: Times Higher Education this week ranked the country fifth best in the world for overall Nobel performance this century.

The table takes into account the prestige attributed to different awards and the number of Nobels received by citizens of each country - but not the differences in population size, which makes Israel's performance all the more remarkable.

In a separate table ranking global academic institutions by their Nobel Prize winners, the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology came eighth, beating Harvard and every British university.

Often called the "Israeli MIT", the Technion came just one place after Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The Technion's most recent winner, Dan Shechtman, attracted particular attention as his discovery, "quasi-crystals", flew in the face of accepted scientific knowledge and initially earned him ridicule.

Israelis Arieh Warshel and Michael Levitt, who both studied at the Weizmann Institute of Science, were awarded the 2013 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

The Technion's president, Peretz Lavie, said that the ranking was especially meaningful because the institute did not have the budget to recruit promising scientists and its success stories tended to be home-grown.

"This is unlike the institutions with huge legacies that can identify stars who are the potential future laureates," he said.

Phil Baty, editor of the rankings, said: "This list gives a snapshot of universities at the very top of their game; those attracting and nurturing the very best faculty in the world and those willing to give their academics the freedom and support to fulfil their potential."