TEHRAN (ISNA) -- Iran ranked 32nd worldwide in terms of nanotechnology research by submitting 250 scientific papers to the publications of Institute for Scientific Information in 2006.

According to ISI figures, papers written by Iranian authors had a 100-percent increase compared with 2005, putting Iran four steps ahead of the 32nd place worldwide and first in the Muslim world.

Turkey follows Iran at second place with 245 articles.

Iran had ranked first among Muslin nations and 22nd worldwide in terms of cited papers in 2005.

The Untied States, China, Japan, Germany and France have been selected as frontrunners of nanotechnology by submitting 11,811, 8,824, 5,231, 4,273 and 2,889 papers respectively in 2006.

France, South Korea, Britain, India, Italy, Russia, Taiwan and Spain are placed from 6th to 12th worldwide in nanotechnology.

As per the 10-year biotechnology development strategy, ratified by cabinet members in 2005, Iran should be amongst the top 15 powers of nanotechnology at the global level.