Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU), also referred to as Shanghai Jiaotong University or simply Jiaotong University, is a public research university located in Shanghai, China. It is renowned as one of the oldest and most prestigious and selective universities in China. It is a member of the C9 League and Yangtze Delta Universities Alliance in China. Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Fudan University, East China Normal University and Tongji University are jointly known as the "Top 4 Universities" in Shanghai. Since 2003, Shanghai Jiao Tong University has produced the Academic Ranking of World Universities which analyzes the top universities in the world on quality of faculty (40%), research output (40%), quality of education (10%) and performance vs. size (10%).[10] Its ranking is exclusively of research universities, mainly in the empirical sciences.

Peking University is a major research university located in Beijing, and a member of the C9 League. It is the first established modern national university of China, founded as the "Imperial University of Peking" in 1898 as a replacement of the ancient Guozijian. By 1920 it had become a center for progressive thought. Today, Peking University is frequently placed as one of the best universities in China by many national and international rankings. In addition to academics, Peking University is especially renowned for its campus grounds, and the beauty of its traditional Chinese architecture. Throughout its history, the university has educated and hosted many prominent modern Chinese thinkers, including figures such as: Lu Xun, Mao Zedong, Gu Hongming, Hu Shih, Li Dazhao, and Chen Duxiu. Peking University was influential in the birth of China's New Culture Movement, May Fourth Movement, the Tiananmen Square protest of 1989 and many other significant events.

Fudan University, located in Shanghai, is one of the oldest and most selective universities in China, and is a member of the C9 League and Universities 21. Its institutional predecessor was founded in 1905, shortly before the end of China's imperial Qing dynasty. Fudan University is composed of four campuses, including Handan, Fenglin, Zhangjiang, and Jiangwan. Starting from the 1950s, Fudan has enrolled international students — one of the first few institutions in China to do so. Since then, Fudan has accepted and trained over 10,000 foreign students from 100 countries and regions worldwide. At the end of 2006, there were 2,812 international students studying at Fudan University, ranked number 2 in the nation. Half of them were actively pursuing degrees, the rest were general visiting scholars. In addition, Fudan enrolls over 1700 short-term students each year.

Sun Yat-sen University, informally called Zhongshan University, has a main campus in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, and a secondary one in Zhuhai. The University is named after the man who founded it in 1924 - Sun Yat-sen, a prominent political figure in the Republic of China. It includes schools and departments in the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, technical sciences, medical sciences, pharmacology, and management science. In 2011, it had 36,000 students in 23 schools and colleges and offered graduate courses across 17 disciplines, including schools in medicine, dentistry, law and business. In its 2011-12 rankings, Times Higher Education World University Rankings placed the university somewhere between the positions 276 and 300 worldwide.

Zhejiang University, sometimes referred to as Zheda, is a national university in China. Founded in 1897, Zhejiang University is one of China's oldest institutions of higher education. It is a member of the C9 League and Yangtze Delta Universities Alliance.

Zhejiang University is located in the city of Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, approximately 112 miles (180 km) southwest of Shanghai. Zhejiang University Library collection contains about 6.9 million volumes, making it one of the largest academic libraries in the country.

Sichuan University is one of the oldest national universities in China. Located in Chengdu, it is ranked No. 8 among the Chinese universities according to the 2010 Academic Ranking of World Universities. Sichuan University is one of the national universities directly under the Ministry of Education (MOE). It is also one of the State 211 Project and 985 Project universities enjoying privileged construction in the Ninth Five-Year Plan period. The president of the university is Professor Xie Heping, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

The Huazhong University of Science and Technology is a public, coeducational research university located in Wuhan, Hubei province, China. As a national key university, HUST is directly affiliated to the Ministry of Education of China. HUST has been referred as the flagship of China's higher education system after Chinese Civil War. HUST manages Wuhan National Laboratories for Opto-electronics (WNLO) at Wuchang, which is one of the five national laboratories in China.

Shandong University, under the direct jurisdiction of the Ministry of Education, is a key comprehensive university with a long history, a variety of disciplines, strong academic strength, and distinctive characteristics, which has great influence both at home and abroad. Shandong University is a member university of Project 211 and Project 985, two national key construction projects to support the development of high-quality universities.Shandong University is one of the initiative universities of modern Chinese higher education. Its medical school, established in 1864, signified the beginning of modern Chinese higher education. Its main body, Shandong Imperial College (Shandong Da Xue Tang) established in 1901, was the second national university in China, only after the Imperial University of Peking.

Capital Medical University (CMU) was founded in 1960, with the original name of Beijing Second Medical College. It ranks among the top academic medical institutions in China and is considered as one of the key municipal universities in Beijing. The founding President, Professor Wu Jieping, was a world-renowned urologist, member of both the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering. The current President is Professor Lu Zhaofeng. CMU is a well known academic institution for its strong competence in the scientific research. It hosts many national and municipal key disciplines, laboratories and some exchange stations for post-doctoral research. High-caliber national and municipal research and training centers and institutes are founded here, covering a wide range of fields including General Practitioner Training, Clinical Medicine, Basic Medicine, Neurosciences, Ophthalmology, Geriatrics, Urology, Cardiology, Pain Medicine, Toxicology, Biomedical Engineering, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Reproduction, Health Policy and so on. We have achieved national and international recognitions in many areas such as Neurobiology, Cytobiology, Immunology, Medical Iconography, Neurology, Neurosurgery, Cardiology, Cardio-vascular Surgery, Kidney Transplantation, Respiratory Disease, Digestive Medicine, Oral-Maxillofacial Surgery, Ophthalmology, Otolaryngology and Pediatric Hematology, among others.

Central South University (CSU) located in Changsha, a historic and cultural city in Hunan province, central south of the People's Republic of China. CSU was established in April 2000 on the basis of the amalgamation of the three former individual universities, namely Central South University of Technology (founded in 1952), Hunan Medical University (founded in 1914 as Hsiang-ya Medical College; currently named Xiangya School of Medicine) and Changsha Railway University (founded in 1953). CSU is a comprehensive research university under the direct administration of the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China. CSU is among the first tier universities in China and also a member of the Project 211 and the Project 985 with strength in science engineering and medical science. According to the newest data in Chinese University Ranking, CSU ranks 16th out of 2000 universities in China.