Central South University (CSU) is situated in Changsha, a famous historical and cultural city in Hunan, China, and covers an area of 2,760,000 m², with its campuses distributed on the east and west of Xiangjiang River.

As a top university directly under the Ministry of Education (MOE) of the People's Republic of China, CSU was one of the first universities to be admitted into key Chinese government initiatives:

• Project 211: Aims to strengthen around 100 institutions of higher education and key disciplinary areas
• Project 985: Aims to establish world-class universities
• Plan 2011: Aims to improve universities' innovation skills
• "world-class" universities project: CSU was listed as one of the A-Level "world-class" universities to be developed by the State Council in September 2017

CSU disciplines
CSU has complete disciplinary systems for Non-ferrous Metals, Medicine, Rail Transit, etc., covering Philosophy, Economics, Law, Education, Literature, Science, Engineering, Medicine, Management, Art and Military Science.

• The ESI (Essential Science Indicators) of materials science is among the top 1‰ in the world.
• The ESIs of 15 disciplines are among the top 1% in the world, including Materials Science, Engineering, Clinical Medicine, Chemistry, Pharmacology and Toxicology, Biology and Biochemistry, Neuroscience and Behavior, Mathematics, Computer Science, Molecular Biology and Genetics, and Social Sciences, Immunology, Psychiatry and psychology, Geoscience and Environmental science and ecology.

CSU national-level platforms
The university drives collaborative innovation.

• 22 national-level innovation platforms, including 2 national key laboratories, 5 national engineering research centers, 2 national engineering technology research centers, 6 national engineering laboratories, 1 national engineering and innovation capacity building platform and 3 national clinical medical research centers. Furthermore, it has led the construction of 2 national "Collaborative Innovation Centers 2011".
• Since 2000, the university has won 91 national Three Major Awards for Science and Technology, including 14 first prizes (special prizes) of national science and technology, and 9 projects have been selected for the "Top Ten Progresses in Science and Technology made by Chinese Colleges and Universities".

CSU and collaboration
CSU is an open university. It has established long-term cooperation with more than 200 universities and research institutes in over 30 countries and regions, such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Japan, France, Germany and Russia, and has been extensively engaged in industry-university-research cooperation with a large number of multinational enterprises. Overseas students from more than 100 countries and regions study here.