The Research Campuses
The photo shows a map of Germany. The campus sites are marked by the logo of the respective research campus.
Source: BMBF / Projektträger Jülich

The Map of Research Campuses

The Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is funding nine research campuses, working in different disciplines and located all over Germany.

The partners on the research campuses conduct trans- and interdisciplinary research under one roof, ranging from basic research to work on the brink of competitive development. The research campuses all pursue the goal of developing comprehensive and sustainable solutions to complex research questions whilst at the same time also considering topics such as societal acceptance or training young scientists.

Over 200 stakeholders are already working on the research campuses. Around a quarter of them are from the field of science and around three quarters from industry, more than half of these from small and medium-sized enterprises.

The proximity of the partners on a research campus helps to develop a joint approach to research and transfer and to balance the different interests of the individual partners

Prof. Dr. Henning Kagermann and Prof. Dr. Ernst Theodor Rietschel, Chairmen of the jury

Research campuses have three main characteristics in line with the aims of the funding initiative:

  • They pool commercial and public research competencies and/or activities on a single site, if possible the campus of a higher education or research institution (proximity, “industry on campus”, “under one roof”).
  • They focus on new topics with a medium to long-term perspective in the joint interest of science and industry and work on these topics in accordance with their specific research profiles or on the basis of a specifically established research programme.
  • They are each supported by a binding public-private partnership based on cooperation agreements, agreements on dealing with intellectual property and significant funding from the partners involved, the level of which depends on the BMBF’s project funding.

Furthermore, the research campuses pursue complementary goals such as providing initial and continuing training and also address questions of societal acceptance. The strategies of the research campuses also make provision for the development and expansion of national and international networking activities.