The University of Bremen's Excellence Strategy

“The Ocean Floor” Cluster of Excellence

Since its establishment in 2019, “The Ocean Floor - Earth’s Uncharted Interface” Cluster of Excellence has been based at MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences at the University of Bremen. As of January 2026, the cluster team will continue its work together with the ICBM – Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine Environment at the University of Oldenburg. In the cluster's upcoming second funding phase, the strong disciplinary expertise in deep-sea research that has developed over decades across northwestern Germany will be consolidated in an even closer manner. The aim is to create a marine region of excellence that will enable new scientific breakthroughs. The cluster investigates exchange processes on the ocean floor as an important and dynamic interface of the Earth system that plays a vital role in the functioning of our planet and its climate. The research findings will be of great importance for better understanding climate scenarios in a warming world.

“The Martian Mindset” Cluster of Excellence

The second cluster to receive Excellence funding at the University of Bremen comes from MAPEX - Center for Materials and Processes. The cluster builds on the preliminary work of the Humans on Mars initiative that was established in 2021. The interdisciplinary cluster team includes researchers from the natural and engineering sciences, mathematics, behavioral sciences, and communications technology. Together, the scientists are adopting "The Martian Mindset" to rethink the production of materials and components from the ground up. The scarce resources and extreme conditions on the red planet serve as an experimental setting to develop a new scarcity-driven engineering paradigm that enables innovative resource and energy-saving processes for material extraction and processing. In the long term, the cluster results will contribute to sustainable human space exploration and, above all, drive green change on Earth.

Minds, Media, Machines

The university’s high-profile area “Minds, Media, Machines” brings together researchers who are working together for the benefit of society to advance our understanding of intelligence and cognition in autonomous agents and agent teams in the context of an increasingly mediatized world.

Social Sciences

In the high-profile area “Social Change, Social Policy, and the State,” researchers work in novel forms of collaboration on issues of social inequality, social cohesion, and global solidarity.

Health Sciences

In the high-profile area of health sciences, research has a strong focus on practical application and focuses on the causes of disease, prevention, and care. In this context, issues of equity and new digital support tools are playing an increasingly important role.