In addition to the faculties, there are other academic institutions that assume specific functions.
The institutions for the promotion of young researchers – from the university-wide Research School to Graduate Schools and Colleges right up to the various young talent groups – make the RUB an internationally prestigious „Talent Incubator“.
ICAMS focuses on the development and application of a new generation of simulation tools for multi-scale materials modelling with the aim of reducing development cost and time for new materials.
In Research Departments, top-level researchers from different faculties unite in a multi-disciplinary environment for a given time. Their main themes reflect the profile areas of the rub.
With its Applied Competence Clusters (ACC), the RUB builds a bridge between research and industrial utilisation of the research results.
In the Central Academic Institutions, researchers probe the depths of precisely defined subject areas without being assigned to a specific faculty. The Cultural Science Institute (KWI) in Essen operates in the tradition of an international Advanced Study Institute. This interdisciplinary Central Academic Facility for Humanities and Cultural Studies is supported by the University Alliance Ruhr .
„Institutes associated with RUB“ are scientific institutions legally, organisationally, and economically independent of RUB which have been accredited as working together with RUB. The independence of the institution is not being affected by being associated with the university.