Museums and collections

Over an area of more than 300m², the exhibition gives an exciting glimpse into 100 years of teaching, research, campus life, and university culture. It also reveals a University that reflects Germany’s own eventful history.

The Mineralogical Museum displays a selection of its 1,500 objects over its 500m² of floor space. You can find well-known minerals such as gold, silver, diamonds, and even a 424kg iron meteorite and one of the largest antimonite crystal groups in the world.

The museum provides a look at the most significant geological and paleontological research collections. Fossils and sediments tell stories about the development of Earth and life. Among the museum highlights are dinosaur fossils, insects encased in amber, and the earliest ancestor of modern horses.

Covering 2000m² of floor space, the museum has numerous fascinating taxidermy displays. From a giant whale skeleton to tiny insects—animals from around the world, in all sizes, forms, and colors are waiting to be discovered.

The open-air premises boast varied vegetation and a host of hidden treasures along the way. The tropical greenhouses provide a good opportunity to briefly escape reality and explore another world.

The Loki Schmidt House—Museum for Economic Plants at Universität Hamburg (Institute of Plant Science and Microbiology in the Department of Biology) houses a unique historical collection and exhibits over 3 floors.

The museum illuminates the last 150 years of medicine, both highs and lows. It explains the meaning of scientific images and models, portrays National Socialist medical crimes, and describes nursing and medical training. It’s largest display is the restored operating theater from 1926.

The Hamburg Observatory, with its neo-baroque domed buildings and surrounding parkland was the most modern of its kind when it was founded in 1912. Now heritage protected, the ensemble of architecture and technology in the Bergedorf district belongs to the Department of Physics and it is now home to the astrophysics research group.

You can access the objects in our scientific collections via FUNDus!—our search portal. The items are organized thematically and the portal is available to anyone who loves to use any and every opportunity for research and discovery.

The exhibition invites visitors to travel back 13 billion years to discover what the latest findings in cosmology and particle physics tell us about the Universe. Interactive displays and a walk-in installation encourage visitors to contribute their own thoughts and research on humanity’s greatest questions.