Italy Bologna

University of Bologna

The University of Bologna (Alma Mater Studiorum — Università di Bologna) was founded in 1088 and is generally regarded as the oldest university in continuous operation in the Western world; the word universitas was first used of it. Dante, Petrarch, Copernicus, Albrecht… The University of Bologna (Alma Mater Studiorum — Università di Bologna) was founded in 1088 and is generally regarded as the oldest university in continuous operation in the Western world; the word universitas was first used of it. Dante, Petrarch, Copernicus, Albrecht Dürer and Umberto Eco are among those who studied or taught there. It is one of the largest universities in Europe, with around 90,000 students and thirty-one departments, organised as a multicampus institution with sites in Bologna, Cesena, Forlì, Ravenna and Rimini and a permanent campus in Buenos Aires. Its research covers the full disciplinary range and is particularly visible in physics and astronomy, engineering, computer science, agricultural and food science, medicine, law, economics and the humanities; Bologna is also the Italian home of the Leonardo supercomputer and a substantial concentration of INFN and CNR activity.