Scientific research has provided an increasingly comprehensive insight into the structure of matter and of the development of the universe. At the same time, the new insights generated many technical developments and applications. The bigger part of the insights attained we owe to experiments at accelerator facilities.

A key instrument for research at GSI is such an accelerator facility. In a combination of linear accelerator and synchrotron, in huge vacuum pipes, charged atomic nuclei, lead by magnetic fields, are accelerated to very high velocities and afterwards shot onto a metal foil. An analysis of the "debris" produced thereby, the new particles created, provides new insights and findings about the structure of the investigated systems and the powers holding them together.

The main focus of the GSI research program is the basic investigation of the field of nuclear physics and atomic physics. In parallel, application-oriented research activities in materials research, plasma physics, biophysics and nuclear medicine were developed. To supply state-of-the-art facilities for science, the accelerator facilities and the experiment facilities are permanently being enhanced and improved.