Università Cattolica promotes research as its founding element, respecting the freedom of its researchers, with the active involvement of its academic components.

In compliance with the general guidelines established by the Academic Senate, the Faculties shall ensure the development and quality of research activities, and to this end shall liaise with the Departments and Institutes, taking into account the proposals made by these latter.
The Faculty Councils are entrusted with the task of planning the objectives of research activities and validating the overall scientific production on the basis of the data acquired by the competent research structures, in particular through the Annual Faculty Programme Document for Research and Third Mission (DA-RT).

The Departments and Institutes are the structures responsible for promoting and organising research activities. They promote and coordinate institutional research activities or those commissioned by third parties while respecting the autonomy of each individual professor and University researcher and their right for direct access to research funding, in accordance with the procedures established by the University's general regulations. They annually draw up the Priority Research Lines as provided for in the Regulations for the distribution of  Università Cattolica's contributions to scientific research. They actively collaborate with the Faculties in the preparation of the Annual Faculty Programme Document for Research and Third Mission (DA-RT). They also play a coordinating role in the process of allocating internal research funds.

There are Research Centres operating alongside the Departments and Institutes. These structures are set up to promote and carry out activities aimed at specific objectives, in which University professors and researchers may also participate, even those belonging to several departments and institutes. They are governed by their own statutes which define their aims and duration; bodies and functions; activities and functioning.
Finally, the Graduate Schools can carry out specialist research activities related to their scientific and professional training courses.

In defining the University's general research strategies and policies, the Rector makes use of the Research Strategies Committee, which is an investigative body of the Academic Senate. Regarding the allocation of internal research funding, it is supported by the Scientific Committees.

Since 2003, the University has had an in-house developed application "Genius", which represents the master record of the research projects developed by its researchers and enables to manage all the approval procedures for internal funding applications, in accordance with specific regulations. Moreover, this application allows professors and researchers to constantly monitor the economic performance of the funded projects. It is accessible only through personal login.