The double ramification is a locus in the moduli spaces M_{g,n} of smooth n-pointed curves of genus g, parameterizing curves that admit a meromorphic function with prescribed orders of zeroes and poles. This locus, or rather its compactification, and its (co)-homology class, plays a role in the enumerative algebraic and symplectic geometry and in mathematical physics. We will discuss an approach to its compactification and its calculation via compactified universal Jacobians.