€1.67bn EU fund for researchers set aside for 2016, open to the world

29 Jul 2015

Within the new series of competitions set out by the ERC starting today, the call begins for Starting Grants 2016, which has a budget of €485m and is open to researchers with between two and seven years of experience since completion of PhD and what the ERC are calling a “promising scientific track record”.

Other grant competitions will follow, according to the work programme’s calendar, with a total of €1.67bn available to researchers through the EU fund, beginning on 15 October, 2015 with the call for Consolidator Grants opening aimed at mid-career researchers, with a deadline of 2 February, 2016.

This will be followed by the call for Advanced Grants for established research leaders on 24 May 2016, with applicants expected to hand in their application by the deadline of 1 September 2016.

The ERC also says that grant-holders can apply for ‘proof of concept’ grants, which facilitates a top-up scheme to verify the innovation potential of ideas arising from ERC-funded projects.

This year’s round of research grant funding announcements varies from the similar scheme showcased last year, which the European research body is saying is a “relative softening of the resubmission rules”.

Applicants who scored a B-grade at step-two of the evaluation in the last call will be able to re-apply immediately, while under the 2015 work programme they had to wait for one year.

The ERC says there are also new restrictions for applications from applicants whose proposals have been rejected on grounds of breach of research integrity.

Stock lab image via Shutterstock

Colm Gorey was a senior journalist with Silicon Republic

editorial@siliconrepublic.com