Understanding HFSP Research Grants: A Complete Guide from the 2025 Webinar

Name: HFSP Research Grants Webinar: 2027 edition
Uploaded: 2026-01-19T08:45:51.618971+00:00
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Description: Summary and key takeaways on Understanding HFSP Research Grants: A Complete Guide from the 2025 Webinar, covering Introduction The 2025 HFSP (Human Frontier

HFSP

Jan 19, 2026

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Introduction

The 2025 HFSP (Human Frontier Science Program) webinar introduced the organization’s mission, funding structure, and detailed guidance on applying for its research grants. Participants were encouraged to complete a short survey and could ask questions live via the chat.

HFSP Overview

Origins: Launched from a science‑diplomacy initiative in the late 1980s; formally endorsed at the 1987 G7 Venice summit.
Members: 16 countries plus the European Commission (17 members total).
Budget: US$60 million per year, headquartered in Strasbourg, France.
Mission: Support innovative, basic life‑science research that explores unknown mechanisms across all biological scales.

Funding Programs

Program	Focus	Typical Funding
Research Grants	Team‑based basic research (2‑4 scientists)	$300k‑$500k per year for three years
Early‑Career Grants	Teams where all members are ≤5 years post‑independent position (≤10 years post‑PhD)	Same as research grants
Post‑doctoral Fellowships	Individual post‑doc training	Separate webinar (2026)
Nakasona Award	Annual prize for scientific discovery	Not a grant

What HFSP Funds

Scope: Any basic question in life sciences—from molecular biology to ecosystem science and cognition.
Interdisciplinarity: Projects must integrate at least two distinct disciplines (e.g., biology + physics, chemistry, mathematics, computer science, engineering).
Internationality: At least one team member must be based in an HFSP member country; the remaining members can be from any country.
Risk & Innovation: High‑risk, high‑gain proposals are encouraged; preliminary data are not required.

What HFSP Does NOT Fund

Incremental or purely applied research (clinical trials, technology development, agricultural production, etc.).
Projects that are solely descriptive or lack a mechanistic focus.
For‑profit collaborations (though academic partners are welcome).

Eligibility & Team Composition

Principal Investigator (PI) must be located in an HFSP member country.
Teams consist of 2‑4 independent scientists; each member should bring a unique expertise.
Only one member per institution is allowed; a second member from the same country is permissible only with a strong justification.
Post‑docs cannot serve as PI; they may join as team members if they hold an independent position.
Early‑career teams are evaluated with slightly relaxed criteria but compete in the same review pool.

Application Process & Timeline (2026 Cycle)

Letter of Intent (LoI) – Open in January; submit by 17 March.
Eligibility Check – HFSP office screens LoIs for scope and eligibility.
Shortlisting – ~10 % of LoIs invited to submit full proposals (mid‑July notification).
Full Proposal – Deadline mid‑September; includes detailed scientific plan, budget distribution, and reviewer suggestions.
External Review – Up to six field‑specific experts evaluate each proposal.
Committee Decision – Review committee meets (January 2027) and the Board of Trustees approves awards (March 2027).

Writing a Successful Proposal

Novelty: Emphasize a truly new, “blue‑sky” question; avoid incremental extensions of previous work.
Interdisciplinary Integration: Clearly describe how each discipline contributes to answering the central question.
Team Collaboration: Explain how the team will work closely together; avoid parallel, independent sub‑projects.
Clarity: Use simple language, avoid acronyms, and make the first two sentences compelling.
Letter of Intent: Craft a concise, persuasive abstract; the title should reflect the core question, not generic phrases like “Understanding…”.
Reviewer Guidance: Suggest unbiased reviewers and justify any joint publications (list them and explain why they do not indicate an existing collaboration).

Funding Details & Budget Use

Annual Amounts: $300k (2‑member team), $400k (3‑member), $500k (4‑member).
Allowed Costs: Salaries for PhD students, post‑docs, lab technicians; consumables; equipment (microscopes, specialized instruments); travel for exchanges.
Not Covered: PI salary, tuition fees, standard office furniture, personal computers (universities cover these).
Indirect Costs: Up to 10 % of the total grant may be used for overhead.

Frequently Asked Questions (selected)

PhD Duration: Grants fund three years; teams can employ a PhD student for the full period, even if the local program is four years.
Cross‑Disciplinary Materials: Established tools (e.g., a well‑known material probe) are acceptable if they enable a novel biological approach.
Human Subjects: Allowed if the study addresses a basic life‑science question and proper ethical approvals are obtained.
Team Mobility: Grants can be transferred between institutions; however, the team must remain internationally diverse after any move.
AI Use: Applicants must disclose AI assistance; HFSP does not restrict language‑editing AI but expects the scientific idea to be original.
Re‑application: Unsuccessful teams may re‑apply in subsequent cycles; feedback is provided for full proposals.

Tips for Prospective Applicants

Start building the team early (6‑12 months before LoI deadline).
Include at least one non‑life‑science expert to strengthen interdisciplinarity.
Pilot data are optional; only include them if they de‑risk a critical step.
Review the HFSP Science Digest 2025 for examples of funded projects.
Use the HFSP website to locate potential collaborators in member and non‑member countries.

Resources

HFSP website (awards section) for detailed guidelines and templates.
HFSP Science Digest 2025 – a collection of project summaries and outcomes.
Upcoming March 2026 webinar on HFSP fellowships.

The webinar recording will be posted on the HFSP YouTube channel. Participants are asked to complete the post‑session survey to help improve future events.

HFSP offers a unique, bottom‑up funding model that rewards bold, interdisciplinary basic research across the life sciences. By assembling a small, truly international team, focusing on a novel mechanistic question, and presenting a clear, collaborative plan, researchers can secure three years of flexible support to explore the frontiers of biology.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is HFSP on YouTube?

HFSP is a YouTube channel that publishes videos on a range of topics. Browse more summaries from this channel below.

Does this page include the full transcript of the video?

Yes, the full transcript for this video is available on this page. Click 'Show transcript' in the sidebar to read it.

in life sciences—from molecular biology to ecosystem science and cognition. - Interdisciplinarity: Projects must integrate at least two distinct disciplines (e.g., biology + physics, chemistry, mathematics, computer science, engineering). - Internationality: At least one team member must be based in an HFSP member country; the remaining members can be from any country. - Risk & Innovation: High‑risk, high‑gain proposals are encouraged; preliminary dat

are *not* required.

and proper ethical approvals are obtained. - Team Mobility: Grants can be transferred between institutions; however, the team must remain internationally diverse after any move. - AI Use: Applicants must disclose AI assistance; HFSP does not restrict language‑editing AI but expects the scientific ide

to be original. - Re‑application: Unsuccessful teams may re‑apply in subsequent cycles; feedback is provided for full proposals.

Helpful resources related to this video

If you want to practice or explore the concepts discussed in the video, these commonly used tools may help.

Grant Writing Handbook For Scientists Recommended

Provides step‑by‑step guidance on crafting compelling research proposals, helping applicants meet HFSP’s emphasis on novelty and clarity

Amazon →

Interdisciplinary Collaboration Software Subscription

Facilitates seamless communication and data sharing among international team members from different disciplines, aligning with HFSP’s requirement for close collaboration

Amazon →

Hfsp Science Digest 2025 Pdf

Shows concrete examples of funded projects, giving applicants insight into the scope and style of successful HFSP proposals

Amazon →

Links may be affiliate links. We only include resources that are genuinely relevant to the topic.

Summarize another video

Full Transcript YouTube

So hello everyone, welcome to the 2025
um HSP webinar on uh research grants.
I'm with my colleagues Almud Kelba uh
the director of our awards and uh
Lilyana Gonchalis who is our science and
communications officer. Welcome to all
of you uh for joining us today.
Um I'd like to just give you a quick
overview. But before I do that, for all
of you who are logged on, please use a
minute after the session to complete the
survey because we would like to know
from where you come and how many there
are. Um that's just for us uh helpful
information to improve um maybe the
timing and everything. Thank you so
much. So today I'll give a short
introduction to HVSP in general, an
overview of our programs and then my
colleague Almud will take over and talk
you through all the necessary steps and
details of our research grant program.
And um as Leana pointed out in the chat
earlier, you can start asking questions
right away in the chat and we will make
sure that everybody gets an answer. So
let's get to it. Um, HFSP arose out of a
science diplomacy initiative in the late
1980s which culminated in a declaration
of the heads of state at this uh, G7 uh,
Venice economic summit in 1987 where the
heads of states in the minutes of the
meeting that you can see here uh,
welcomed the initiative of the human
frontier science program presented by
the government of Japan uh, with the aim
to promote through international
cooperation basic research on biological
functions. That's our core mission uh
given to us at that meeting. And since
HFSP has grown somewhat, we have new
member countries uh joining over the
last couple of years. So we're now 17
members, not countries but members
because European Commission is not a
country per se. So we have 16 countries
plus the European Commission makes 17.
HSB started to award uh grants in 1990.
We headquartered in Strasburg in France
and currently run on an annual budget of
$60 million US.
Now what are we supposed to do with
that? What is our mission? Um as pointed
out in that single yellow sentence
earlier, our mission is to support basic
research in the life science. Um and we
focus on innovative really cutting edge
research that sort of extends into the
unknown at the frontiers of life
sciences. So we fund things that haven't
been done before or have um not promised
a continuation of something. So we're
it's really clearly focused on
mechanisms uh in living systems uh that
is uh the the broadest sense of of
defining biology in our context or life
science research if you so want. And
it's really important um that you
understand that we attach really um
importance in the decision- making to
the scientific merit of the program of
the proposal to the internationality and
the interdisciplinarity.
These items will come back in uh
Almood's uh explanation on the research
grant program in much more detail.
So um since starting with the program,
HFSP has been actively supporting
uh scientists in all these colored
countries. The blue ones are our members
and the yellow ones are countries which
are not members but but where we support
or have supported uh researchers through
HSP research grants or fellows from
these countries going out with HSP
post-doal fellowships.
But as you can imagine since the 1987
sort of the the the
world has changed. Science is no longer
sort of the privilege of the G7 uh uh
countries. More countries are there who
have excellent research environment and
provide um research institutions where
life science research is carried out at
the highest level. And so we were
fortunate that in 2023
the G7 science ministers meeting in
center in Japan picked up again on HFSP
which I highlight here in yellow and in
their minutes of the um memorandum for
understanding mentioned again the value
that HFSP brings to the member countries
and to um international collaboration in
general.
So what are we proposing? uh what are
our programs? You see on the left here
there are in blue the the award programs
made up of the research grants which is
the topic of today's uh webinar. Then we
have post-docctoral research fellowships
for that we do a separate webinar uh
early next year. Uh if you are
interested in that please just follow
our announcement to follow that and we
have an annual prize. It's a science.
It's a prize for scientific discovery
which is called the HSP Nakasona award.
In addition, we have some of the support
activities, outreach activities which
you see on the right. We have an annual
meeting. We organize master classes in
grant writing and are organizing
frontier workshops that are topical uh
workshops at the smaller scale.
What is so unique about HFSP and this I
tried to summarize in a single slide in
a couple of bullet points. We are really
the only international multilateral
program where a national funding
consortium um puts their money into a
single port uh with no direct say on who
gets funded.
It's really fully bottom up
curiositydriven. So you approach HFSP
with an idea and not with preliminary
data. We don't ask for that. It's 100%
cross-disciplinary and international and
there are certain criteria in the grant
program which will be explained in a
minute.
It's discovery research we do have
sort of leverage to support high-risisk
high gain proposals. Um uh we know that
in a basic research proposal not
everything you want to do may work the
way you had intended it but that's a
thing we are used to that's part of
discovery research of basic research.
Our program is very flexible it's agile
and we we have a very um small
administrative load on the sciences that
we fund. It's very simple, very
straightforward and we really see
ourselves in a science without borders
constellation in funding and supporting
international collaboration in science
and technology.
How does it work? So our members give us
a budget which is then uh integrated
into our overall uh organizational
framework which we use to manage the
proposals and the awards. It's a central
budget. there is no um topical uh
separation and as I said it's only merit
driven.
The scientific community can then submit
proposals to our office to the different
uh uh uh submission deadlines as
mentioned no priority areas. It's fully
ide.
And then we have independent
cross-disciplinary international review
committees who evaluate, assess and
decide on the proposals
and then once a decision is taken, we
will support you over three years uh
with um the financial support but also
with other means uh that I should show.
So this is uh in a nutshell HFSP from a
high level. If you're interested beyond
this webinar to find out what kind of
research do we support, I recommend that
you go on our website and look up the
HFSP science digest. We just published
the volume 2025
which has a plethora of interesting um
summaries and articles um about the
research that HFSP funded scientists
have produced over the years. So this is
a a really a nice resource for you if
you want to know more about the type of
research that we support because it
really is very broad across the entire
spectrum of of the modern life sciences
including at the interface to uh
robotics to material science including
chemistry physics um informaticians and
mathematicians. So it's really a highly
interdisciplinary research uh focus
and if you want to know more you can
always reach us under the yellow email
addresses and Almud will say more as
mentioned we have the March 2026 FE
webinar for the HSP fellowship. So
prepare yourself if you're interested
and please do consider completing our
survey at the end of the program. So
with that I leave it to my colleague
Almood to um continue us into the grant
program.
>> Thank you Gchan and uh nice to see that
many of you have connected to learn
about our research graph. So I will
continue and go directly into the matter
of research graph.
This is my daily business. So I hope I
can explain to you what we expect to see
uh what we think can be successful and
also what the review committees would
maybe say about certain types of
occupations.
So as Gramm said we uh fund research
grants
which are coming in two shapes. All
research grants are team grants for two
to four scientists. Each of them leading
a lab or being an independent scientist
with maybe could be a small lab. um
the
PI of the team. So one person in the
team who initiates the application has
to be sitting in a member country of HSP
but all the other team members can be in
any countries of the world.
The
grant project can deal with any basic
topic which is at the front of the life
sciences. So anything from molecular
biology, cell biology,
organismic level of biology, ecology or
ecosystem science. If it is a basic
research question, we there is a chance
that we fund it.
This research question that a team
applies with should be a new question
for all team members.
And if her proposal makes it then we
support it for three years.
The research grants program are for
teams of scientists at any career stage
in if they are independent scientists.
And then the early career grants are
reserved to teams where all team members
are within five years of their first
independent position and 10 years after
their PhD.
We often get questions about borderline
cases. uh you can ask us via email but
generally if we decide that a team is
not eligible for an early career team
all we do is moving the proposal to the
research grant program where the team
has equally good chances to succeed.
So what do we really support? So as
Gramm said, it has to be basic research
and the idea is to really
find a project that has a chance to
bring new light in one of the important
questions in in life sciences. So a
mechanistic question, how does a certain
part of the life sciences, how does the
organism work? How does something
function? As I said, it can be anything
from molecular to ecosystem and even
cognition.
And one of our core interests is really
that
teams should approach a research
question by integrating ideas and
concepts and tools from more than one
field and include fields like material
science, chemistry, maths, physics,
psychology,
anything which allows the team to answer
a complex question um more
comprehensively than by just using the
expertise of a life scientist.
It should be original projects,
innovative projects which have a
potential to move the fun of knowledge
by considerable amount amount and not
just incremental.
We definitely only fund international
collaborations
and reviewers look very carefully at
applications of two team members in
neighboring countries
is then they ask for more
a better outcome than if it's really an
intercontinental collaboration. And the
background to this idea is that really
still the research traditions and the
ways of thinking differ between
different uh research cultures and we
think that will help to make a project
more competitive and more interesting
and actually more successful.
So as confirm said we do fund high-risk
research if it promises high gain and do
not ask for preliminary data
but
risk doesn't mean it may or it may not
work. It means if it works it's really
great but it's probably very hard to get
it to work and our first proposed method
may not work but we'll have an idea what
to do if it doesn't.
As it's a huge field, we do have large
peerreview committee uh that reviews all
the HSP grant proposals. It's 24 or 25
people in the same committee and they
all discussing all applications which
tells you that they have to be very
broadly minded. And it also tells you
that all proposals in all fields will be
treated the same way. there's not just
one committee that's doing one thing and
another committee that's doing something
else.
So in a nutshell um this is mainly what
we fund in terms of of science
and of course there's a backside to it.
There's a lot of research that we HFP
does not uh support and um
Oh, it's not support. No, that's that's
what we do support. Sorry. H I I deleted
that slide. That's very stupid. So,
okay. So, I'll take you the opposite of
what we do support and that's what we
don't support. If it's not really
innovative and cutting edge, we do not
uh support it. So if it's incremental
and also if it is a more applied project
HFSP does not support applied research.
So any clinical any technological
advance that doesn't answer a biological
question HFSP does not aim to support
that and we do get a lot of such
proposals and uh they have a very low
chance even if it's very good science
uh grammar has already told you to look
at the science digest um there's another
publication you find on the HFSP
homepage page on the 25 research grant
awardees that tells you what we've been
funding starting this year. So that also
gives you an idea of topics and
proposals that have made uh the made it
in the competition.
And just to give you a little glimpse
from some projects um and the diversity
of projects,
there's projects in in neuroscience that
answer very broad questions like how did
the ability to count evolve? Um and
there was a team an international
intercontinental team that asked this
question. Um we've been funding a
project quite recently on uh aging using
uh termite kings and queens uh versus
termite workers to understand what makes
one of them live very long and the
others not. We've been funding a project
which connects um cancer and bone
research
and maybe one of our uh wildest projects
supported included an architect and
studied how the ventilation in termite
mounds would actually be organized and
how these mounds are built to um allow
for good ventilation. And actually that
has had already impact on how uh
ventilation in buildings is planned.
Ah here we are with doesn't support I
didn't know my order of slides.
So as I said clinical pharmaceutical
research, applied technology,
directly applied agricultural forestry,
fishery production research and then
also
projects that aim at just collecting
data, projects which are completely
descriptive, not asking um for the
mechanisms.
um purely observational studies and some
studies which have a lot of omics but no
functional questions fall in this
category
and then we do not fund in forprofit
environments but collaborations are
always possible. Now, as you have seen
from the last slides, even though we
only fund basic research, actually many
projects still lead to applications
simply because basic questions
in the end very often can be applied if
the solutions are u uh useful and valid.
If we fund a project
um as I said the principal applicant has
to be an HSP member country. If we fund
then there is an award of $300,000 US
for a team of two 400,000 for a team of
three and 500,000 US per year for a year
team of four members and we pay for
three years. The funding cannot be used
for the PI so the applicant's own salary
but obviously for salaries of postocs
PhD students uh lab uh technicians uh
material we're pretty um open to
anything that makes the project
function.
Normally we have about 800 700 800
lesses of intent which is the first
stage of applications.
Um and then
about 10% of them or a bit more are
invited to submit full proposals a few
months later and then we pay between 30
and 40 awards. So the award chance
aren't very high, but if you've made it
to the stage of sending a full proposal,
then the their chances of success are
actually quite good.
Here's the timeline for the next cycle.
Um
we will open the application site um in
January and then you have time until the
17th of March to start an application
which means you open the proposal form
and you save it with whatever title of
your project and uh then when you've
done that you have another 9 days to
submit with all the details. The reason
that there are two deadlines is that it
actually takes contributions from all
team members uh to submit a full
proposal and uh if you only started the
day of submission, it's usually not very
efficient.
So the first thing we do in the HFSP
office in stressbook is uh checking the
eligibility
and then a small uh committee evaluates
whether proposals within the scope that
I've explained and then about 10% or
sometimes more which of the proposals
which are purely clinical research or
applied technological research or
something completely different or that
are really not following the
instructions and the the scope of HFSP,
they are uh removed from the competition
and then all the remaining proposals go
through the full PO review by the
committee
and they will identify about uh 250
letters of intent which are the most
promising ones which suggest really
excellent and really highly uh
competitive interesting research. These
are discussed by a smaller committee of
10 to 12 experienced uh committee
members and then there will be about 80
to 100 teams that are invited to submit
a full proposal
and everybody will get to know the
result of this part of the
first part of the review process by mid
July and then there's time until
midepptember for those teams who are
invited uh to submit a full proposal to
submit it and these are then reviewed by
up to six external experts which are
really in the field of the research and
actually invited teams are asked to
suggest some of these. Um we always uh
point out that teams need to suggest
reviewers that do not have a conflict of
interest and that feel competent in the
field. we sometimes get very strange
suggestions. So that's a good thing to
think about.
And then
each of these uh proposals is reviewed
by three review committee members
and discussed at the review committee
meeting which happens at the end of
January, the year after. So that will be
um
27.
And then the those that have made it uh
uh approved by the board of trustees of
HSP in March and the teams will be
notified.
You'll find all the details of this on
your our homepage and we'll update the
homepage with the new review guidelines
in a few weeks already. So, but there
are no major changes. So, you can look
it up now as well.
Yeah.
And just a side note that there has to
be an application opened by 17th March.
That's not seen on the application
guideline site. So it's important to
read in the guidelines.
So what makes a successful project
and what are the reviewers looking for?
The reviewers look for really novel and
daring ideas and innovative approaches.
So they looking for something that they
haven't heard about, something that is
really
having the potential to answer a
question that hasn't been attacked
before or answer a question that's maybe
old but attack it with completely new
methods.
It's really important to include
scientists from outside the life
sciences. That helps to make the
proposal um competitive.
If a project requires some uh modeling,
some mathematics, some computational
methods, it's really useful to include a
person who's good at that method but may
not have worked on this uh specific
topic. But methods are broader than
topics in that sense.
And then it's always something that
committee members look for is that the
team is working um closely together and
asking new questions. So a very common
comment that we get from committee
members is oh but this this PI has been
working on this topic for so many years
already and now they're just asking the
next question that um is on the list
that's not an HSP project.
So we always say start early because it
takes time to develop a team and a team
project. You need to talk the team needs
to be talking together and uh if it's a
team as an HFSP project that has not
worked together before it actually takes
some time
then as we said international preferably
intercontinental
interdisciplinary
and
a new team that hasn't worked together
because very often if new people talk
together
actually new ideas arise. is people
who've been discussing projects together
very often come up with the same
solutions as before. While if you
haven't discussed before with somebody,
you may actually find new intersections
of your competences and your interests
that are really novel
and
really ask for a blue sky question.
something that maybe initially you
thought ah that would be so great to
research do research on but there's no
chance we can do that. take such a
question and find the right
collaborators and aim to answer it.
And this goes along with the repeated
point that if there are already
preliminary results then maybe you have
already started then it's usually not a
natur project.
So again each team member has to bring a
unique own approach to the research
question. a team of four immunologists
or four mouse brain researchers wouldn't
be successful.
Think of a question that's really really
novel
and make sure that each of the team
members has an important role to the
project. And that's why two to four
members seem to be the right size of a
team because close collaboration with a
large team is usually not as efficient.
Clearly explain in the proposal how you
will collaborate.
So projects where each answers part of a
question but each team can each team
member can work on their own and
independently in parallel that's not
seen as a as an HFSP project either.
And if there's
modeling or theory included
that needs to be explained in detail
because there are competent members in
the committee that will look at that.
What you shouldn't do is basically the
opposite. The next logical step in your
research program that's something you
should apply for from another funer
anyway.
applications that you think are easily
fundable in your national research
funding agencies, they're usually not
really HSP projects.
Obviously, collaborations within a
single country are not eligible. And if
there's the exceptional case of two
members in one country, it needs to be
very well argued for.
But definitely a team of two members in
one country and two members in another
will not be funded by HSP either.
You cannot have a team with more than
one member from the same institution.
They will be ineligible
and it does not help to add a famous
name
and the person doesn't have a clear role
in the team.
In general, the reviewers are looking at
the project more than at the track
record of team members
because originality can easily come from
early career researchers who do not have
a long track record but still have very
good ideas.
And then again,
it's not helpful for an HFSP proposal if
you start with the application of the
results or the applied side, the
translational side of the project that
may be there, but really HFSP is asking
you to put out a proposal that has a
chance to answer a basic research
question.
If there is some application later on,
that's all fine, but it's not really the
topic of the HSP proposal.
So, yeah,
we we read a lot of these letters of
intent and there are a few things that
pop up very often often which which
maybe you would want to avoid or maybe
you would to take into account. So, very
often the title reads like understanding
the something revealing the something
just remove the first two words and give
us the title of the project of course
you want to understand it that's for
sure
as the letter of intent is the most
critical step in the process actually
even though it's short the abstract is
uh just a few hundred words um and then
there are small abstracts for each sub
project you really have to be very
convincing
Reviewers will not even read the second
paragraph if your first paragraph isn't
convincing because they have to read a
lot. So you have to win the reader in
your very first sentence or maybe in
their first two sentences. You need to
convince them that the research question
is interesting and important and just
few things that sound counter in
counterintuitive.
It's actually not complex but syn simple
language and style that can be very
convincing. It's
generalists that read these proposals in
the first stage. So nobody will
understand your acronyms because the
reviewers will not be in your sub field
of your research field. So try to avoid
acronyms.
Try to use language that can be
understood easily and can convince that
the question you are asking is
important. If it's just on a sub aspect
of the functioning of one enzyme that
you've been studying for a few years,
maybe it's not HSP.
It helps to ask somebody who is outside
your field to read and understand it and
take their suggestions because somebody
from outside the field will see it
with a bit more distance and can give
you
um can give you advice of how maybe a
reviewer would read the proposal. And
then don't spend space on saying the
project is inter interdisciplinary,
international and innovative. Just show
it in the text
and do not tell us how fantastic the
team is. The reviewers will see that.
They will see it from the small number
of publications that you have to list
but also from the way um you explain the
science.
Okay. So again, this is the
um dates and maybe that helps. U I'll
leave that for a moment. Um and then we
can answer questions.
Okay.
Um
so I I will have a look at the question
answers uh question apps and answer them
live.
Um if I click on that does that work?
Um so the first question says
um
ah if if scientists want to employ a PhD
student it's not only in the Netherlands
that a PhD is four years it's also in
some other countries and actually
we do fund research for three years so
we pay three years in a row
um starting in the month that the team
aims to start. The team tells us
uh but the team is allowed to use the
funds for four years.
So if you employ a PhD student, you
should actually start employing them
right at the beginning of the the grant
period.
The teams will know that they have been
awarded end of March and the teams can
start the grant anytime between May and
December. So that allows teams who need
to employ somebody on a 4-year uh
fellowship or position to employ that
person on the right date.
I think that's that answer
and the budget for a two member team is
going to be 300,000 per year and the
team can decide exactly how to divide
it. Sometimes one team member needs to
buy equipment in the first year, so gets
more funds in the first year and then
this other team member gets more in the
second year, but that's among the team
members. So it's 300,000 years on.
Um there's a question about the
innovation requirement across
disciplines.
For example, if a consortium includes a
chemist, would it be acceptable for
their contribution to involve a
wellestablished material probe as long
as it's used in combination with the
other discipline creates a generally
novel biological approach?
Um yes, we're really looking at the
novelty for the biological field in the
life sciences and um the same applies
for um computational methods that may
have been used in physics but maybe
completely new to be used in a
biological field. um that's fine unless
it's a really standard method that
everybody's already using in BG then of
course it's not really
um there's a question about tuition fees
and HSP does not fund tuition fees HSP
funds the salary of
uh PhD students postocs of the students
lab assistants
a PhD student fellowship
but not the educational part of it. So
HSP does not fund the education of the
student which sounds strange because of
course the doing the science belongs to
the education but tuition fees are not
uh funded.
We think that's the job of the
university or somebody else.
The definition of a new team
collaboration. There are occasions when
previous
joint publications of an applying team
are seen as okay. For instance, if a
team or two members of a team or all
members have been jointly authoring a
multi-author paper, one of those
consortium papers without having had a
close collaboration.
Review papers can also be seen a little
more relaxed. And then sometimes teams
that have had one or two papers together
like 20 years ago, that's also fine. So
this is about what we think about it. We
ask teams to list all joint publications
in the proposal and then um both us in
the secretariat and the review committee
members look at it and decide case by
case uh whether it's um seen as an
ongoing collaboration or not.
So multiple institution submissions from
elite institution is that seen as
negative
and the point is we don't get
applications from institutions we get
applications from scientists and each
scientist is seen as an individual
applicant. Each individual applicant can
only be part of one application each
cycle and that's both for early career
and research grants program but it's
also as a PI and as a co-PI in a team.
So if you are applying um as a copi you
can only apply be part of one grant even
as a copi you can't be a part of an of
two different applications
it is clear that we do get
multiple submissions from researchers
from the same institution we do not look
at that um we really take each
researcher as an individual applicant.
Go has mentioned to look at the website.
Yes. Um
there is a site where if you go to the
um HSP website it says awards and you
can actually look by uh country
um not for the recent awards for the 25
awards but for the older awards you can
look by country and see
um actually it doesn't really matter
from where awards were awarded.
But it may help if you want to find
somebody
um in your university whom you can ask.
Can you share your letter of intent that
you sent when you got awarded? That
usually helps to ask former awardees.
What did you look for? What did you
think about? How did you plan it? That
actually helps.
um
university labs qualify
especially so a university lab is
something which can have very many
definitions so
applicants are not institutions as I
said but applicants aren't labs either
applicants are scientists who have a
research group or a
And there are so many different versions
of labs that it's very difficult to
answer this question. But for instance
in some countries such as Germany but
also in Japan there are very often um
large labs which are headed by one full
professor. But then there may be
subgroups individually
um headed by either an assistant
professor or somebody with another title
but each of which has their own small
research group.
Such people can apply for an HFSP
um
uh prop uh grant, but we may ask the
head of department or the lab leader to
confirm that if awarded this applicant
actually can both decide about their
research program individually,
independently and also about the budget.
So we do not want to fund somebody who
works in somebody else's lab and then
the big boss is actually handling the
funds. That's something we do not fund.
But if somebody is in one of those
positions where they are not completely
sure, please send us an email and we
help you to find out whether you are
eligible or not.
So how does HSP balance consolidated
track record in old own field of
research and new blue sky ideas? And
that's a very good question. It's sort
of a bit of a balance.
Um
definitely
what we ask for in the proposal is to
list 10 up to 10 publications for each
of the team members.
And this is meant to help the reviewers
decide whether the researcher actually
has the
expertise to work on these risky ideas.
Obviously either you use methods to
answer a risky blue sky idea
that you have already developed or that
you are able to develop and it should be
clear from your track record that you
will be able to develop it technically.
Say a person who's never ever touched uh
cryo
but now proposes a project which mainly
uses cryomm for something really really
important and very difficult and very
risky. In that situation, the reviewers
would probably want to see that the
person has done
something related to it or that the
person has access to a cryo em lab where
they can get help um with the more
technical parts, but the person should
be clearly giving the information needed
to evaluate their ability in that kind
of field or or technique
or another team member should be able to
do this. So team members can be
specifically for specific questions. So
you could have a cryo project that uses
crym and the person who's doing crym in
the project has done it but on
completely different questions that
would be okay.
Can a project include a part that
involves field-based research? Yes, it's
a very simple answer. Yes, it does. And
very often,
if field work is required and field work
is to be done in a different country, it
may be worth the effort to find a
qualified scientist from that country.
if it's a major part of the project to
include and really include in the
proposal a scientist from the area where
you want to do the research and not just
a person who will get you the permits
for the work but really a person who can
make a serious scientific contribution
to the project. I've been collaborating
personally myself with people in various
countries including Brazil and India and
I do know that science in those
countries is seen very favorably if if
scientists from the country are involved
and very often these countries do have
very good scientists if you go and look
for them.
Is there a template to follow for the
LOI? Yes, there is. And if you look at
our homepage, there is a how to write a
letter of intent section which gives you
the type of text that will be required
in yellow. So you can look it up there.
Are early career awards judged
separately or do they have a separate
allocation?
So it's a yes to the first question and
a no to the second. So they are
all evaluated by the same committee in a
way. It's not very separately
but they're discussed in a separate
session
and reviewers are even instructed very
clearly to take career stage into
account even for the research grants
program. We do see a lot of almost early
career uh projects in the program grants
where somebody's been having their lab
for six years or their PhD for 11 but
the other members are very young. So
reviewers do take this into account.
There's no separate allocation.
Um it's each year decided there's a will
be a ranked list of the program grants
and a ranked list of the early career
grants and then there is a decision
taken where the cut will be um in in
both lists. So that's a decision that's
uh taken each year. The success rates
are very similar in both project uh
categories. Sometimes one is higher,
sometimes the other.
H I think I No, I didn't. Oh, yes I did.
Okay. Thank you for is it typical to
include in the budget funds for the
exchange of graduate students
and or posttos. So a there's no budget
in this proposal because the the grants
come as a lump sum and we do hope that
researchers when they get awarded know
how to make use the money most wisely. I
do know that some granting agencies uh
demand that research researchers def
decide already at application state
which computer they will buy and then
two years later when they buy it that
computer will not be the best computer
to buy. So no HSP doesn't ask for a
budget and yes student exchange posttock
exchange lab visits um that's all part
of HSP grants and is very favorably seen
in the in the project um because that's
part of how projects of this type work.
you have PhD student in one of the team
members labs and maybe a postto in the
other and they exchange heavily and they
teach each other the methods needed they
exchange material and so on. So yes,
a posttock,
yes, a posttock for an early career
grant does have to have a position.
So we cannot accept applications from
somebody who is a postock and they need
to have the position started the latest
uh at the full proposal stage. So we
sometimes get proposals from people from
teams that include a team member who
says I will start my position at that
university in June. Um and then we ask
for a paper that confirms that. Um
that's that's fine but a postto cannot
run an HSP lab. HSP has post-docctoral
fellowships
um and those are for postocs but uh
grants are for PIs that have a position
at the university.
Um
can we receive these slides? I think the
talk will be uh the presentation will be
uh online because it's been uh recorded
and yes you can uh see this as much as
you wish.
What is the distinction between the
early career program and the the
research grant program?
The only real difference is that in the
early career program the researchers are
early career
and the
slight difference that results from that
is that we assume that it's a little bit
more difficult if one is early career to
start a project that is very far from
the outgoing research. And it's also a
little bit more difficult to start a
project with it is really highly
interdiciplinary.
So when the committee discusses
projects from the early career program,
they are a little more relaxed with
these two criteria.
But they are that as well if they notice
that a team is almost early career but
it's discussed in the program grants. So
in the discussions I hear repeatedly
that this is a very early career team
although it's a program I know we are
discussing a program grant but it's
actually early career team and I think
they should be given benefit for that.
So it's not very much of a difference.
It's not like for instance ERC grants
where I think an early career researcher
would have no chance whatsoever in one
of the senior uh grant uh schemes.
How do you ensure AI is not used to
prepare proposals?
Um well that's a very interesting
questions. I tell you we we've we've
looked at that and a year ago I would
have told you that maybe um there are
actually programs that can
more or less tell you whether something
is AI written or written by a person.
And a year ago, I would have told you we
would use programs that are not exposing
the text that we test to be public and
check. But this year, I'm telling you
that we've looked at it and these
programs that propose to
decide whether something's AI written or
not, these programs cannot do it any
longer. And so we do not ensure that AI
is not used to prepare proposals.
We do ask teams to let us know whether
they've used AI and we do instruct you
as applicants
not to use it to create ideas.
But maybe if you use it to improve
language or something, that's up to you.
We just want to know. It's
not as far as we know having an indirect
influence on the decision
but
it's the project idea that counts and if
you want to do an experiment
that's up to you. Yes. So we can't
ensure that any longer and I don't think
anybody can if they are really honest.
Um
so that's where we are at this time.
Is it better that there's no joint
proposals to list? I'm not really sure
what that means.
Uh, whoever wrote Katherine Cotter, can
you explain that question a little
better? Um,
because if you have other joint
proposals, we asked you to list them and
um, yeah, please, I think I need more
details for that question.
To clarify mechanisms of the human
sense,
we are thinking to do some measurement
in young children. Is this theme fit to
the HSP?
Um,
we do find research that is on human
subjects. If it answers a basic question
in the life sciences, yes, uh, you need
to, of course, have permits to do
experiments on human subjects. I'm sure
you're aware of that. But uh generally
uh human senses like all animal senses
are in scope of HSP and so that will
come.
If I'm an academic transition from one
institution to a new one, can I move the
HSP grant? That's a very good question.
Yes, you can.
You can um
move it at any stage of your grant. uh
and we support that. And um if you've
already got payments to one institution
and then you move after one or two
years,
um
we we helped you doing this in a smooth
way. But we ask the money to be moved
from one institution to the next and not
via HSP because the only ones who would
win from that would be the banks.
So yes you can you can also move during
the application process but if
team members move such that after the
move all of them are in the same country
then the application is no longer
eligible. So check that carefully.
Are there any banned countries from for
copiis? Oh, that's a very difficult
because it is a political question.
There's a specific country uh to which
the European Commission is very hesitant
to pay any funds. I'm not naming that.
Um, and I do know that there are maybe
universities in some countries that are
hesitant to sign the agreement
with a for a team with members in
certain countries. So that's actually
something that's not coming from HSP,
but if you're in a country that is
critical with respect to research
security
um and collaborations with some other
countries,
then it is wise to check your team
composition
with your research institution
uh up front. So we do not see the
situation that a team is fantastic and
awarded and then the institution your
institution doesn't want to sign the
agreement because the agreements are
made between HSP and all institutions in
all the team members countries and so if
a certain country whatever uh appears
and your institution doesn't uh want to
sign then we can't on the ground.
But yes, we HSP as such is aiming to be
unpolitical and um not exclude any
country.
Can researchers from the same
multi-enter institution but different
sub centers apply together? Now, I'm not
really sure what a multi-enter
institution is, but
if you're at say um um
one of those universities which have a
dependons in another country,
that is not possible to apply together.
If your university has another campus
somewhere whatever for the life sciences
and for the clinical work
um
that is seen as one university.
If you have a specific question it's
probably good to send us a a a mail. But
I I remember a
um proposal from
three members. One in a university and
the second in another university and the
third was in a different country and the
third was in the university hospital of
one of these two institutions. We said
no university hospitals mean that you're
a professor at the medical faculty of
this institution which that person was
not eligible but if you have a question
just ask us
then how many researchers can be
included in the same team from one
country? um preferably only one and at
maximum maybe a second. And if a second
team member from the same countries
included, the second team member has to
be from a different institution
and the reviewers want to really see a
good reason why this person has to be
from the same country. There are
specialists in some areas where there's
only one person who can do the job.
that's all fine. But if you need an
electron microscopist
in the general life sciences and you
tell the reviewers that the person has
to be in your country, they may not be
convinced. Also if the person doesn't
really add a new interdisciplinary
component but is a second iminologist in
a team which al already has an
iminologist or whatever brain scientist.
So
it happens that applications with two
members, two out of three or four in one
country are successful, but it's rare.
And definitely if it's more than two,
definitely there's no way it's
successful.
a permanent position at a university and
presently doing a an a posttock at
another university until March.
That's a very interesting com uh
situation. Um
we would want March 27.
I mean if you're a posttock when you're
applying
Yeah. send us an email. We need to know
more details about that. But usually if
you're a postto when you're applying
you're not eligible.
Maybe just apply the year after when
you've really set up your lab because a
permanent position in some countries
does not necessarily mean that you are
running a research group.
So a pre post posttock position is
usually not the permanent position that
defines an independent researcher. But
if you have a specific situation and
these happen then just let us know and
send us a mail and ask.
Okay.
Is pilot data desirable for ERC
applications? I think we've we've said
that preliminary data are not really
desirable.
Um
but sometimes
if
if you propose a project that's really
highly risky
and where the very first step that needs
to be done to make the entire project
possible. If that first step, this first
experiment is already very risky and
it's very likely that it doesn't work
and there's no good explanation what you
do if it doesn't work. That would mean
the project falls into pieces after two
months or half a year. That's something
that HSP tries to avoid. So in that
situation maybe pilot data as a proof of
concept will be helpful but otherwise it
doesn't really uh make a difference
between ESC uh between um
between early career or um
uh
project program grants and ERC usually
actually stands for European no ECR Oh,
we early career research. Okay. Yeah.
Anyway, yeah. So,
usually
maybe a proof of concept if it's really
a risky project will help, but normally
it's
okay to start a completely new project.
Okay.
Kathleen Cot, thank you. You mentioned
that the publication to list join for
the population to list joint proposals
but then it shows collaboration that may
be misunderstood possibly as a new team.
Why would one joint
list joint projects?
Uh why would one list joint projects?
Because if you tell us that you won't
then we'll may find them anyway. ed
dozen of joint papers with one of the
team members and I honestly think that
reviewers are not very happy if they
find that team members have published
together but didn't list these papers.
So why would you list joint
publications? Because you are expected
to be honest that's all.
And there are very simple methods. I'm
not sure you're aware of that, but there
are very simple methods to check whether
two people have published together.
And um you don't need to be a top
scientist to use them. And we are
actually able to use them. And that's
why you would want to list them. And in
that field where we ask you to list
joint publications,
we
give you space in which you can explain
in a sentence or two why you think that
shouldn't be considered. There are cases
like
there's this paper which has two team
members as co-authors but actually it
was a collaboration of our postto
supervisors at the time and actually the
two of us never really closely
collaborated but each of us provided a
little bit of data or something and then
we would say okay that is not a problem.
So that's the reason
anonymous attendee is there any
allowance for time extension of
criteria 10 years? Yes. So ah not for co
yeah we decided that co was hitting uh
everybody on this planet. I know some
were hit harder than others, but
actually most people were hit uh quite
hard and we did decide in the end not to
change it their conditions.
Um but we do allow extensions for
parental leave, long periods of illness,
uh long periods of taking care of close
relatives.
um and you have to enter such periods
uh in the CV with start month and end
month. So that's taken into
consideration otherwise it's not really
a problem because almost early career
researchers
are successful in program grant propo uh
competition as well.
a posttock position offer in an other
institution expected to start in
September 26. Yet I'm waiting for my
thesis defense.
Um oh now we have postto fellowships
uh later in summer 26. Yes, I think you
can apply with that but um
that should be fine. Yes,
but you could send a mail to fellow at
HFSP and double check if you want to be
really sure.
Do you have guidelines for the level of
commitment that PIs are expected to put
into their work on a project? Oh,
obviously we want full commitment. Now
it's not like um some funders actually
ask the percentage of commitment uh that
PAS PIS put into a project right HFSP
doesn't do that and one of the reasons
is that it's something that how would we
know it's going to happen how would we
ever control a percentage of commitment
and um how do we know that a person
isn't 500% committed. So honestly
we don't see that as a meaningful
component of an HFSP grant proposal and
so we don't enter it um as a commit as a
criterion
if the posttock applicant in the team
oops
there's no posttock applicant in the
team.
So if you're a posttock, you cannot
really apply for an HSP grant unless
you have a position long before the
award begins. And that means actually at
the point when uh full propos actually
you have to have a position when you
apply usually
that gives you five years to apply for
early career grants. Isn't that great?
So a posttock is not eligible as a team
member
and definitely the PI cannot host
another team member as a posttock.
It's not it's not a grant for a PI to
host postocs. These grants are between
team members that have not worked
together. So if one of them is the
postto of the other, that doesn't work
for a naturalist PT team.
Um, okay. Hello to Argentina.
Um Romina Barros,
you cannot act as a PI of the proposal,
but you will build a team and then you
will have to have a member team member
from a member country and that team
member would have to take the PI role.
That's simply because the HSP member
countries want to keep some control over
the research grant program and so that's
where the PI who is the contact point to
HSP usually but otherwise team members
are really seen as on the same level
scientifically that's why we we have
this rule but if your team if you put
together your team and there is a member
somewhere else that's fine we We have
actually funded quite a number of teams
in with members in Argentina. So you
should actually find Argentinians on
that page on that HFP homepage and you
can look them look look them up and
maybe you know someone of them and can
ask them about um about advice.
Okay. Katherine Cotter.
Um,
how to distinguish between misconstruing
the extent of the collaboration?
Um,
well, it's just basically
you explain how you've been or not been
collaborating.
Uh those people who
do evaluate these proposals are very
experienced
and they do know how collaborations work
and if you explain it in a sentence or
two they will interpret it in the best
possible way.
So, but send us a mail if you have a
specific questions and we'll try to to
let you know um what we think about it
and what the uh committee will most
likely do because there are these cases.
We've got a lot of cases where there's
one or two publications between team
members and the review committee says,
"Yeah, but that is not a problem." And
then there are the cases where they have
a recent publication together where the
team with their reviewers say well this
team is already on this project so it's
not a new collaboration. It's usually
quite easy to see.
Um
are there online webinars targeting the
fellowship applications? Yes, there will
be in March and if you watch our
homepage or sign up for our newsletter,
you will get to know it first of the
mill as soon as we have set a date, but
we haven't yet.
The definition of a team applies at the
research group level rather than to an
individual researcher. This research
group can comprise multiple
investigators. No. So the definition of
yeah so we we are aware that team can be
used in very different ways. So an HSP
team is comprised of individual team
members and each team member is an
individual researcher
but these individual researchers would
be running a research group. So that's
the type of researchers that have at
least the first PhD student or have a
large research group or a small research
group. But there are these very large
research groups with five PIs each of
which has their own um grants and
postocs. Such groups with several PIs
aren't really HSP
team members because it's a single
person who is actually listed as a team
member of the grant and we sometimes but
rarely see applications where someone
says well I'm mark something and then in
the project say Mark and Elisa will do
this and then I'm looking up Elisa A and
Elisa is actually his colleague and
we'll say no
either it's Mark doing it with his
postocs and PhD students which are not
applicants but members of the PIs the
team or it is Elisa doing the project
but it's not two people in the same
university doing acting as a team member
and you can't share their team position.
So you can't say well there's an
application between Mark and Elisa as
one team member. No, it has to be
decided whether Mark is running the
project or Elisa from that
if you get what I mean otherwise just
ask again.
Okay.
SWA now the
ah yes so you can employ um Senia Tito
you can employ postocs from the age of
peak grant and you can
pay PhD students and you can pay master
students and lab assistants you can buy
microscopes
you cannot buy your desk or your
computer and you and not other sort of
standard lab lab and and desk material.
We assume that the university pays for
the standards. You can't pay a
secretary, but yes, you can pay posttos.
Good. Ah, Katherine, is indirect costs
covered? That's a very good question.
HSP
uh allows
10% of the total grant sum to be spent
on indirect costs. That's far less than
most universities
uh take, but the HSP
the HSPO
actually gets funds to fund projects and
not to fund university infrastructure as
such. And um so indirect costs only to
that very low percentage.
Even though universities do not like it,
we have seen no grant that was not taken
up because of that. So universities have
are able to bend their rules for NMSP
grant.
Um,
if I fail to receive the research grant
one year, can I try again the year
after? Yes, you can. The no rules that
ban uh applicants. It's far too
complicated for a team grant to ban uh
applicants. We have usually tried to
send feedback on the proposals. Um, we
do definitely send feedback to all
proposals that have been subinted as
full proposals. Um some of them apply
again, some of them make it, some don't.
Um we in the recent years we've
tried to also um send feedback to those
who've been rejected in the letter of
intent stage but this particular year we
haven't because we got so many
applications that I simply couldn't do
it and you may have seen good slide
which said that there are 17 people
working at HMSP
um I'm one of them. Um if there's
feedback written uh from the compiled
from the comments from the reviewers
that we promised the reviewers not to
share directly um then it's me and 1,200
was just too much but yes you can apply
again.
>> Okay I think this was the last question
we close it here a bit later than
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participating in this webinar. Thank you
Almud for this presentation and all
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