European Research Council

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FP7 IDEAS ProgrammeThe ERC Starting Grant scheme
Gianpietro van de Goor, PhDDeputy Head of Unit
Strategic matters and relations with the ERC
Scientific Council ERC-DIS / European
Commission Den Haag, 9 July 2008
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ERC, Ideas and FP7Main issues

• An integrated structure with a specific
  vocation
• Independent scientific governance (Scientific
  Council)
• Dedicated Implementation Structure (Executive
  Agency)
• Part of the family of FP7 and complementary to
  other FP7 supports to research
• Bottom-up vs targeted research
• Individual teams vs consortia
• FP7 Ideas programme provides funding
• Budget (2007-2013) 7.51 bn (around 15 of FP7
  budget)
• Average budget 1 bn per year

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ERC Grant schemesStrategic principles

• All fields of science and scholarship are
  eligible
• Investigator-driven, bottom-up
• Excellence is the only valid criterion
• Individual team research project
• Investment in research talent
• Attractive, flexible grants, up to five years
• Under control of the lead researcher (Principal
  Investigator)
• Independent individual teams in Europe
• Nationality and Age of researchers is not
  relevant
• Host organisation to be located in EU or AS

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ERC Grant schemes3R and 2 schemes

• Aim Retain Repatriate Recruit
• Favour brain gain and reverse brain drain
• improve career opportunities and independence -
  especially for young researchers
• increase competition, recognition and
  international visibility - for excellent
  individual scientists and scholars in Europe
• Activities Two complementary funding schemes
• ERC Starting Grant (StG) attract retain the
  next generation of independent research leaders
• ERC Advanced Grant (AdG) attract reward
  established independent research leaders

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ERC Grant schemesWho can apply? Main
requirements

• Principal Investigator
• Nationality of researchers or current place of
  work is not relevant.
• Host organisationTo be located in MS or AS.
• Frontier ResearchProjectsAll fields of
  scienceand scholarship are eligible(investigator
  -driven, bottom-up).

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ERC Grant schemesWho can apply? - Individual
Research Teams

• Individual Research Teams
• headed by a single Principal Investigator (team
  leader)
• of any nationality
• if necessary, including additional team members.
• The Principal Investigator has the freedom to
  choose the research topic and the power to
  assemble his/her research team meeting the needs
  of the project.
• Teams can be of national or trans-national
  character, but the scientific added value has to
  be proved.
• The ERC evaluation and selection procedure is a
  highly competitive process based on the sole
  criterion of scientific excellence !

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ERC Grant schemes Calls and Budget 2006 2011
(prospective schedule)
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ERC Grant schemesOperational Principles

• Application in response to calls for proposals
• Principal Investigators applies in conjunction
  and on behalf of a research-performing host
  institution
• Staged Evaluation Procedure
• to manage large number of expected
  applications(almost 9167 proposals received in
  response to 1st Call for ERC Starting Grant
  proposals)
• Panel-based peer review process
• Scientific Council selects panels and peer
  reviewers
• Panels assess and select proposals

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ERC Starting Grant(ERC Starting Investigator
Researcher Grant)

• Principal Investigator (2 to 9) 3 to 8 years
  after PhD
• Support researchers at the start of their
  independent research career and establishing or
  consolidating their own independent research team
  (or research programme)
• Provide a structure for transition from working
  under a supervisor to an independent research
  leader
• up to 2,000.000 Euros per grant (for 5 years,
  pro rata reduction for shorter periods)
• ? of ERC annual budget per year, annual calls
• 300 Starting Grants per year, 1500 Starting
  Grants over 7 years of FP7 (2007-2013)
• Read the Guide for Applicants !

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ERC Starting Grant Next Call 2008/2009 -
Preliminary information

• Indicative budget 300 Mio.
• Call launch end of July 2008 with 3 call
  deadlines
• Physical Sciences on 29th October 2008
• Social Sciences on 19th November 2008
• Life Sciences on 10th December 2008
• 3 main research domains interdisciplinary
  research domain, with separate indicative budgets
• PE Physical Sciences Engineering (39)
• LS Life Sciences (incl. medical) (34)
• SH Humanities Social Sciences (14)
• Interdisciplinary (13)

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ERC Starting GrantProfile of the PI

• Any nationality or age
• Any current place of work but working or
  moving to work in Europe(EU member state, FP7
  Associated Country)
• 3-8 years of experience after PhD - certain types
  of career breaks are accepted up to a maximum of
  2 years read the Guide for Applicants!
• Potential for research independence and evidence
  of maturity
• at least one important publication without
  participation of PhD supervisor
• Track-record of early research achievements
  appropriate to their research field and career
  stage ? Starters vs Consolidators
• First StG call (300 grants, 21 host countries, 32
  nationalities, 170 host institutes)
• Average Age 35 years (spans from 24, 28 to 44y)
• Average experience 6-7 years
• Average grant size
• Gender 26 women (as low as 12 in LS2 up to 71
  in SH4)

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ERC Starting GrantEarly research achievements
track-record

• Publications, as main author indicating those
  without the presence as co-author of their PhD
  supervisor) in major international peer-reviewed
  multi-disciplinary scientific journals and/or in
  the leading international peer-reviewed journals
  of their respective research fields, also
  indicating the number of citations (excluding
  self-citations) they have attracted.
• Granted patent(s) (if applicable).
• Invited presentations to peer-reviewed,
  internationally established conferences and/or
  international advanced schools (if applicable)
• International Prizes/Awards/Academy
  memberships(if applicable)

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ERC Starting GrantsProposal content and
submission (preliminary)
ERC Starting Grant proposal
PART A online forms A1 Proposal and PI
info A1T Track Record A2 Host institution
info A3 Budget
PART B1 submitted as .pdf Section 1 Track
Record of PI Scientific Leadership Potential 2
p. CV (including funding ID) 2 p. Early
achievements track record 2 p. Extended
synopsis 5 p.
PART B2 submitted as .pdf Section 2 Scientific
proposal 15 p. Section 3 Research Environment 2
p.
Annexes submitted as .pdf Statement of support
by host PhD certificate (incl. supporting
documents to extend the eligibility window)
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ERC Starting GrantsProposal evaluation
Submission
Step 2
Step 1
Proposal - B
Proposal B1B2
Proposal B1
Section 1
Section 2
Section 3
Annexes

• Evaluation
• - Indiv. assessments
• Interdisciplinary flag
• Interviews
• - PANEL MEETINGS
• - Ranking

Evaluation - Indiv. Assessments - PANEL
MEETINGS - Ranking
Eligibility Check
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ERC Grant SchemesEvaluation Scientific
Excellence is the sole criterion

• Evaluation of Excellence at three levels
• Quality of Principal Investigator
• Quality of Research Project
• Research Environment
• Referees and panels evaluate and score criteria
  under Heading 1 and Heading 2 numerically which
  will result in the ranking of the projects
• 1-4 per criterion
• Threshold 2 per criterion
• Criteria under Heading 3 will be considered as
  "pass/fail" and commented but not scored

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ERC Grant Schemes Peer Review Evaluation Panels

• 25(20) Panels covering all fields of science,
  technology and scholarship
• 3 sets of Panels 1 StG Panels, 2 AdG Panels
• Each Panel consists of the Panel Chair
• and 10-15 Panel Members
• Panel Chair oversees evaluation process for the
  proposals assigned to his/her panel in
  collaboration with the ERC staff
• The Panel Chair gives high level credibility
  stamp and visibility to the whole evaluation
  process

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ERC Grant schemesAll fields, budget
pre-allocation in 3 1 areas

• ERC covers all fields of science, engineering and
  scholarship
• For operational reasons the ScC agreed on 3 main
  research domains 1 horizontal domain
• Physical Sciences Engineering 10 Panels
• Life Sciences (incl. medical) 9 Panels
• Humanities Social Sciences 6 Panels
• Interdisciplinary Research (cross-panel /
  cross-domain) Panel Chairs
• The call budget will be pre-allocated to these
  areas as follows
• 39 - 34 - 14 - 13

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ERC Grant schemesMultiple Applications/Resubmissi
ons

• General
• Only one ERC grant managed by a Principal
  Investigator (or Co-Investigator) can be active
  at any time
• No Principal Investigator (or co-Investigator)
  may be associated with more than one application
  to the ERC during the same year
• Starting Grant
• No Principal Investigator who has submitted an
  eligible proposal to a Starting Grant call may
  apply to the next Starting Grant call, unless
  his/her proposal was evaluated above the quality
  threshold during the 2nd step but not funded due
  to insufficient available budget
• StG Principal Investigators can compete during
  the last 2 years of their grant for an AdG
• Read the Guide for Applicants!

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ERC Grant AgreementConcept

• Agreement between ERC and Principal
  Investigators (PIs) hosting organisation
  (beneficiary)
• Rights/obligations on scientific, financial,
  ethical conduct and monitoring, eligible costs,
  IPR, modifications, grant portability
• Supplementary Agreement between PI and its
  hosting organisation
• Rights/obligations administration, project
  execution, IPR
• Single grant holder approach
• PI and members from same organisation
• But multi-partner/multi-national teams are
  possible

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ERC Starting Grant Similar type of funding

• Same/similar conceptual aim of the grant scheme
• Establishing or consolidating a research team
• Establishing or consolidating scientific
  independence
• Similar scale of funding 100-400000 per year
  for up to 5 years, i.e. up to 2 Mio)
• Same research project (similar/same objectives or
  approaches applied)
• e.g.
• Marie-Curie Excellence Grants
• European Young Investigators Awards (EURYI,
  0,75-1,25 Mio. for 5 years)
• NWO Innovational Research Incentives Scheme
  Vidi (up to 600000 for 5 years)
• DFG Emmy Noether Programme (funding of
  Independent Junior Research Group, for up to 5-6
  years)
• SNSF Professorship Programme (establishment of
  independent team, for up to 4-6 years, in
  average 1 Mio.)

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ERC Starting Grant Case StudiesPublished in
'Science at the service of Europe'DG-RTDs- a
brochure based on DG-RTDs Annual Activity Report
2007
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ERC Starting Grant Case StudiesOther
publications available or coming soon

• List with names of PIs and host institutions of
  430 retained proposals, incl top 300 being funded
  http//erc.europa.eu/pdf/Listfinal.pdf
• ERC Starting Grant brochure with Case
  Studiesavailable in September/October
• Various brochures on Starting Grant case studies
  produced/published by national actors
• FP7 project database (FP IDEAS projects)available
  in August/September
• ERC project databasein development

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• Merci!
• Thank you!
• Danke!

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Documentation

• Specific text of Call for Proposal
• ERC Work Programme
• ERC Guide for Applicants
• ERC Grant agreement
• Other
• ERC Guide for Grant Holders
• ERC Guide for Peer Reviewers
• ERC Rules on submission, evaluation, selection
  and award procedures
• Read always the last published versions !

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Up-to-date InformationERC website at
http//erc.europa.eu
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Applicants ServicesInformation and helpdesks

• ERC News Alerthttp//erc.europa.eu/?fuseactionre
  g.edit01
• ERC National Contact Pointsinform, raise
  awareness and provide advice on ERC funding
  opportunities, application, follow-up
  http//erc.europa.eu/index.cfm?fuseactionpage.ncp
  List
• ERC helpdeskhttps//www.epss-fp7.org/epss/helpdes
  k.jsp
• EPSS helpdesktechnical support on electronic
  proposal submissionhttps//www.epss-fp7.org/epss/
  helpdesk.jsp

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ERC-2007-StG Two step evaluation process
Stage 1 evaluation 6 success rate
8794 proposalsevaluated (9167
submitted!) Requested budget about 10
billion
Stage 2 evaluation 54 success rate
Interviews
559 full proposals Requested budgetabout
535 million
300 anticipated grants Awarded budgetabout
300 million
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ERC-2007-StG Submission (stage 1) Electronic
Submission System

• EPSS coped well with massive response
• First ERC call for proposals closed on 25/04
  without any significant technical issue.
• Total number of proposals 9.167 (registration
  figure 11.251)
• The peak transaction time for the reference
  transaction was 1.5 seconds
• The system handled a peak of 36 transactions a
  second

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ERC-2007-StG Stage 1 Country of host
institution of the 8794 evaluated proposals
Percentage of eligible proposals by country of
host institutions and domains
34 countries
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ERC-2007-StG Stage 2 Outcome Grantees by
country of host institution (top 300)
Percentage of grants by country of host
institution
21 countries
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ERC-2007-StG Repatriation and Recruitment to
Europe
FI
SE
UK
DE
BE
CH
ES
EL
IL
from Argentinia
Source Top 300 proposals
from Australia
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