European Research Council

1
European Research Council

• Starter Grant Competition 2008
• Info Session
• IUA Marie Curie, TCD Science Gallery, 15-05-08

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What is ERC/IDEAS?

• ERC is the body / IDEAS is the FP7 programme
• 7.5b part of the 50b FP-7 programme (2007-2013)
• Whereas COPERATION targets top down research in
  thematic areas such as Space, Security , ICT ,
  Health etc, IDEAS is bottom-up i.e. pure,
  PI-driven, academic research!
• This is NOT your typical consortium project with
  partners in multiple countries!
• An ERC/IDEAS grant is typically owned by one PI,
  conducting research in 1 location
• Covers ALL areas of research science,
  engineering, humanities and social sciences
• AdG1 has budget of 517m. Will fund approx 300
  grants (at average of 1.7m)

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What grant schemes does the ERC operate?

• Starter Grant (StG)
• Aimed at young early stage researchers who are
  attempting the transition to independence or are
  consolidating a recently established independent
  group.
• Grant sizes up to 1.5m for up to 5 years ?
  200-300 grants
• Advanced Grant (AdG)
• Aimed at established research leaders
• Grant sizes typically up to 2.5m for up to 5
  years ? 300 grants

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Who is eligible for the Starter Grant competition?

• 3-8 years post PhD
• In theory anyone can apply..as long as your
  host institution supports you (signs off)
• BUT..you will need to be the VERY BEST in the
  3-8 year post PhD cohort!!
• The success rate in the first Starter Grant
  competition was 3 (9000 applicants). However the
  recent Advanced competition is likely to be more
  in the range of 15
• All disciplines, any nationalityas long as work
  is carried out in EU members states or associated
  states

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Evaluation criteria (I)Scientific Excellence is
the sole Criterion

• Potential of applicant
• Quality of proposal
• 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
• Criteria under Heading 3 will be considered as
  "pass/fail" and commented but not scored

PERSON PROJECT PLACE
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Evaluation criteria (II)ERC Starting Grant

• Principal Investigator Potential to become a
  world class research leader
• a. Quality of research output
• Has the Principal Investigator published in high
  quality peer reviewed journals or the equivalent?
• To what extent are these publications
  ground-breaking and demonstrative of independent
  creative thinking and capacity to go
  significantly beyond the state of the art?
• b. Intellectual capacity and creativity
• To what extent does the Principal Investigator's
  record of research, collaborations, project
  conception, supervision of students and
  publications demonstrate that he/she is able to
  confront major research challenges in the field,
  and to initiate new productive lines of thinking?

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Evaluation criteria (III)ERC Starting Grant

• Quality of the research proposal
• a. Ground-breaking nature of the research
• Does the proposed research address important
  challenges in the field(s) addressed?
• Does it have suitably ambitious objectives, which
  go substantially beyond the current state of the
  art (e.g. including trans-disciplinary
  developments and novel or unconventional
  approaches)?
• b. Potential impact
• Does the research open new and important,
  scientific, technological or scholarly horizons?
• c. Methodology
• Is the proposed research methodology (including
  when pertinent the use of instrumentation, other
  type of infrastructures etc.) comprehensive and
  appropriate for to the project? Will it enable
  the goals of the project convincingly to be
  achieved within the timescales and resources
  proposed and the level of risk associated with a
  challenging research project?

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Evaluation criteria (III)ERC Starting Grant

• Research Environment
• a. Transition to independence
• Will the proposed project enable the Principal
  Investigator to make or consolidate the
  transition to independence?
• b. Host institution normally applicant legal
  entity
• Does the institution hosting the project have
  most of the infrastructure necessary for the
  research to be carried out?
• Is it in a position to provide an appropriate
  intellectual environment and infrastructural
  support and to assist in achieving the ambitions
  for the project and the Principal Investigator?
• c. Participation of other legal entities
• If it is proposed that other legal entities
  participate in the project, in addition to the
  applicant legal entity, is their participation
  fully justified by the scientific added value
  they bring to the project?

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What is the proposal structure?
Self evaluation Major contributions International
recognition Inspire the young Field-switching

• A. Admin forms in EPSS (online early pre
  registration)
• B. 28 page (? uploaded PDF) application
  submitted via EPSS
• Section 1
• Emerging leadership profile 2 pages
• Curriculum Vitae 2 pages
• Early achievement record 2 pages
• Extended Synopsis 5 pages
• Section 2
• Scientific Proposal 15 pages
• Section 3
• Research Environment 2 pages

Standard academic CV Include funding id
Top 10 pubs. Monographs Patents Presentations Expe
ditions Conferences Prizes
Short form proposal
Long form proposal
the HEI
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What is the process for evaluation?

• 28 page (? uploaded PDF) application submitted
  via EPSS
• Section 1
• Emerging leadership profile 2 pages
• Curriculum Vitae 2 pages
• Early achievements record 2 pages
• Extended Synopsis 5 pages
• Section 2
• Scientific Proposal 15 pages
• Section 3
• Research Environment 2 pages

High Volume priority
Step 1 evaluation
passed?
n
rejected
y
Step 2 evaluation
passed?
n
rejected
Interview
Fund/Not Fund
y
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Who will evaluate my proposal?

• 3 research domains (300m)
• Physical Sciences Engineering (39?) 10 panels
• Life Sciences (34?) 9 panels
• Humanities Social Sciences (14?) 6 panels
• Applicant selects panel the s/he wishes to
  evaluate his/her proposal
• Each panel is 10-15 peer reviewers, with panel
  chair (supported by remote referees)
• Interdisciplinary panel (NOT chosen by applicant
  panel chairs will bring forward special cases
  10 of budget held for this scenario)

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The Evaluation Panels
The panel names are accompanied by a list of
panel descriptors indicating the fields of
research covered by the respective ERC panels.
LS1 Molecular and Structural Biology and
Biochemistry molecular biology, biochemistry,
biophysics, structural biology, biochemistry of
signal transduction LS1_1 Molecular biology and
interactions LS1_2 General biochemistry and
metabolism LS1_3 DNA biosynthesis, modification,
repair and degradation LS1_4 RNA synthesis,
processing, modification and degradation LS1_5
Protein synthesis, modification and
turnover LS1_6 Biophysics LS1_7 Structural
biology (crystallography, NMR, EM) LS1_8
Biochemistry of signal transduction
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What are the key dates?

• The starter grant competition will probably open
  in July 08
• The submission deadline depends upon the domain
  you select
• Physical Earth Sciences end Oct 08
• Humanities and Social Sciences mid Nov 08
• Life Sciences mid Dec 08
• Evaluation through late 2008/early 2009with
  results.maybe by Q2/3 2009

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What supports are there to help me?

• The ERC work programme
• The ERC User Guide the detailed information
  you will need to write your proposal
• Monitor the ERC website and sign up for alerts
• http//erc.europa.eu/
• Your NCPs

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Key Contacts in Ireland for the ERC
Serving the Science community
Dr. Graham Love Science Foundation Ireland T
353 (0)1 6073284 F 353 (0)1 6073201 E
graham.love_at_sfi.ie
http//groups.google.com/group/erc-ireland ?
science engineering
Serving the Humanities Social Sciences
Ms. Sorcha Carthy Irish Research Council for the
Humanities Social Sciences T 353 (0)1
6603652  F 353 (0)1  6603728 E
scarthy_at_irchss.ie W www.irchss.ie
http//groups.google.com/group/FP7HSS ? HSS

• http//www.fp7ireland.com/default.aspx ? the new
  FP-7 Ireland website