SNSF Starting Grants: 145 proposals received

This picture shows a researcher looking into a microscope in a laboratory. © SNSF

The SNSF has received 145 applications for SNSF Starting Grants in response to the call for proposals. The SNSF Starting Grants are part of the backup measures offering excellent researchers a temporary substitute for ERC funding schemes, from which Switzerland has been excluded.

​As a result of the successful initiative against mass immigration, researchers intending to work in Switzerland cannot submit grant proposals to the European Research Council (ERC) until further notice. The highly competitive and international nature of research in Switzerland must be safeguarded by specific backup measures until a new political agreement with the European Union is reached.

Researchers seize opportunity at the SNSF

Supported by the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI), the SNSF has set up "Temporary Backup Schemes". The first scheme to be introduced allowed researchers to submit proposals for SNSF Starting Grants until 25 March 2014. All in all, 145 researchers seized this opportunity, requesting a total funding amount of CHF 219 million.

The SNSF Starting Grants are open to all scientific disciplines. The highest number of submissions was recorded in mathematics and in the natural and engineering sciences (68 proposals), followed by biology and medicine (52 proposals) and the humanities and social sciences (25 proposals).

The SNSF will evaluate the submitted proposals in the coming months and make the corresponding funding decisions by the end of 2014. The SNSF Starting Grants are aimed at promising young researchers with two to seven years' postdoctoral experience who are working or negotiating a position at a Swiss research institution. The maximum grant per project amounts to CHF 1.5 million for a running time of up to five years.

  • Temporary Backup Schemes: SNSF Starting Grants