EURIZON Fellowship Programme for Ukraine finally in full swing

The third round of proposal evaluations for the EURIZON Fellowship Programme for Ukraine has concluded, resulting in the selection of additional 34 groups of scientists in Ukraine. These successful applicants and their team members will all be granted individual funding for a period of up to 12 months.

On April 30, 2024, the third and final batch of 34 Principal Investigators (PIs) and their teams received notifications that they have been selected to receive grants funded by the EU Commission through the "EURIZON Fellowship Programme for Ukraine". This means that a total of 65 research teams have been identified across three selection shifts within this programme under the supervision of the Scientific Review Panel (SRP) composed of 14 executive directors and scientists from pan-European Research Infrastructures and Ukrainian research institutions. As a result, 324 scientists in Ukraine will be awarded individual grants that will support their scientific work at their home institutions in Ukraine and boost international collaborations, even amidst the difficult conditions of ongoing attacks.

Background

When the call for this programme was initially published in April 2023, the organizing team in the EURIZON project anticipated and prepared to handle approximately 70-90 applications. However, when in May 2023 the call was closed with an overwhelming response of over 780 applications, the challenge was a huge one: each proposal necessitated to independent review by two external experts. In response, a call for evaluators was opened in June 2023, and hundreds of experts from all over the world volunteered to contribute to the evaluation process, resulting in more than 1,500 reviews. This comprehensive evaluation procedure, involving the eligibility check, the external independent reviews and the final nomination by the EURIZON Scientific Review Panel (SRP), extended beyond the initially estimated timeframe, causing delays in decision-making for all applicants. The process was challenging also due to the high number of outstanding applications across various scientific fields.

Thanks to the European Commission, the dedicated budget for the EURIZON Fellowship Programme was significantly increased in response to the exceptional interest: the initial budget of 1.5 million euro was tripled. There is a 4.5-million-euro fund that will be dedicated exclusively to supporting the individual members of the winning teams in Ukraine.

Laserlab-Europe is one of 27 consortium members in the EURIZON project.

More information: https://www.eurizon-project.eu/news/updates/eurizon_fellowship_programme/