Piotr Śniady, Wiesław Babik and Michał Bilewicz became the awardees of the 2015 National Science Centre (NCN) Award. Each will receive ca. EUR 12 000 for their respective outstanding research achievements.

Winners of the 2015 NCN Award. From left to right: dr hab. Michał Bilewicz, prof. dr hab. Piotr Śniady and dr hab. Wiesław Babik. Photo: Michał Niewdana

The winners were chosen from amongst researchers under 40 years old as the idea of the Award is to support young researchers. It is conferred for notable achievements in basic research carried out in a Polish research institution. The Award has been funded by enterprises committed to supporting research.

The 2015 winner in Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences is dr hab. Michał Bilewicz, a social psychologist at the Faculty of Psychology, the University of Warsaw, for demonstrating the trifactorial structure of today’s anti-Semitism and its psychological consequences.

Prejudices lead to discrimination, conflicts and sometimes even to crimes and genocide. I decided to study these prejudices to better understand and be able to explain the dark side of the human psyche. By learning more about sources of prejudices we can be more successful in our efforts to prevent them – and I hope my research will prove useful in this particular field, said dr Michał Bilewicz.

The  Award in Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences was funded by FBN Poland: Colian, ENEL-MED SA, Grupa Bemo Motors, Nowy Styl, Netbox PL Sp. z o.o. and Yes.

This year’s winner in Life Sciences is dr hab. Wiesław Babik, an evolutionary biologist at the Institute of Environmental Sciences, Jagiellonian University. The chapter of the Award has singled him out for his research on adaptive evolution in animals, with particular focus on the MHC genetic variability.

I am interested in the use of historical information stored in DNA for making conclusions on evolutionary processes. Such research helps us better understand the mechanisms thanks to which the enormous number of creatures inhabiting the Earth have come into the world.

The Award in the category of Life Sciences was funded by Celon Pharma S.A.

This year’s third laureate of the NCN Award is professor dr hab. Piotr Śniady who works at the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Adam Mickiewicz University, and the Polish Academy of Sciences. His significant results in the Physical Sciences and Engineering deal with the calculus of probability.

The aim of my investigations is to find hidden structures that could explain the shape of our physical world as well as the invisible one of mathematical ideas. The tools offered to us by combinatorics seem particularly well-suited for the task, said professor Śniady.

The Award in Physical Sciences and Engineering was funded by EDF Polska S.A.

The National Science Centre Award in three domains is conferred by the NCN Council and a special chapter, composed of the representatives of the Centre as well as the sponsors of the Award. Candidates can be nominated by other eminent researchers, with each researcher recommending only one candidate.

There were 72 entries with several nominees named more than once. Of the entries sent, the competition committees of the NCN Council chose two finalists for each of the three research domains. The final selection had been concluded by the chapter already back in September, but the laureates’ names were kept secret until the evening of the ceremony. 

The award ceremony was held on 7th October at a Gallery of 19^th-Century Polish Art in the Cloth Call (a branch of the National Museum in Krakow).  It was hosted by Grażyna Torbicka, and the winners received their laurels from the hands of the secretary at the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, professor Maciej Ratajczak; director of the NCN, professor Zbigniew Błocki; the chair of the NCN Council, Michał Karoński, and representatives of the Award’s funding partners: Jerzy Chachuła, R&D director of EDF Polska S.A.; Bogdan Manowski, member of the board at Celon Pharma S.A., and Adam Rozwadowski, board director at the ENEL-MED S.A.

Photos by Michał Niewdana

We would like to inform all researchers interested in applying for POLONEZ 1 fellowship that the OSF electronic submission system is now open. The deadline for submitting applications is 15^th December 2015.For more information please see: www.ncn.gov.pl/polonez.   

Contact: Agata Mendrek, tel. 12 341 91 39, polonez@ncn.gov.pl

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 665778.

We are pleased to invite researchers interested in applying for the POLONEZ 1 fellowship for a web chat in English, that will be held on the 15^th October 2015 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. During the chat we would be happy to answer all questions regarding the call documentation, the submission system, etc.

All technical details regarding access to the chat will be announced on the NCN website at the beginning of October. We strongly encourage applicants to read the call documentation before joining the chat.

We would also like to invite all POLONEZ 1 applicants to use the POLONEZ 1 Partner Search Tool, a match-making section created in order to establish new cooperation between incoming researchers and Host Institutions in Poland.

The POLONEZ 1 call was announced on the 15^th September and will be closed on the 15^th December 2015.

For more information about POLONEZ 1 please visit: www.ncn.gov.pl/polonez.

Contact: Agata Mendrek, tel. 12 341 91 39, polonez@ncn.gov.pl

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 665778.

We would like to inform all applicants interested in applying for the POLONEZ 1 fellowship that the electronic submission system will be opened in the next few days. A delay in opening the system occurred due to the fact that the resolution concerning the granting of state aid, issued by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education has only just been adopted on the 14^th of September. In order to enable institutions who benefit from state aid to participate in POLONEZ 1, NCN must introduce the necessary changes in the submission system.

According to the resolution mentioned above, researchers are able to apply for fellowships in a wide range of Host Institutions located in Poland, such as:

• research organisations,
• university research centres established within a single university structure,
• scientific libraries,
• enterprises with the status of a research and development centre as defined in the Act of 30^th May 2008 on Certain Forms of Support for Innovation Activities,
• organisational institutions having legal personality status, established on Polish territory,
• enterprises conducting res earch in a different organisational form than those set forth in 1-5.

The exact date the submission system will open shall be announced on the NCN website. We apologise for any inconvenience.

More information about POLONEZ 1.

CONTACT:

Agata Mendrek

tel. +48 12 341 9139

polonez@ncn.gov.pl

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 665778.

The National Science Centre opened its tenth call for proposals within the OPUS, PRELUDIUM and SONATA funding schemes with a financing pool totaling PLN 240 million. The NCN also launched its first call for proposals within the POLONEZ funding scheme targeted at researchers from abroad who want to carry out research in Polish institutions. This funding scheme was allocated as much as PLN 40 million. POLONEZ 1 is the latest funding scheme administered by the NCN, offering a research fellowship of one or two years to researchers from abroad who wish to come to Poland. However, to be eligible for funding, the applicant must meet two conditions: hold a PhD degree or have 4 years of full-time research experience as well as neither having lived nor worked/studied in Poland for longer than 12 months in the period from 15 September 2012 to 14 September 2015.

“POLONEZ is the first funding scheme targeted at scientists from other countries which, thanks to co-financing obtained from the European Horizon 2020 programme, offers truly attractive financial conditions. I hope it will enable us to attract talented and ambitious researchers to Poland, who will serve as an influx of fresh blood energising and motivating Polish research", emphasised Prof. Zbigniew Błocki, the National Science Centre director.

The awardees will be granted guaranteed funds for employment in host institutions of EUR 31,500 per year and a research grant of up to PLN 160,000 per year. Additionally, they may obtain more than EUR 20,000 annually to cover the costs related to temporary relocation, family benefits (if the researcher’s family is also coming to Poland) and a training package offered by the NCN. The host institution will be reimbursed 20% of all overheads. The POLONEZ 1 funding scheme is co-financed by the Horizon 2020 programme within the Maria Skłodowska-Curie Actions (COFUND).

What is more, the National Science Centre has announced calls for proposals within three funding schemes that enjoy great popularity among Polish scientists: OPUS 10, PRELUDIUM 10 and SONATA 10.

PRELUDIUM 10 offers funds to researchers at the beginning of their career who have not been awarded their PhD degree yet. The funding scheme has been allocated PLN 30 million for this purpose. PRELUDIUM is unique worldwide: very few countries around the world offer PhD candidates a principal investigators. As shown by statistics, most applications in previous calls for applications were submitted by PhD candidates.

“We do our best to support young scientists with good ideas for research. At the same time, we are aware of the very difficult position PhD Candidates in Polish science are in. The system of financing graduate programmes is not working well - only a small percentage of students receive scholarships, especially in the field of Humanities, Social Sciences and the Arts. As a result, very few of them actually complete their doctoral dissertation. The NCN Council called the Ministry of Science and Higher Education to take urgent steps aimed at the expeditious implementation of necessary, comprehensive changes in this respect" said Prof. Michał Karoński, chair of the NCN Council.

The OPUS 10 funding scheme offers grants for the performance of basic research to all scientists, irrespective of their age and experience. The funds obtained in this funding scheme are sufficient to build a large research team consisting of both researchers in post-doc positions and PhD candidates receiving scholarships. The resources from the scheme can also be used to purchase equipment necessary to conduct research.

SONATA 10 is dedicated to researchers at the early stages of their career who have already been awarded a PhD degree. Previously, the call for proposals was open to people who were awarded their PhD degree in the period of 5 years prior to the date of submitting the application. As a result of a recent amendment to the Act on the financing of science, SONATA 10 is now open to anybody who has defended their doctoral dissertation in the period of 7 years before the year of submitting the application, i.e. in the period from 2008-2015 in this case.  The funds allocated to the scheme amount to PLN 30 million.

The calls for proposals announced by the National Science Centre will enable it once again to offer public funds for the purpose of financing basic research in the form of research projects and to grant de minimis aid to finance internships in enterprises for PhDs who are at the onset of their scientific career.

Applications may be submitted via the OSF system (https://osf.opi.org.pl) until 15 December 2015. The results will be announced by mid June 2016.

The National Science Centre invites researchers to submit proposals under POLONEZ 1 funding opportunity addressed to incoming researchers  who would like to carry out basic research in host institutions in Poland. Proposals must be submitted in English via OSF submission system. Access to the system will be available on the 15^th of September 2015.

Call announcement: 15^th September 2015 

Deadline: 15^th of December 2015

For more information please see POLONEZ 1 Guidelines for Applicants.

Call documentation:

• POLONEZ 1 Call Text
  • Attachment 1: Application Form
  • Attachment 2: Evaluation Sheet
  • Attachment 3: Eligible Costs
  • Attachment 4: Declarations of the Host
  • Attachment 5: State Aid

Contact:

polonez@ncn.gov.pl

tel: 00 48 12 341 9017 or 00 48 12 341 9139\

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 665778.

In the recently concluded SYMFONIA 3 call for cross-domain research projects, six winners were named, with an aggregate funding of almost € 7.7 million.

There were 62 submissions sent in response to the SYMFONIA 3 call for proposals, of which the six best were selected by the Centre’s Expert Team. Under the SYMFONIA scheme it is a prerequisite that projects stand out for their excellence and boldness in pushing beyond the boundaries of disciplines, in other words to pursue research that is genuinely transdisciplinary and contributes to the creation of new values in science.

Three projects were given funding in excess of € 1.5 million each. The one with top financing, Air Pollution versus Autoimmunity: The Role of Multiphase Aqueous Inorganic Chemistry (APARIC), is led by professor Rudi van Eldik. The project will be carried out by a research consortium of Jagiellonian University’s Faculty of Chemistry, the Faculty of Medicine at Jagiellonian University Medical College and the Institute of Pharmacology of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Only a slightly smaller grant was given to professor Stefan Chłopicki. The Principal Investigator and his team of researchers from Jagiellonian University, in search of organ specific mechanisms of liver steatosis and heart failure, will investigate pharmacotherapeutic mechanisms, stereoscopic signatures and nanomechanics of dysfunctional endothelium in both conditions. The third highest funding awarded will support the project titled: An Atlas of Brain Regulatory Regions and Regulatory Networks ­– a Novel Systems Biology Approach to the Pathogenesis of Selected Neurological Disorders, submitted by doctor Bartosz Wilczyński and his team of researchers from the University of Warsaw, the Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, and the Institute of Computer Science of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Funding in excess of € 1.3 million was awarded to researchers from the University of Silesia and Jagiellonian University. They will study the effect of physical processes and excipients on the properties of poorly water-soluble active pharmaceutical ingredients. The Principal Investigator of the project is professor Marian Paluch. Prof. Ewa Zuba-Surma and her team will receive almost € 1.18 million for their research project dealing with the optimization of biocompatible scaffolds combining graphen and defined stem cell populations for tissue regeneration. The research team comprises scholars from the Faculty of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Biotechnology of Jagiellonian University and the Institute of Electronic Materials Technology. Funding worth ca. € 0.8 million will be granted to the team of professor Zbigniew Leśnikowski. Researchers from the Institute of Medical Biology of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Institute-Centre for Molecular and Macromolecular Studies of the Polish Academy of Sciences will work on the project Composites of Nucleic Acids and Oligofunctionalized Boron Clusters as New Material for Bionanotechnology.

The call was open to research projects which involved the creation of new full-time jobs for researchers with a doctorate, and the employment of at least four PhD candidates. The projects may last between 3 and 5 years, and the total sum applied for must be between € 470,000 and € 1,650,000.

The National Science Centre has published the results of the ETIUDA 3 and FUGA 4 calls. Thanks to funding from the Centre as many as 93 PhD candidates will benefit from year-long scholarships, as well as  54 researchers – from post-doc internships. The aggregate sum of funding given to young researchers is  around the EUR 8 million mark.

The ETIUDA call is there to help PhD candidates work on their dissertations. In the third edition of the call, applicants were required to have started the registration and conferment procedure for a doctoral degree in a Polish research institution or to commit to start the procedure by 30^th June 2015. The young researchers whose projects were approved for funding will receive a monthly grant of EUR 710 for 12 months in addition to a research stay of between 3-6 months in a research centre of their choice, in order to enhance their research. The ETIUDA 3 call saw 280 submissions, with nearly half of them qualified to the second stage of evaluation. 132 PhD candidates were invited to interviews. The scholarships were granted to 33 per cent of applicants.

Our scholarships [ETIUDA] and internships [FUGA] are intended to support young people in their difficult beginnings as researchers. Awardees of the ETIUDA and FUGA calls are offered relatively substantial resources, of which they can make flexible use. In the calls of both types so far concluded, there have been around 500 awardees, said professor Zbigniew Błocki, director of the National Science Centre.

Applications for funding in the FUGA 4 call were open to individuals with a doctoral degree held for up to 5 years. In response to the call, researchers submitted as many as 214 applications, of which one quarter were approved for funding. Over the course of their internships young researchers will be paid monthly salaries of up to EUR 2 600, totalling over EUR 6 million.

The idea of the FUGA calls is that research internships take place in research institutions in a region of Poland other than that of the applicant’s alma mater. Thus the Centre contributes to supporting the mobility of researchers in Poland as well as helping upgrade candidates' skills by means of their involvement with research teams from different parts of the country. New ETIUDA and FUGA calls will be announced in December 2015.

Young researchers may receive salaries from the National Science Centre’s resources not only as applicants in distinct calls dedicated to them, but also as co-investigators in projects carried out by senior researchers. Our successful applicants are often explicitly required to create new positions for post-docs and PhD candidates. A few dozen new job offers are published on our webpage every month, said professor Michał Karoński, chair of the Council of the National Science Centre.

Advanced researchers, scholars carrying out international research projects as well as those considering forming a new research team may apply for funding under new calls by the National Science Centre. Proposals should be submitted by 15^th September 2015.

This is for the seventh time that the NCN has announced its prestigious MAESTRO call. It is addressed to eminent researchers who plan to do pioneering research, including interdisciplinary enterprises conducive to the advancement of science which may lead to discoveries. The total sum of funding earmarked for successful MAESTRO 7 candidates exceeds € 14 million.

In MAESTRO 7 projects the Principal Investigator may be a researcher with a doctoral degree who over the course of the last 10 years has had their papers published in quality journals, has acted as Principal Investigators in at least 2 completed research projects, and who can claim additional research activity, e.g. participation in international conferences. In MAESTRO 7, the projects must provide for employment of at least one post-doc and at least one doctoral student, each for a minimum of 36 months.

HARMONIA 7 is an opportunity for researchers to carry out projects in collaboration with partners from abroad or use large international research facilities. Its budget is nearly € 12 million. The cap on funding available to an individual project has been set at € 355,000 (paid to the beneficiary over the course of 3 years). Note that the funding received under HARMONIA 7 may serve to cover only the costs incurred by the Polish contribution. Additionally, the purchase, construction or upgrading of research equipment does not qualify for funding.

SONATA BIS 5 is a funding scheme where the resources serve the purpose of building a new research team. Applicants may be individuals who earned their PhD or equivalent in the years 2003-2012. The research team may include only one researcher with habilitation (as Principal Investigator); arrangements must be made for hiring at least one doctoral candidate for a period of at least 36 months. The funding available under the SONATA BIS 5 scheme totals € 16.5 million.

The calls we have now announced are an important element of the system of distributing resources that the NCN has developed: it is an efficient tool for selecting the best researchers and equipping them with necessary resources. Unfortunately, our budget is disproportionately low when compared to individual needs and this is one reason for the limitations we have introduced in the call regulations. A success rate of 16 per cent means that receiving a grant from the NCN is not only a matter of writing a good proposal, said professor Zbigniew Błocki, director of the NCN. We have been appealing for an increase in the budget for basic research in domestic finances; otherwise the system is perceived as daunting. In Poland we have many excellent researchers with very good ideas and they deserve support in developing those concepts.

The new MAESTRO, HARMONIA and SONATA BIS calls are also instrumental in introducing modifications to the catalogue of costs eligible for funding in the projects. This is a policy which the Council of the NCN has been implementing since the last edition of the OPUS, PRELUDIUM and SONATA calls. The modifications apply for the most part to salaries in grants.

The National Science Centre and BiodivERsA consortium invites researchers to the call for international research projects.

The following themes are covered (equal in relevance):

1. Understanding and managing the biodiversity dynamics of soils and sediments to improve ecosystem functioning and delivery of ecosystem services.
2. Understanding and managing biodiversity dynamics in land-, river- and sea-scapes (habitat connectivity, green and blue infrastructures, and naturing cities) to improve ecosystem functioning and delivery of ecosystem services.

The indicative global budget for this call is ca. 30 million euro.

The deadline for submitting pre-proposals is 20^th of July 2015.

Scientific teams will be invited to form transnational research consortia with teams from minimum 3 countries participating in the call, except for proposals including research groups from outermost regions and overseas countries and territories for which it suffices if the research groups come from two different countries and the proposal concerns three different funding organisations.

24 national/regional funding organisations from 15 countries are joining this call:

Belgium, Bulgaria, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey

Polish applicants should also submit a short application via OSF system (UNISONO application) by the 27^th of July 2015. Budget of the Polish part of the research project in the OSF system should be given in PLN. The Euro exchange rate should be calculated according to the NCN Council’s Resolutions no 7/2013 and 22/2014 (1 EUR= 4,2277 PLN). 

For more information please click here: http://www.biodiversa.org/741.

Contact:

marcin.liana@ncn.gov.pl, +48 123419161