Proposal forms for ETIUDA 8 and SONATINA 4 calls are now available in the ZSUN/OSF system. The deadline for submission is 16 March 2020, 4 p.m. CET.

• ETIUDA 8 call announcement
• SONATINA 4 call announcement

We are pleased to announce that three projects involving Polish researchers have been awarded funding in the Solar-Driven Chemistry pilot call. The aim of this initiative was to encourage research in all areas relevant to the photochemical transformation of small, abundant molecules, such as carbon dioxide, water or nitrogen, into more valuable, storable chemicals by means of solar radiation. Within the Solar-Driven Chemistry Call over EUR 4,6 million have been granted to 6 research projects.

Polish projects awarded within the call:

1. Solar Light-Driven Processes for Methane Photochemical Conversion. Polish Principal Investigator: dr hab. Dorota Anna Rutkowska-Żbik, Jerzy Haber Institute of Catalysis and Surface Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences. The project will involve research teams from Finland and France.
2. Photoproduction of hydrogen in biphasic systems with electron donor recycling. Polish Principal Investigator: prof. dr hab. Marcin Wojciech Opałło (Project Leader), Institute of Physical Chemistry, Polish Academy of Sciences. The project will involve research teams from Finland and Switzerland.
3. Interfacial engineering of semiconductors for highly selective light-driven chemical transformations. Polish Principal Investigator: prof. dr hab. Wojciech Macyk, Jagiellonian University in Cracow. The project will involve research teams from Finland and Germany.

Congratulations to all funded research teams.

The Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange (NAWA) opens the call for proposals under the Polish Returns programme. The programme enables Polish scholars to return to their home country and become employed at universities and research institutes. From this year on, it is possible also to obtain a starting grant for fundamental research, financed by the National Science Centre (NCN).

This year, the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange is launching the third edition of the programme. Its aim is to enable outstanding Polish scholars to return to their home country and take up employment in Polish higher education institutions, scientific units or research institutes. The programme offers the returning scholars optimal conditions to carry out world-class research or developmental work in Poland. The funds obtained under the Polish Returns programme cover the salary of the returning scholar and the costs of establishing a project group (research team).

From this year on, it is possible to obtain funding for fundamental research, as well. Grants for fundamental research (the so called research component) constitute additional funding for the best projects selected in this year’s edition of the Polish Returns programme. They can be spent by the returning scholar and their project group within the first 18 months of the project’s lifetime. These funds are available thanks to the cooperation agreement that was signed by two agencies of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education in September 2019. On 2 January 2020, NAWA and NCN executed an annex to the agreement, which provides for their cooperation in carrying out the Polish Returns programme. The agreement and the annex were signed by Director Łukasz Wojdyga on behalf of NAWA and by Director Prof. Zbigniew Błocki on behalf of the NCN.

42 scholars from among others American, British, French, Danish, Spanish, German, Austrian, Swiss, Japanese, Singaporean and South Korean academic and research institutions have returned to Poland to work at universities and research centres under the Polish Returns programme so far. They do research among others in Warsaw, Gdańsk, Krakow, Poznań, Wrocław and Szczecin.

The call for proposals in the third edition of the Polish Returns programme closes on 31 March 2020.

MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE CALL

The National Science Centre (hereinafter: “NCN”) in cooperation with the JPND network (EU Joint Programme – Neurodegenerative Disease Research), announces the call for international research projects concerning development of imaging and brain stimulation technologies to diagnose and treat neurodegenerative diseases.

The call for proposals is open to any consortia composed of at least 3 research teams from at least 3 countries participating in the call. The call participants must meet the national requirements of the funding organisations participating in the call.

Countries participating in the call:

Australia, Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Canada, Luxembourg, Latvia, Germany, Norway, Poland, Switzerland, Sweden, Turkey, Hungary and Italy.

Application process:

Stage I:

• international level: the Polish research team prepares a joint pre-proposal in English in cooperation with its foreign partners and submits it via the electronic submission system of the JPND.

Stage II:

• international level: the Polish research team prepares a joint full proposal in English in cooperation with its foreign partners and submits it via the electronic submission system of the JPND;

• national level: the Polish research team prepares an NCN proposal covering the Polish part of the project and submits it to the NCN via the ZSUN/OSF electronic submission system. Instructions for submitting proposals in the OSF/ZSUN submission system are available here.

Call timeline:

• Submission deadline for joint pre-proposals: 3 March 2020
• Invitation to submit joint full proposals: May 2020
• Submission deadline for joint full proposals: 30 June 2020
• Submission deadline for NCN proposals in ZSUN/OSF: 7 July 2020
• Call results: December 2020

In the JPND Call 2020, funds may be awarded to cover remuneration for the research team, remuneration and scholarships for students and PhD students, purchase or construction of research equipment and for other costs crucial to the research project.

The total funds allocated by the NCN for the tasks to be performed by Polish research teams in the call amount to EUR 500,000.

The budget of the Polish part of the research project in the joint proposal should be prepared in EUR, with the exchange rate of EUR 1 = PLN 4.2916.

Please read:

• call documents available on the JPND website (applies to all applicants in the call);
• detailed information for applicants below and annexes hereto (applies only to entities applying for NCN funding).

MORE ABOUT THE CALL

The winners of this year’s edition of the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange (NAWA) Polish Returns programme can receive funding for their research thanks to grants from the National Science Centre (NCN).

Grants for basic research are additional funding for the best projects to be selected in this year’s edition of the Polish Returns programme, to be used during the first 18 months of the project’s implementation by the returning scientist and his/her project team. They are made possible by a cooperation agreement concluded in September 2019 between two agencies under the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education. On 2 January 2020, the NAWA and the NCN concluded an annex to the agreement, which deals with cooperation in the implementation of the Polish Returns programme. The agreement and the annex were signed on behalf of NAWA by director Łukasz Wojdyga, and on behalf of the NCN by director Professor Zbigniew Błocki.

“The Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange supports academic mobility and internationalisation of Polish universities and institutes. Thanks to our cooperation with the National Science Centre, we can respond even better to the expectations of researchers, contributing to the development of their individual scientific careers and increasing the potential of Polish academic and scientific centres. This is particularly important in the Polish Returns programme, whereby we support scientists who, after years abroad, decide to implement their ambitious research projects in Poland” says Łukasz Wojdyga, NAWA Director.

On 7 January 2020, the third edition of the Polish Returns programme will be announced. The programme has been continued by NAWA since 2018. It aims to enable outstanding Polish researchers to return to Poland and take up employment at Polish universities and research institutes. Under the programme, NAWA finances the remuneration of the returning researcher together with the costs of the employer; the remuneration of the members of the project group together with the costs of the employer; the costs of relocation and adaptation of the workplace. In this year’s edition, thanks to the NCN grant, the research component of the project will also be co-funded up to PLN 200 thousand.

“Supporting the arrival of successful researchers abroad is very important for the development of science in Poland. I am convinced that due to the annex just signed, the Polish Returns programme, enriched with a research component, will be even more effective in encouraging the best scientists to take up work in our country and will enable them to create internationally competitive research teams” states Professor Zbigniew Błocki, NCN Director. “Our cooperation with NAWA is developing very well and I hope to continue it in the future” he adds.

Polish Returns is another programme in which the NAWA and NCN cooperate. In September 2019, the agencies announced a joint call for research projects carried out by PhD students – PRELUDIUM BIS. In this programme NAWA finances a foreign fellowship for a PhD student implementing a research project.

The objective of the NCN and NAWA cooperation is to create common forms of research funding to ensure continuity and coherence of research as well as to increase mobility, which is essential for achieving scientific excellence and establishing international cooperation. The result of joint activities of these two institutions will be a complementary call offer, ensuring greater effectiveness of the grant system.

Read more about the Polish Returns Programme

Signing of the NCN-NAWA cooperation agreement, 12 September 2019

We would like to invite researchers to participate in SHENG 2 – the second edition of a funding opportunity for joint Polish-Chinese research teams organized by the National Science Centre (NCN) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC).

SHENG 2 aims to support research projects in selected fields of science:

Call announcement: 15th December 2020

Call deadline: 15th March 2021

Results: November 2021

Start of joint research projects: January 2022

Complete version of the call documents will be adopted by the NCN Council and made available on the website in the second half of 2020.

SHENG 3, which is planned to be announced in December 2022, shall cover the following fields of science:

OUTLINE OF SHENG 2 CALL

ELIGIBILITY:

• Eligible Host Institutions in Poland: NCN proposals may be submitted by the entities specified in Article 27 (1) (1) –(2), (1) (4) – (5) and (1) (7) of the Act on the National Science Centre of 30 April 2010 (Journal of Laws of 2019, item 1384);
• The Polish Principal Investigator (PI) must have at least a PhD degree when submitting a proposal;
• Eligible Host Institutions in China: please refer to NSFC rules: http://www.nsfc.gov.cn/publish/portal0/tab475/info70247.htm
• Grants that are considered state aid will not be offered;
• Only projects involving basic research will be funded;
• Research project duration: 36 months;
• All costs must be eligible according to the national eligibility requirements;
• The budget of the Polish part of the project must be at least 250,000 PLN; there will be no maximum limit for the Polish part of the project;
• The budget of the Chinese part of the project must not exceed 1,500,000 RMB.

APPLICATION PROCESS:

The joint proposals must be submitted online to both agencies’ respective submission systems, together with all necessary documents conforming to the formal requirements of the respective funding organisation set out in the call documentation. Submitted joint proposals must be identical; a project will be rejected if the joint proposals submitted to the two agencies differ.

Submission deadline: 15th March 2021

PROPOSAL REVIEW AND EVALUATION PROCEDURE:

Proposals will be subject to an eligibility check and peer review. The eligibility check of proposals will be carried out by the NCN and NSFC. The merit-based evaluation will be open only to proposals approved as eligible by both agencies.

All eligible proposals will be reviewed by both organisations separately.

At NCN, each eligible proposal will be evaluated by expert panels as well as by at least two external referees. The panels will consist of recognised researchers from the at relevant disciplines who are familiar with the NCN decision-making procedures.

At NSFC, each eligible proposal will be evaluated by expert panels as well as by at least 5 external referees.

Support will be granted to those proposals where both NCN and NSFC recommend funding.

CONTACT:

POLAND, NCN:

Dr Magdalena Godowska, email: Magdalena.Godowska@ncn.gov.pl, tel. +48 12 341 9016

Magdalena Dobrzańska-Bzowska, email: magdalena.dobrzanska-bzowska@ncn.gov.pl, tel. +48 12 341 9094

CHINA, NSFC:

Dr. Wencong Li; email: liwc@nsfc.gov.cn, tel. +86 010 6232 7014

Paweł Dłotko, Gracjan Michlewski and Bartłomiej Wacław will each set up a research group in Warsaw. They prevailed against 24 applicants from all over the world and have been selected as the new Dioscuri leaders in the second call published by the Max Planck Society and the National Science Centre Poland.

The scientists will start establishing their respective research groups in the second half of 2020. Coming from different scientific backgrounds, the three of them share similar career paths: after completing their studies and PhDs in their native Poland, they went abroad for postdoc positions at prestigious research institutions. Each of them has held a position at a British university for the past few years, and will now be returning to build up a centre of scientific excellence in Warsaw – striving to conduct top-class internationally competitive and innovative research.

Starting next year, Paweł Dłotko will establish the Dioscuri Centre in Topological Data Analysis at the Institute of Mathematics, Polish Academy of Sciences. He will be supported in his endeavours by his partner in Germany – Dmitry Feichtner-Kozlov from the Institute of Algebra, Geometry, Topology and its Applications at the University of Bremen. The aim of this interdisciplinary research group is to develop and implement tools of Topological Data Analysis as well as to bring them to the various disciplinary communities. “We will find mathematically correct solutions to practical problems”, says Dłotko. “We will build new rigorous and explainable data shape descriptors in data science, analyse time series from cancer biology, climate research and economics, examine medical images of neurons, airways, spongy bone, and search for the best performing materials for CO2 capture and more“, adds the 35-year-old mathematician. Dłotko has been working as a Senior Lecturer in mathematics at Swansea University (UK) since 2017.

Another Dioscuri Centre will be launched by Gracjan Michlewski. The RNA biologist will establish the Dioscuri Centre for RNA-Protein Interactions in Human Health and Disease at the International Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology in Warsaw. His partner in Germany is Juri Rappsilber from the Institute of Biotechnology at the Technische Universität Berlin. Together, they will investigate the cellular roles and structural characteristics of novel RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) and RNA-protein interactions. The major focus of their investigations will be on the RNA-protein interactions in innate immune response to RNA viruses including influenza, commonly known as the flu. “RNA viruses have already caused several epidemics in the 21st century; the emergence of a new influenza pandemic or a viral bioterrorism attack could have catastrophic consequences on public health and the world economy. Thus, a detailed molecular understanding of host-virus interactions is imperative in order to know how best to inactivate the virus and prevent major disruptions”, says Michlewski, who is currently working as a Senior Lecturer at Edinburgh Biomedical School, University of Edinburgh (UK) and Associate Professor at the Zhejiang University-University of Edinburgh Institute (China).

As for the third of the three new leaders, Bartłomiej Wacław will establish the Dioscuri Centre for the Physics and Chemistry of Bacteria at the Institute of Physical Chemistry, Polish Academy of Sciences. Arne Traulsen from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Plön will support him as the German partner. The Dioscuri Centre will use experiments, computer simulations and mathematical theory to create data driven, quantitative models of bacterial growth and evolution in complex environments: the interior of animal cells and animal secretions such as mucus. Research performed at the Centre will contribute towards the understanding of bacterial infections and the evolution of antimicrobial resistance in animal and human hosts. The theoretical physicist explains: “While the focus of the Centre will be on basic research in simple in vitro models, the long-term goal is the creation of quantitative, predictive models of bacterial infections that could be applied to develop new antimicrobial therapies.” Wacław is currently working as an Associate Professor at the Institute for Condensed Matter and Complex Systems at the University of Edinburgh (UK).

Group Leaders of three new Dioscuri centers: Paweł Dłotko, Gracjan Michlewski and Bartłomiej Wacław (left to right). @private

The Dioscuri Programme, which was initiated by the Max Planck Society, is jointly managed with the National Science Centre Poland (NCN) and aims to establish internationally competitive research groups in Poland. Together with the two Dioscuri Centres established already, five of the ten planned Dioscuri Centres in Poland have now been selected. Each of the centres is financed with up to 1.5 million euros for a period of five years. The costs are shared equally between the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education (MNiSW), while the host institutions in Poland provide the infrastructure.

The third call for Dioscuri Centres was published in December 2019 and is open to applicants from all scientific disciplines, including the humanities, social sciences, life sciences and natural sciences, until 23 March 2020. For more information, please visit https://ncn.gov.pl/dioscuri/dioscuri3

We are pleased to announce that two projects involving Polish researchers have been awarded funding in the JPI-EC-AMR call for transnational research projects on antimicrobial resistance.

Within the Joint Call on Diagnostics and Surveillance 2019 over EUR 12,1 million have been granted to 12 research projects addressing the development of diagnostic and surveillance tools, technologies and methods to detect antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

Complete list of the projects recommended for funding

Polish projects awarded within the call:

• IDAREMS: Concomitant IDentification and Antibiotic REsistance profile of bacteria in one hour with an adaptive targeted single Mass Spectrometry analysis. Polish Principal Investigator: prof. dr hab. Marek Tomasz Gniadkowski, National Medicines Institute. The project will involve research teams from France, Canada and Thailand.
• AntiRYB: Yeast-based biosensors for the specific and accessible detection of pathogens and antimicrobial resistance. Polish Principal Investigator: dr Alicja Kuch, National Medicines Institute. The project will involve research teams from Norway and Sweden.

Congratulations to all funded research teams.

On the 13th of December, the National Science Centre hosted another "round table" meeting, during which researchers and NCN officials debated how to facilitate cooperation between the NCN and the research world.

The purpose of the meeting was to analyse the grant application processes, as well as project implementation and accounting, and to identify areas where legal provisions or NCN policy measures create requirements that unnecessarily impede or protract them. Round table participants took an especially close look at the terms and conditions, procedures and agreements that require researchers or host institutions to take superfluous administrative steps.

The meeting was attended by Polish researchers and research organization authorities that had previously submitted their postulates to the NCN. After listening to their experiences and suggestions, the director, the Council and the leaders of grant-handling NCN units, in cooperation with their guests, went on to consider possible improvements that would streamline the proposal review process and subsequent project administration. Issues on the table included, for instance, a number of proposed changes to the structure of proposals, the review procedure, the call portfolio, reporting, cost estimates and project accounting.

Some of the topics brought up during the meeting, e.g. a call to support Polish researchers applying for ERC grants, have already been discussed extensively at the NCN.

The National Science Centre (hereinafter: “NCN”), in cooperation with the JPI Urban Europe network, announces the call for international research projects under the ERA-NET Co-fund Urban Accessibility and Connectivity (EN UAC) call for proposals, concerning subjects related to the development of modern cities and urban areas. The detailed scope of research is described in the call announcement.

Funding proposals may be submitted by international consortia composed of at least 3 research teams from at least 3 countries participating in the call. The principal investigator of the Polish research team must hold at least a PhD degree.

Countries participating in the call: Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, Latvia, Germany, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, Sweden, Turkey, United Kingdom and Italy.

Application process:

• International level: the Polish research team prepares a joint proposal in English in cooperation with its foreign partner and submits it via the electronic submission system of the French Funding Agency (ANR): https://aap.agencerecherche.fr

• national level: the Polish research team prepares an NCN proposal covering the Polish part of the project and submits it to the NCN via the ZSUN/OSF electronic submission system. Instructions for submitting proposals in the OSF/ZSUN submission system is available here.

Call schedule:

• Submission deadline for joint pre-proposals: 17 March 2020, 3 p.m. CET
• Invitation to submit joint full proposals: May 2020
• Submission deadline for joint full proposals: 22 September 2020
• Submission deadline for NCN proposals in ZSUN/OSF: September 2020
• Call results: December 2020

In the EN-UAC call, funds may be awarded to cover remuneration for the research team, remuneration and scholarships for students and PhD students, purchase or construction of research equipment and for other costs crucial to the research project.

The total funds allocated by the NCN for the tasks to be performed by Polish research teams in the call amount to EUR 500,000.

Please read:

• call documents available on the JPI Urban Europe website (applies to all applicants in the call);
• detailed information for applicants below and annexes hereto (applies only to entities applying for NCN funding).
  MORE ABOUT THE CALL