Two ERC Starting Grants are coming to Czechia

Prestigious grants have been awarded to researchers from Charles University and IOCB Prague.

In the 2024 ERC Starting Grant call, a total of 494 researchers from 51 countries received funding. ERC Starting Grants will help create up to 3,160 new positions for postdoctoral researchers with two to seven years of experience and provide sufficient resources for building their own teams and implementing the proposed projects.

The grants will support scientific projects across a wide range of disciplines, including both the soft and hard sciences. Two of these grants are headed to the Czech Republic. Specifically, one to Charles University in Prague (FSV UK), where Michal Smetana received a grant for his project MICROCODE, and the other to the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of the CAS, where Paulo Paioti was awarded a grant for his project AtropShape.

Out of 3,474 applications, 494 projects were selected making the overall success rate for the call 14.2%. The laureates proposed to carry out their projects at universities and research centres in 24 European countries. As in previous years, Germany leads with 98 projects, followed by the Netherlands (51), the United Kingdom (50), and France (49). Among the winners are nationals from 51 countries, with the majority being German (94 researchers), Italian (61), French (44), and Spanish (36).

For more information, visit the ERC website.