Horizon 2020: European Research Council Grants

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1 Horizon 2020: European Research Council Grants The rules, the evaluation procedure and support to the applicants Petra Perutková Mobility and ERC NCP Technology Centre AS CR

Technology Centre ASCR The Technology Centre ASCR supports the Czech Republic s participation in the ERA, prepares analytical and conceptual studies for R&I, performs international technology

2 Technology Centre ASCR The Technology Centre ASCR supports the Czech Republic s participation in the ERA, prepares analytical and conceptual studies for R&I, performs international technology transfers, and supports the creation and development of small innovation businesses. Established in 1994 as a non-profit interest association of ASCR institutes, currently ~ 70 staff members, webpage Business Development and Technology Transfers National Information Centre for European Research Strategic Studies for Research and Innovation Czech Liaison Office for R&D&I in Brussels

3 National Information Centre for European Research (NICER) Who are we? National contact organization for EU framework programs (project CZERA financed by Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports, 10/ /2015) Provides professional advice & complex support to national research teams, research organizations & industrial enterprises dealing with FP projects Experienced team of NCPs and FP analysts, well recognized in the Czech research community Our services information services (large-scale awareness e., trainings on proposal writing) consultation services (proposal pre-screening, advice on administrative procedures and contractual issues ) monitoring and analysis of Czech participation in FPs publication activities (a two-monthly periodical ECHO focused on ERA-related information, Vademecum FP7, H2020 booklet) electronic services (newsletter, webpages:

Nowotny, Czech ERC grantees) Interviews with grantees (ECHO 4-5/2010, 2/2012)

Schaeffer from University of Cambridge&C.

4 Selected Past Activities : 8th Czech Days for European Research, Workshop on ERC (with Prof. Nowotny, Czech ERC grantees) Interviews with grantees (ECHO 4-5/2010, 2/2012) : Workshop for ERC StG/CoG Applicants (targeted group of potential applicants) : ERC grants in H2020: How to write a competitive proposal (with R. Schaeffer from University of Cambridge&C. Meads from Imperial College London) 19/2 and 26/2/ ERC Workshops for Applicants in PE and LS domains (interactive, successful proposals) Bibliometric analysis of successful ERC StG 2012 applicants (ECHO journal 2/2013,

5 Forthcoming Events : European Research Council and the Czech Republic: Horizons for Social Sciences and Humanities (in cooperation with the Faculty of Arts of the Charles University and the Office of the ERC Vicepresident Pavel Exner), Charles University : Workshop for Applicants in the LS domain, Technology Centre AS CR : Workshop for Applicants in the PE domain, Charles University Registration and more information via

Only FRONTIER RESEARCH Projects are Funded ERC supports projects that are novel, original, innovative, very often of an interdisciplinary nature, use novel, unconventional methods and approaches, are

6 Only FRONTIER RESEARCH Projects are Funded ERC supports projects that are novel, original, innovative, very often of an interdisciplinary nature, use novel, unconventional methods and approaches, are addressing questions beyond the frontiers of knowledge, can open new horizons or new directions in the research field, have significant expected impact on science, scholarship or engineering, often are high-risk/high-gain projects (significant payoffs). No reason to ask for funding of the continuation of the work done for decade(s) without any substantially new idea. Do not propose me too research. (ERC evaluators)

7 Eligibility criterion: ERC Starting/ Consolidator Grants Ph.D. awarded 2 up to 7 years prior to 1 January 2015 (StG) Ph.D. awarded over 7 up to 12 years prior to 1 January 2015 (CoG) Further requirements: PI s commitment to the project: min 50% (for StG)/ 40% (for CoG) (30% for AdG) of the total working time on the project & min 50% in an EU MS/AC Profile of the PI (ERC Work Programme 2015): At least one (StG)/ several (CoG) important publication without participation of PhD supervisor Early achievements track-record appropriate to the field and career stage: up to 5 (StG)/ 10 (CoG) publications in the leading international peer-reviewed journals incl. citations, evtl. invited talks to peer-reviewed, internationally established conferences, granted patents, prizes and awards

8 ERC Advanced Grants Track-record of significant achievements in the last 10 years (WP 2015): 10 publications as senior author (in fields where alphabetic order of authorship is the norm, joint author) in major international peer-reviewed journals or 3 major research monographs (min. 1 translated into another language) - SH Alternatively: granted patents (5) invited talks in well-established internationally organised conferences (10) research expeditions led by the applicant (3) membership in the steering and/or organising committees of well-established international conferences or congresses (3) scientific prizes/awards or membership in well-regarded Academies major contributions to launching the careers of outstanding researchers recognised leadership in industrial innovation

9 2012 Bibliometric Analysis of Successful ERC StG 2012 Applicants Our Motivation Frequent bibliometrics in the evaluation summary reports Publication, Number of publications, Publication record Articles, Journal Papers, Conferences, Nature/Science Cited, Citations, Number of citations, h-index First author, publications without supervisor His list of publications includes an above-average number of publications 2013 No bibliometrics

10 Bibliometric Analysis of Successful ERC StG 2012 Applicants ERC Panel Structure FP7 (WP2012) H2020

11 Number of Publications Data provided by Ondřej Pecha, Technology Centre AS CR, Published in ECHO 2/2013,

12 Number of Publications Tab 1. Number of All Publications (WoS) - Laureates 2012 (N=533) Starter Consolidator Panel N Mean SEM Median Min Max N Mean SEM Median Min Max LS1 9 28,4 3,85 29, ,0 5,87 27, LS ,0 7,59 37, ,3 12,55 47, LS3 7 22,0 3,37 26, ,1 10,48 23, LS ,6 11,06 31, ,1 17,58 64, LS ,0 3,70 22, ,6 5,67 24, LS ,3 8,06 31, ,1 32,76 50, LS ,7 11,74 36, ,1 13,81 68, LS8 7 22,0 3,02 21, ,0 6,95 53, LS9 8 33,8 7,60 26, ,3 5,12 50, PE ,1 2,32 13, ,9 3,56 32, PE ,9 9,46 48, ,2 21,76 54, PE ,7 4,61 33, ,7 9,48 73, PE ,1 4,53 36, ,1 9,50 48, PE ,6 8,12 42, ,1 12,18 93, PE ,9 4,55 31, ,8 5,35 39, PE7 8 54,8 6,28 48, ,0 15,61 68, PE ,0 13,04 21, ,8 7,73 68, PE9 7 48,1 7,46 42, ,5 22,10 79, PE ,8 6,12 25, ,9 12,07 61, SH1 4 8,8 2,56 9, ,7 1,48 19, SH2 15 7,9 2,25 5, ,7 2,93 8, SH3 5 23,8 13,41 15, ,8 14,28 24, SH ,1 6,70 34, ,3 18,24 43, SH5 3 3,7 2,03 4, ,2 4,01 10, SH6 7 2,3 2,25 5, ,1 2,83 15,0 1 23

13 Conference Proceedings

14 First Author: All Publications

15 Does the PI have at least one publication in Nature or Science?

16 Sum of Times cited without self-citations

17 H-index

18 ERC Advanced Grants (2008 call) Karol Życzkowski, Jagiellonian University (Cracow)/ Polish Academy of Sciences (Warsaw)

CORDIS Find a project: http://cordis.europa.

19 CORDIS Find a project: ERC webpage Projects and Results:

Participant Portal Submission Service (PPSS) https://ec.europa.

20 Participant Portal Submission Service (PPSS) opportunities/h2020/index.html Information for StG/CoG Applicants, ERC Work Programme 2015

Evaluation of ERC Projects 25 panels (Panel Chair and 10-16 panel members): PE (10), LS (9), SH (6) http://erc.europa.

21 Evaluation of ERC Projects 25 panels (Panel Chair and panel members): PE (10), LS (9), SH (6) Evaluation criterion: excellence of the research project and the PI Evaluation elements applying to the excellence of the research project and the PI can be found in the ERC Work Programme 2015, p !

22 Evaluation Elements Applying to the Excellence of the Research Project (StG, CoG, AdG) Step 1 Step 2 What is the challenge? What competitive edge do you and your team have compared to other efforts worldwide? ERC Work Programme 2015, p. 31

23 Evaluation Elements Applying to the Excellence of the PI (AdG) does not apply for StG/CoG Step 2 fully agree agree partially disagree partially strongly disagree Evaluation Summary Reports 2013

24 Weaknesses of the Proposals in ESRs I Principal Investigator Limited potential for independence, disproportion between the PI experience and the goals of the project, low visibility/recognition, no experience with managing funding, leadership, no publications in high impact journals All publications are still together with the PI s previous Ph.D. supervisor. The PI never did a post-doc in a different environment; only short stays in connection with research projects of her home institution. The PI lacks experience with leading a small group or even supervising PhD students. He has not yet applied successfully for funding. His scientific papers published as main author have not been widely recognized. His success in attracting research support has been relatively modest. Strengthening your CV with evidence: Research be very specific about your outcomes (new knowledge you ve generated, collaborations you ve set up/initiated, technical difficulties you ve overcome ) Leadership have you supervised students/ led a team/ designed any projects/ attracted funding?

25 Weaknesses of the Proposals in ESRs II Project Low originality, narrow focus, continuation of previous work The application addresses an important, yet purely technical challenge no breakthrough expected due to the incremental nature of the proposed research. The challenges are significant and of interest within a narrow field. The proposal is not convincing in explaining, why and how the project will achieve a breakthrough compared to other existing research projects internationally. Resources - Justification is essential! The resources requested are too high compared to the ambition of the project. The applicant should extend more collaborations. The necessity to employ a full-time project manager can be questioned. The PI's involvement is unbalanced: 30 months at 40% and 18 months at 75%. It is not clear why the postdocs will be only 50% time on the project, what they will be doing for the remaining 50% time, where they will be located. Keep the evaluation elements with you while writing the proposal!

26 Weaknesses of the Proposals in ESRs III Project Methodology incl. Work Plan Little/no preliminary data, standard methodology, no contingency plan, no risk analysis, unclear work plan/outcomes of the project The research methodology is not innovative and doesn't provide solutions to the main questions raised in the project. The proposal is too much a general description of actual research on photovoltaic rather than a conclusive research plan. There are little preliminary data the feasibility is not very clear. Something like a Gantt chart with key intermediate goals is missing. There is no planning over the time presented and little organisation within and amongst the tasks proposed PI presents no risk analysis. If the concept does not work, what contingency plans does the PI have? Do not forget to include a Gantt chart/a clear, concise work plan!

27 ERC Calls for Proposals in 2015 Proof-of- Concept Starting Grant Consolidator Grant Advanced Grant Call identifier ERC-2015-PoC ERC-2015-StG ERC-2015-CoG ERC-2015-AdG Publication date 7 November October November February 2015 Deadline(s) 5 February, 28 May, 1 October February March June 2015 Budget mil. (estimated no. of grants) 20 (130) 430 (330) 585 (330) 630 (280)

28 Czech HI of ERC Projects (I) ( ) Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague (StG-2007) CHOBOTIX: Chemical processing by swarm robotics (Fr. Štěpánek) Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry AS CR, Prague (AdG-2008) HORIZOMS: New Horizons for Mass Spectrometry (D. Schröder ) Dipolar Rotor Array (J. Michl) Charles University, Prague (StG-2010) CCOSA: Classes of combinatorial objects: from structure algorithms (D. Král*) ISORI: Ion Spectroscopy of Reaction Intermediates (J. Roithová) Institute of Philosophy AS CR, Prague (one of beneficiaries, StG-2010) OVERMODE: Origins of the Vernacular Mode (P. Rychterová**) Institute of Physics AS CR, Prague (AdG-2010) OMSPIN: Spintronics based on relativistic phenomena in systems with zero magnetic moment (AdG-2010, T. Jungwirth) SC2: Spin-charge conversion and spin caloritronics at hybrid organic-inorganic interfaces (SyG, J. Wunderlich, one of beneficiaries) * grant transferred to UK ** grant transferred to AT

29 Czech HI of ERC Projects (II) ( ) Institute of Biophysics AS CR, Brno (one of beneficiaries, ) BIOINCMED: Bioinorganic Chemistry for the Design of New Medicines (AdG) Institute of Contemporary History AS CR, Prague (one of beneficiaries) RESOCEA: Regime and Society in Eastern Europe (AdG, ) Institute of Botany of the AS CR, Brno (StG-2011) LONGWOOD: Long-term woodland dynamics in Central Europe: from estimations to a realistic mode (P. Szabó) Institute of Mathematics AS CR, Prague (AdG-2012) MATHEF: Mathematical Thermodynamics of Fluids (E. Feireisl) Institute of Mathematics AS CR, Prague (AdG-2013) FEALORA: Feasibility, logic and randomness in computational complexity (P. Pudlák) Masaryk University, Brno (StG-2013) PicoStructure: Structural studies of human picornaviruses (P. Plevka) Charles University, Prague (CoG-2013) LBCAD: Lower bounds for combinatorial algorithms dynamic probl. (M. Koucký)

30 Any Questions? Petra Perutková Mobility and ERC NCP Technology Centre AS CR Ve Struhách Prague tel.: perutkova@tc.cz

Horizon 2020 Excellent Science Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) European Research Council Grants (ERC)

Horizon 2020 Excellent Science Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) European Research Council Grants (ERC) National Information Day Future and Emerging Technologies 27 April 2015, Prague Petra Perutková