ERC Starting Grant 2022 Results: €636 m to 408 young scientists – One project in Cyprus
The European Research Council (ERC) announced the 408 early career scientists that were selected for funding under the ERC Starting Grant (ERC StG) 2022 Call.
Cyprus received one grant. Particularly, the Research and Innovation Foundation (RIF), would like to congratulate Dr Tuija Jokinen, Assistant Professor in the Climate and Atmosphere Research Center (CARE-C) of The Cyprus Institute, that was selected for funding for the project entitled: “The role of Base molecules in AErosol formation (BAE)”.
The project will underpin the modelling of atmospheric aerosol processes, which are subject to major precursor emission changes in Europe and beyond. The BAE project is of particular significance to global efforts to address the climate crisis, as aerosol formation and growth mechanisms need to be better understood to improve air quality and weather prediction models, and reduce uncertainty of radiative forcing in climate change projections.
Overall, more than 3.000 proposals were submitted in 2022, leading to a success rate of 13.9%. The call has been funded under Horizon Europe, the Framework Programme of the EU for Research and Innovation 2021-2027. The list of the winners, as well as statistics, are included in ERC’s announcement.
The ERC Starting Grants support excellent researchers with 2-7 years of experience after their PhD (extension possible in certain occasions such as maternity leave), that already have promising scientific achievements and would like to implement frontier research in any field. The funding can reach €1,5 m. for up to 5 years, with the possibility for an additional €1m. The only evaluation criterion of ERC is scientific excellence.
The president of ERC Prof. Maria Leptin commented: “… I cannot emphasise enough that Europe as a whole – both at national and at EU level – has to continue to back and empower its promising talent. We must encourage young researchers who are led by sheer curiosity to go after their most ambitious scientific ideas. Investing in them and their frontier research is investing in our future”.
The RIF can support researchers interested in submitting ERC proposals with a Host Institution in Cyprus, via proposal screening services, access to the ERC Mentoring Initiative, interview training and mock interviews and other services. For more information contact the ERC National Contact Points in Cyprus (Katerina Karakasidou Malla, [email protected], tel. 22205036 and Ioannis Theodorou, [email protected], tel. 22205038).