The ERC has announced the awarding of the Consolidator Grants that go to 329 top researchers across Europe. The funding, part of the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, is worth in total €630 million and will give them a chance to have far-reaching impact on science and beyond. 7 of the chosen researchers are Greek.

The ERC Consolidator Grants are awarded to outstanding researchers of any nationality and age, with at least seven and up to twelve years of experience after PhD, and a scientific track record showing great promise. Research must be conducted in a public or private research organisation located in one of the EU Member States or Associated Countries. The funding (maximum of €2 million per grant), is provided for up to five years and mostly covers the employment of researchers and other staff to consolidate the grantees’ teams.

The Greek researchers are: Malafouris Lambros from the University of Oxford, Bonanos Alceste from the National Observatory of Athens, Sarigiannis Marinos from the Greek Foundation for Research and Technology, Tassis Konstantinos from the Greek Foundation for Research and Technology, Panagiotou Konstantinos from the University of Munich, Rentetzi Maria from the University of Vienna and Papaioannou Elias from London Business School.

The grantees will carry out their projects at universities and research centres in 22 different countries across Europe, with as leading locations the United Kingdom (60 grants), Germany (56), France (38) and the Netherlands (25). In this competition, researchers of 39 nationalities received funding, amongst them are notably Germans (55 grants), Italians (33), French (32) and Britons (31). The research projects proposed by the new grantees cover a wide range of topics in physical sciences and engineering, life sciences, as well as social sciences and humanities.

The ERC has evaluated 2,538 research proposals this time, out of which 13% will be funded. Thirty-two percent of grants were awarded to female applicants. The grants will create an estimated 2,000 jobs for postdocs, PhD students and other staff working in the grantees’ research teams.

About the ERC

The European Research Council, set up by the European Union in 2007, is the first European funding organisation for excellent frontier research. Every year, it selects and funds the very best, creative researchers of any nationality and age, to run projects based in Europe. The ERC has three core grant schemes: Starting Grants, Consolidator Grants and Advanced Grants. An additional funding scheme, Synergy Grants, was re-launched in 2017. To date, the ERC has funded over 7,500 top researchers at various stages of their careers, and more than 50,000 postdocs, PhD students and other staff working in their research teams. The ERC has an annual budget of €1.8 billion for the year 2017, which is around 1% of overall spending on research in Europe. With a budget of over €13 billion for the years 2014 to 2020, the ERC is part of the EU research and innovation programme, Horizon 2020, for which European Commissioner Carlos Moedas is responsible. The ERC is led by an independent governing body, the Scientific Council, chaired by the ERC President, Professor Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, since January 2014.