HFSP funding opportunity announcement

In January 2023, South Africa was admitted as a member of the International Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP) following a competitive application process. The South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) and the National Research Foundation (NRF) serve as joint institutional members.

South Africa is the 16^th country to be admitted, and the only country from Africa.

“HFSP Research Grants support innovative basic research into fundamental biological problems with emphasis placed on novel and interdisciplinary approaches that involve scientific exchanges across national and disciplinary boundaries (see guidelines).

Participation of scientists from disciplines outside the traditional life sciences such as biophysics, chemistry, computational biology, computer science, engineering, mathematics, nanoscience or physics is recommended because such collaborations have opened up new approaches for understanding the complex structures and regulatory networks that characterize living organisms, their evolution and interactions.

Research grants are provided for teams of scientists from different countries who wish to combine their expertise in innovative approaches to questions that could not be answered by individual laboratories. Preliminary results are not required and applicants are expected to develop new lines of research through the research collaboration.

It is understood that such research inherently contains risks and HFSP expects that teams of applicants address the risks and outline mitigation strategies for their research in case of failure and how they intend to achieve their goals.

Applications for applied research, including medical research typically funded by national medical research bodies, will be deemed ineligible (see guidelines).

Two types of grants are available: Research Grants – Early Career and Research Grants – Program.

*Former Young Investigators

Both provide three years support for 2 – 4 member teams.

Awards are fixed sums dependent upon team size.

Deadlines:

• Compulsory initiation of a Letter of Intent by obtaining a 7-digit LOI ID (1 XXX XXX): 21 March 2023

• Submission of a Letter of Intent: 30 March 2023

• Submission of Full Proposals: mid-September 2023, on invitation only”

 More information: Research Grants | Human Frontier Science Program (hfsp.org)