The starting grants are intended for researchers who are at the start of their academic career and who completed their PhD two to seven years ago. Almost 2,700 proposals were submitted this round, with a success rate of 14.8 percent. According to the ERC, around 2,600 jobs for postdocs, PhD candidates and other personnel will be created using the 400 grants.

Third place

The highest number of grants awarded went to researchers at German (87) and French (50) institutions. The Netherlands managed to secure 44 starting grants, comfortably beating bigger countries such as Italy and the United Kingdom (32).

27 of the grants will be going to researchers with Dutch nationality. These may also be working at institutions abroad. Within the Netherlands, the highest number of grants is to be received by researchers from Leiden University.

Subject to change

The ERC warns that the list of grants awarded may still be changed. This is because the United Kingdom is officially “non-associated” to Horizon Europe, the EU programme for research and innovation from which the grants are paid. If this remains the case, successful applicants at British institutions will only receive their grants on the condition they use them to carry out research at an institution in a country that can take part in Horizon Europe. Examples of the latter include Turkey, Israel and Switzerland.