SNSF Professorial Fellowships/SNSF Starting Grants

The School of Engineering (STI) of EPFL is composed of five Institutes, grouping the laboratories working in specific fields of Engineering, as follows:

Institute of Bioengineering

Institute of Electrical and Micro Engineering

Institute of Materials

Institute of Mechanical Engineering

Institute of Neuro-X

The STI and its Institutes apply an internal review process of the potential applications to the following programs:

The STI and its Institutes will NOT consider applications to the 2022 ERC Starting Grants call. In case of questions please contact research.sti@epfl.ch .

Please note that the Institute of Materials (IMX) will not consider applications within the framework of the SNSF professorial fellowships or SNSF Starting Grants funding instruments.

Grantees of the Ambizione program are hosted by a laboratory. Grantees of the SNSF  Professorial Fellowships and the SNSF Starting Grants programs are hosted in an Institute. Applications hosted by a laboratory or Institute of the STI need to get the support of all corresponding parties, up to the Dean of the STI.

Particularly, if you would like to join the STI by applying to one of these grants, you must:

SNSF Ambizione – STI application process

• Step 1 : contact your potential host laboratory and Institute in STI and get the support of the head of the laborator and Institute Director for your application. You must contact your hosts (both lab and institute) as soon as possible to inquire about their internal deadline and requirements.
• Step 2 : pre-register your application according to the EPFL Research Office (ReO) instructions, which can be found in the EPFL toolkit for the Ambizione grant here . Please contact the EPFL Research Office (ReO) at research@epfl.ch in case of questions. To pre-register your application, you need to include the SNSF “Detailed confirmation letter” signed by both the host unit professor and the host Institute Director. Please note that the SNSF “Detailed confirmation letter” template will be made available by the SNSF (and included in the ReO EPFL toolkit) on August 1st 2022.
  • The STI deadline to pre-register your application with the ReO is 1 September 2022
  • Applications pre-registered after the above-mentioned deadline will not be considered by the STI

• Step 3 : wait for the STI to review, jointly with the respective host laboratory and Institute, your pre-application.
  • The STI will notify you whether your application is supported or not, at latest by 1 October 2022
  • If your application is supported, you will be re-directed to the ReO to obtain the General Confirmation Letter that you need to include in your application to the funding body.

Overall, the following calendar applies to this process*:

Call Call Opens Call Closes STI deadline to pre-register your application with the ReO Latest date at which the STI communicates you whether your application is supported or not
SNSF Ambizione 1 Aug. 2022 1 Nov. 2022 1 Sept. 2022 1 Oct. 2022

* Please note that some Institutes might have deadlines for the preliminary process described at Step 1 . Please check with your host whether this is the case.

In case of questions, please do not hesitate to contact research@epfl.ch .

SNSF Professorial Fellowships and/or SNSF Starting Grants (please see note hereafter(1) ) – STI application process

• Step 1 : contact your potential host Institute in STI as soon as possible to inquire about their internal deadline and requirements.
• Step 2 : pre-register your application here . To pre-register, you have to:
  • Indicate your target call
  • Specify the tentative title and short abstract describing your research project
  • Specify your host Institute at the STI – Please note that the Institute of Materials (IMX) will not consider applications within the framework of the SNSF Professorial Fellowships or SNSF Starting Grants funding instruments.
  • Specify whether special lab space and equipment will be needed to deploy your research project
  • Upload your CV

Please contact research.sti@epfl.ch  in case of questions.

• • The STI deadline to pre-register your application is 15 September 2022.
  • The pre-registration portal will close on 15 September at 23h55 anywhere on earth (strict deadline). Late applications will not be accepted.

• Step 3 : wait for the STI to review, jointly with the respective host Institute, your pre-application.
  • The STI will notify you whether you are invited for an interview, at the latest by 15 October  2022. Interviews will take place around early November.
  • For applicants invited to the interview step, the final decision on the STI support will be communicated at latest by mid-November 2022.

Overall, the following calendar applies to this process*:

Call (TBC(1) ) Call Opens (TBC(1) ) Call Closes (TBC(1) ) STI deadline to pre-register your application with the STI Rejection or invitation to interview sent by the STI Latest date at which the STI communicates you whether your application is supported or not
SNSF Professorial Fellowships/SNSF Starting Grants 1 Nov. 2022 1 Feb. 2023 15 Sept. 2022 15 Oct. 2022 Mid-Nov. 2022

* Please note that the pre-registration deadline of 15 September 2022 is a strict deadline and applies to both calls even if the SNSF calendars have not been published yet. Modifications to the calendar for the other steps of the process (i.e., interview and communication of support) might occur depending on the official opening dates of the calls that will be announced by the SNSF (see (1) ). In case of questions, please do not hesitate to contact research.sti@epfl.ch .

(1) IMPORTANT NOTICE

• On 25 July 2022 the SERI announced that, should Switzerland still be out of Horizon Europe by 25 October 2022 (ERC Starting Grant deadline), the SNSF will launch a transitional measure in November 2022: the 2023 SNSF Starting Grant. The aim of this transitionalmeasure is to replace the ERC Starting Grant. However, it is possible that it will also replace the SNSF Professorial Fellowships.
• Please stay up to date with the SNSF Newsletter and the EPFL ReO, SNSF, SERI, Euresearch Twitter accounts. The EPFL Research Office will inform the EPFL campus by e-mail as soon as the situation clarifies.
• In the meantime, the STI has defined this pre-registration process and timeline.  These have been developed based on the few information available at this moment, complemented with regulations on similar calls: if modifications to the eligibility criteria and deadlines will be announced by the SNSF when the call is officially launched, we will contact all the applicants who have pre-registered their application on the STI portal, to discuss modification to the schedule of the selection process, if needed. Thank you for your understanding.