STARS 2021 Call

STARS GRANTS 2021

Through the STARS Grants 2021 call, the University of Padua supports individual research initiatives with a duration of two years. The funding adopts a "bottom-up" approach, with no predefined priority areas. Participants are invited to submit a research project in one of the 27 scientific areas within the three ERC domains, corresponding to the disciplinary groupings established by the University Macro-areas (PE: Physical Sciences and Engineering, LS: Life Sciences, SH: Social Sciences and Humanities).

Programme objectives

The call is designed to encourage the University's participation in international competitive calls and, in particular, in European Research Council calls. Recipients of STARS GRANTS 2021 funding will undertake to submit a proposal within the ERC framework during the project or in the periods immediately afterwards. The sole evaluation criterion for research projects will be scientific excellence.

Who can apply?

The call is open to Principal Investigators (PIs) of any age and nationality who wish to carry out their activities at a Department of the University and are able to demonstrate the innovative nature, ambition and feasibility of their scientific proposal. 

It is possible to apply for one of the following types of funding:

• STARS Starting Grants (STARS-StG): for excellent PIs in the start-up phase of their team and/or their independent research activity;
• STARS Consolidator Grants (STARS-CoG): for excellent PIs already carrying out research activities at Unipd, in the consolidation phase of their team and/or their independent research activity;
• STARS Wild Card Grants (STARS-WiC): for PIs who submitted a project to the European Research Council under the 2019 and 2020 calls, indicating the University of Padua as the Host Institution, and who, although they obtained the final score of "A" in the second evaluation step, thus becoming eligible for funding, were not funded due to budget limits.

How and when to apply

The STARS Grants 2021 call is open from 11 January 2021 to 12 April 2021 at 13.00 (Italian time).

Applications must be submitted through an online system for which registration is required: http://pica.cineca.it/.
The project submission procedure, application forms and the description of the supporting documents that must be attached are available in the annex to the call, “Guide for applicants and proposal templates”.

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STARS Grants

International Research Office
Research Area and Relations with Businesses
via Martiri della libertà 8, 35137 Padua
talent.stars@unipd.it