Grants Office Newsletter June 2026

Dear Researchers of the University of Basel, 

With decreasing budgets and an ever-increasing number of proposals, Grant writing is becoming even more of a challenge. Many of you contribute to exceptional effort not only of submitting proposals but also contributing many hours of your precious time to evaluating them and participating in panel meetings. This role is essential for upholding the highly rated peer review system. 

In our last Newsletter before the summer break, we highlight the upcoming calls and opportunities, as well as giving an overview of changes to some well-known schemes. 

Last but not least, we introduce “Research Connect” which can help you find alternative calls for your project ideas. 

We wish you all a nice summertime and hope you have found a cool place to survive the heatwave. 

The Grants Office Team

Eve Silfverberg, Gillianne Bowman, Aleksandra Grzegorczyk, Luca Wacker & Julia Wyss

There has been a lot of activity around the ERC Grants this year and this will continue in the coming months. Deadlines are coming up in autumn and early next year. The Grants Office organized an ERC Information Event for University of Basel researchers and other events are already scheduled. Read our overview to learn more about the upcoming changes and what you can look forward to in the coming weeks and months. 

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The SNSF will launch the last call for Ambizione proposals in 2026. As of 2028, a new career funding scheme will replace Ambizione and Postdoc.Mobility, the SNF will announce further details next year. 

A few important changes have been introduced for the last Ambizione call with a deadline on November 3: Applicants must have a Swiss link, i.e., Swiss nationality, a degree from a Swiss institution of higher education or at least 12 months research experience at a Swiss institution after their PhD, and a contact person can only support one applicant for the upcoming deadline. 

Interested applicants can join the Information Event offered by the Grants Office on September 7, 2026, 16.30-18.00. Please register by sending an email to grants@unibas.ch. 

Since the beginning of May, researchers at the University of Basel, as well as the University Hospitals and associated institutions IOB and Swiss TPH, may use ResearchConnect for searching for suitable funding opportunities on an international level. It replaces the previous database Research Professional.

To access ResearchConnect for the first time, an account has to be set up. We will organize a training webinar in autumn to help you to a smooth start with the new tool. 

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MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships have received a record number of 17’000 applications in 2025. The success rate in the SNSF project funding has dropped to 30%. Virtually all funding agencies receive more submissions and can fund less projects. The SNSF has therefore reduced the number of proposals and running projects per person, introduced a Swiss link for career funding programs, or discontinued some programs. So far, it is open how MSCA plans to reduce the number of applicants in the coming calls.

Researchers are kindly invited to reach out to the Grants Office if they have questions to specific programs or want to discuss alternatives.

A quick and friendly reminder from the Vice President for Research: Please announce your grant proposals, including SNSF project funding proposals, in the Grants Tool.

Why? Because we want to support you every step of the way. Announcing your proposal early ensures you have access to tailored guidance during the preparation phase and helps us guarantee a smooth start for your project. The Grants Tool also offers valuable resources, like budget calculators for individual schemes, to make the process even easier.

As always, our door (and inbox!) is open. If you have any questions or need assistance, don’t hesitate to reach out—we’re here to help.

Thank you for your collaboration!

At the end of last year, the SNSF announced that as of 1^st January 2027 expenditure for open access publications will be reduced. Article processing charges (APCs) above 3’500 CHF will no longer be covered, not even partially. Changes to book publications will also be introduced. 

More recently they announced that the SNSF is joining the open access platform Open Research Europe, allowing free publication of articles. 

The University Library also announced a recent update regarding Open Access publications.

This year, the SNSF has celebrated the 10^th anniversary of the SNSF Scientific Image Competition. Many images have been submitted by researchers at the University of Basel. 

In the latest issue from Horizonte – The Swiss Research Magazine – with a special focus on Testing Democracy, Prof. Dr. Katrin Meyer contributes to “Democratic participation doesn’t always promote equality”. Prof. Dr. Mohamed Bentires-Alj’s work on personalized cancer therapy is mentioned in an article on “Mini-organs are conquering the lab”. Last but least, Prof. Dr. Nicole Probst-Hensch from the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute, expresses the scientific community’s disappointment of the discontinuation of the Swiss Health Study, a long-term monitoring of the impact of environmental pollution on the population, in “Flying blind with PFAS and pesticides”. 

The Grants Office would like to congratulate: 

• Dominik Zumbühl, Philipp Treutlein and Julien Baglio for their Bridge Discovery Quantum projects
• Arka Banerjee and Adrian Bertschi for their Bridge – Proof of Concept projects
• Grzegorz Sarek, Roider Elisabeth, Amandine Grimm, Boris Sevarika, Dennis Gillingham, Melpomeni Fani, Georg Rauter for their Innosuisse projects
• The winners of 29 new SNF projects 
• Eleonora Seelig and Marios Psychogios for their IICT projects
• Matteo Balletti, Lana Martysheva, Kyle Lewis Barlow, Yavuz Furkan Yazicioglu, Catia Carvalho Mendes, Xinyuan Ji and Alessandro Fagnano for their MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships
• Dominik Zumbühl, Ivan Martin, Julia Bielicki, Matthias Briel, Christine Alewell, Niklaus Labhardt for their Horizon Europe projectsSonja Schmid, Interreg Oberrhein
• Karen Dixon for an AACR (American Association for Cancer Research) grant
• Richard Neher for his Swissuniversities grant
• Mario Bernasconi for an AXA Research Fellowship
• Glenn Bantug and Christoph Hess for their Uniscientia project
• Pablo Sinues and Mélina Richard for their project from the Gottfried & Julia Bangerter-Rhyner Stiftung
• Judith Zaugg and Nina Khanna for their Krebsforschung Schweiz projects

Check out ResearchConnect for more national and international Calls.