Project grant – Cooperation with ISIS: instrumentation and methods for ESS

Please refer to the application form in Prisma in parallel with reading the instructions below, which describe the call-specific content of the application. More information on what to do in practical terms is available in our Guide for applicants Opens in new window..

Language

Foreign experts are involved in the scientific assessment of the applications. To ensure fair and equitable assessment and efficient processing, please therefore complete your application in English.

Sections of the application

The application form includes the following tabs:

• Descriptive information
• Research description
• Budget and research resources
• Publications
• Letter of support
• Administrating organisation
• Participants
• CV

The information we request under each tab is described below.

Descriptive information

Abstract

In the abstract, please describe in brief the following:

• What is to be done: purpose and aim
• How the research will be carried out: project organisation, time plan and scientific methods
• What is important about the planned activity, how will it enable future research
• How the collaboration will be conducted.

The abstract shall provide a summary picture of the purpose and implementation of the research. Please use wording to ensure persons with another subject specialisation can understand the information.

The description may cover a maximum of 1 500 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one third of an A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Popular science description

Describe the project in such a way that a person who is not familiar with the subject can understand it. Describe what is to be done, and why. Explain also in what way the new knowledge may be important.

The popular science description is an important tool when we inform about the research funded by the Swedish Research Council. If we grant your application, we reserve the right to use the description for information purposes.

The description may cover a maximum of 4 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Note: The popular science description must be written in Swedish, unlike the rest of the application.

Research description

Ethical considerations

Describe the ethical issues raised by your project or corresponding. You must also describe how you plan to address ethical dilemmas that may arise. Please justify why the research should be carried out against the background of the ethical issues you have identified. How do your research questions and expected results measure up in relation to the ethical issues? Please also state whether the research involves any handling of personal data, or experiments on animals or human subjects. If no ethical issues are raised, please justify this.

The justification may cover a maximum of 4 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Research plan

The research plan shall be forward-looking and consist of a brief but complete description of the research task. It shall cover a maximum of 12 page-numbered A4 pages in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins, including references and any images.

The research plan must include the following headings and information, listed in the following order:

• Purpose and aims: State the overall purpose and specific aims of the project.
• State-of-the-art: Summarise briefly the current research frontier within the field or area covered by the project. State key references.
• Significance and scientific novelty: Describe briefly the impact the project may have in the short and long term. Describe also how the project advances or innovates the current research frontier.
• Preliminary and previous results: Describe briefly your own previous research and pilot studies within the research area that make it probable that the project will be feasible. If no preliminary results exist, please state this.
• Project description: Describe the project design under the following headings:
  • Theory and method: Describe the underlying theory and the methods to be applied in order to reach the project goal.
  • Time plan and implementation: Describe summarily the time plan for the project during the grant period, and how the project will be implemented.
  • Project organisation: Clarify how you and any participating researchers and personnel will contribute to the implementation of the project. Explain in particular how the time allocated by you (that is, your activity level) as project leader is suitable for the task, including the relationship with your other research undertakings. Describe and explain the competences and roles of the participating researchers in the project, and also any other researchers or personnel who are important for the implementation of the project.
• ISIS collaboration description: Describe how the collaboration with the ISIS researcher/research group will be conducted. Also describe the impact of the collaboration.
• Instrumentation: Describe the developed instrumentations function and link to ESS, and one of the first eight instruments. Include a technical description of the equipment and an estimate of its economic life, and describe also how it complements existing possibilities on the instrument.

Provide the following information as well. If a heading is not relevant to your application, please state this under the heading.

• Equipment: Describe the basic equipment you and your team have at your disposal for the project.
• International and national collaboration: Describe your own and the team’s collaboration with other foreign and Swedish researchers and research teams. State whether you contribute to or refer to international collaboration in your research.
• Other applications or grants: If you are applying for or intend to apply for other grants from the Swedish Research Council, please clarify the relationship between the projects. This applies also if you are receiving ongoing grants from the Swedish Research Council with grant periods that wholly or partly overlap with the grant you are now applying for. You should also justify why you are submitting one or several further applications. Describe also the relationship with other applications to or grants from other funding bodies for the same project concept (from you or another researcher).

Budget and research resources

Project personnel

State the activity level (per cent of a full-time equivalent) of all personnel active within the project, that is to say yourself, any other researchers and other personnel. Please also state the salary you are applying for, for yourself and/or other personnel active within the project, both as a percentage of a full-time salary and as actual annual amounts (including social security contributions). Please state the amounts in Swedish krona, rounded to the nearest 1 000 SEK.

Other costs

Describe any other costs of the project (premises costs, running costs and depreciation costs). Please state the amounts in Swedish krona, rounded to the nearest 1 000 SEK.

Indicate any costs for instrument parts under running costs.

You may include depreciation costs for equipment to be used in the project, provided that

• the equipment has an economic life of at least three years
• the equipment has an acquisition value above a certain amount
• the need cannot be satisfied through use of national or international infrastructure supported by the Swedish Research Council and thereby open to all.

You may only include the proportion of depreciation costs that corresponds to the use of the equipment in the proposed project, and you may not include depreciation costs for equipment that is wholly funded by other grants. Please contact your administrating organisation for information about what is included in local research infrastructure, acquisition values or how to calculate depreciation costs.

Total cost

Prisma will automatically add up your budget items in a table. The total amount you are applying for shall also include indirect costs. You will have to add these to the table yourself. Here you can also add any additional costs that the project entails (for which you are not seeking funding under this call).

Please contact your administrating organisation if you have any questions about what constitutes indirect and direct costs.

Justification of the budget applied for

Justify briefly each cost applied for in your budget. The description may cover a maximum of 4 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately one A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Other funding

Please state your or any other researcher’s funding for the project over and above what is applied for in this application. Please state the amounts in Swedish krona, rounded to the nearest 1 000 SEK.

Publications

Applicant’s publication list

Please attach your publication list drawn up according to the headings and information below. The list shall cover a maximum of 5 page-numbered A4 pages in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins.

Sort the publications under each heading in reverse chronological order, so that the latest publication is at the top of the list. Please only include articles or equivalent that are published or accepted for publication at the time of applying. The author name order shall be identical to that of the published work. The application cannot be supplemented with publications after the deadline for the call.

1. Selection of publications: List the 10 publications of greatest importance to your application. Describe how you contributed to each publication, and its relevance to the research project described (maximum 4 lines per publication). Highlight your name in bold in the author list.

2. Relevant publications from 2013–2021: In this part, the publications listed under item 1 shall also be included if they have been published during the period in question. Sort the publications, with your name highlighted in bold in the author list, under each heading (publication type) in the following order:

• Peer-reviewed original articles
• Peer-reviewed conference contributions, the results of which are not included in other publications
• Peer-reviewed edited volumes
• Research review articles
• Peer-reviewed books and book chapters
• Other publications including popular science books/presentations

Participating researchers’ publication lists

Attach all participating researchers’ publications lists compiled into one file. The list for each researcher shall include the 10 publications that are the most relevant to the research described, and shall cover a maximum of 1 A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins. The name of the researcher in question shall be highlighted in bold and also be included in the page header of each list.

Please only include articles or equivalent that are published or accepted for publication at the time of applying. The author name order shall be identical to that of the published work. The application cannot be supplemented with publications after the deadline for the call.

The publications shall be of the types: Peer-reviewed original articles, conference contributions, edited volumes, research review articles, books and book chapters, and other publications including popular science books/presentations.

Letters of support

Collaboration with researchers at ISIS (UK) national neutron source is a requirement. The letters of support from ISIS and ESS (European Spallation Source), shall be combined into a single PDF and uploaded to the application. Each letter must be max. 1 A4 page, however one additional page per letter is allowed for any digital signature.

ISIS support letter must

• include a description of how the project fits into the development of one of the first eight instruments at ESS or other software or method development projects focused on early experiments at ESS. If the applicanttion involves a position as a researcher with the instrument team, include a confirmation that this will be possible and a brief description of how the applicant (and their research group) will contribute to the instrument team’s activity.
• include a confirmation that ISIS is prepared to allow the applicant (and their research group) to collaborate with relevant research groups at ISIS (UK) according to the proposed project plan
• be signed by ISIS Science Division Head or similar.

ESS support letter must

• include a description of how the project fits into the development of one of the first eight instruments at ESS or other software or method development projects focused on early experiments at ESS. If the application involves a position as a researcher with the instrument team, include a confirmation that this will be possible and a brief description of how the applicant (and their research group) will contribute to the instrument team’s activity.
• be signed by the ESS Director for Science or similar.

Administrating organisation

Please state the administrating organisation and project site.

Participants

Here you as applicant may invite other participating researchers and administrators to your application.

CV

Under this tab, please upload your relevant CV information from your personal account in Prisma. Any participating researchers must upload their own CV information to the application.

The following information (where available) must always be included in each CV:

• Education: First, second and third cycle higher education and specialist degrees.
• Work: Current employment (including employment form) and longer relevant employment held, postdoctoral visits (also included as employment if relevant), research exchanges relevant to the research described and any longer interruptions in the research that have impacted on your opportunity to gain merit as a researcher.
• Merits and awards: Docentship/associate professorship, supervisees (postdoctoral and doctoral students; state the number of persons in each category and list the names of the up to 10 most relevant to you), up to 10 of your most relevant grants awarded in competition, up to 10 of your most relevant prizes and awards, and up to 20 other merits relevant to the application.
• Intellectual property rights: For example, patents and open access computer programs developed by you; state up to 10 of your most relevant.

Scientific quality is the fundamental criterion when the Swedish Research Council allocates grants to research. Your application is evaluated in competition with the other applications on the basis of the following evaluation criteria.

Evaluation process

Your application for cooperation with ISIS instrumentation and methods for ESS is evaluated by a review panel where the members are Swedish and international researchers.

At least three members review and grade your application individually. The entire review panel then meets at a review panel meeting to discuss and prioritise the applications, and finally to make a proposal for a decision to Director General.

Review panel Opens in new window.

Following the grant decision your application will receive an individual final statement containing the grades and a summary of the review panel’s discussion and overall assessment of the scientific quality of the application.

Here you will find a more comprehensive description of the Swedish Research Council's assessment of applications. Opens in new window.

Evaluation criteria and guiding questions

The evaluation of the scientific quality of your application is made based on four basic criteria (Scientific quality of the proposed research, Novelty and originality, Merits of the applicant, Feasibility). In addition to the basic criteria, your application is also evaluated using an additional criterion, Relevance to the call. The purpose of using several components is to achieve a multi-faceted evaluation. In this call the scientific quality and the relevance to the call are the two most important criteria for the assessment.

The criteria are assessed on a seven-grade scale, except for feasibility and relevance to the call, which are assessed on a three-grade grade scale.

For each criterion, there are guiding questions to support the panel members’ evaluation of your application. These can also function as guidance for you when you write your application.

Scientific quality of the proposed research (1–7)

Guiding questions:

• To which extent does the proposed project lead to scientific excellence of the early experiments at ESS?
• If applicable, to which extent does the proposed instrument part development provide state-of-the-art capabilities for advancing research?
• To which extent does the proposed project lead to early involvement of Sweden based researchers in the early experiments?
• To which extent is the science case sufficiently explained?

If applicable:

• To which extent does the applicant, or the applicants group, contribute to the instrument team’s activities in the position of a researcher?

Novelty and originality (1–7)

Guiding questions:

• To which extent does the proposed project lead to that new and innovative scientific questions can be explored?
• To which extent does the proposed project contain new and relevant methods?
• To which extent does the proposed project, or its results, lead to that new and unique properties of the coming ESS can be explored?

Merits of the applicant (1–7)

Guiding questions:

• Has the applicant, or the group, the competence required within the field of the application to realize the project?
• If applicable, does the applicant have the required theoretical and practical experience for the project?

Feasibility (1–3)

Guiding questions:

• To what extent does the applicant (-s) have sufficient experience and competence to be successful with the project?
• To what extent does the research plan contain a description of the project that makes it probable that it, activity or research, will be a success?
• To what extent is the budget reasonable?
• To what extent is the projects leader and other persons activity levels reasonable in relative the work to be conducted?

Relevance to the call

Guiding questions:

• To which extent does the project comply with the purpose of the call of as participating as early users/expert users when ESS starts?
• To what extent is the collaboration with researchers active at the UK national neutron source ISIS described?

If applicable:

• To what extent is the support letter confirming the possibility for the position as a researcher with the instrument team?
• To which extent does the proposed position as a researcher in an instrument team contribute to the purpose of the call?

Overall grade (1–7)

The above subsidiary criteria are weighed together into an overall grade, which reflects the review panel’s joint evaluation of the application’s scientific quality.

As a guidance, the Scientific quality of the proposed research and relevance to the purpose of the call are the two most important criteria, whereas the novelty and originality can be given lower importance.