Research project grant Röntgen-Ångström Cluster

The following requirements must be fulfilled in order for you to be eligible to apply for the grant. We carry out checks and reject applications that do not fulfil the requirements.

Focus

The research must address materials science or structural biology, and aim for a development of instrumentation and/or methodology (hardware or software) at one or more of the following research infrastructures: PETRA III, FLASH, BESSY II, MAX IV Laboratory, ESS and European XFEL. Projects focusing on x-ray techniques should exploit the advantages of these new sources (e.g. coherence and brilliance) will receive priority. The aim is to strengthen Swedish-German research expertise to enable optimal use of the above mentioned research infrastructures. Project proposals that include cross-border mobility of postdoctoral researcher(s) to one of the mentioned facilities will be looked favourably upon. Proposals with a focus on new instrumentation and methodology at ESS can due to the delayed start of ESS also be conducted at ILL, ISIS, FRMII and SNS.

Applicant

The applicant for a project grant must be an individual researcher together with their organisation (a Swedish Higher Education Institution (HEI) or another Swedish organisation that fulfils our criteria for administrating organisations for Swedish Research Council grants Opens in new window.). We must have approved your organisation as an administrating organisation for you to apply. The administrating organisation must sign your application in Prisma no later than 7 calendar days after the deadline for this call.

You shall be the project leader and have scientific responsibility for the project. The time you set aside for the project (your activity level, that is the percentage of a full-time equivalent) must be suited to the task and its implementation throughout the grant period.

You must hold a Swedish doctoral degree or an equivalent foreign degree, awarded no later than the deadline for this call. For applicants with Swedish doctoral degrees, the award date listed in Ladok applies.

The application must include an ongoing or a new collaboration with researchers and/or research groups active at a university or research institute in Germany. One of the collaborating researchers is the applicant from Germany, hereafter called the ‘German applicant/international project leader’, who must hold the equivalent academic qualifications to the Swedish counterpart. Please note that

• the German applicant/international project leader must submit a separate application, comprising the identical research plan, to the BMBF/PT DESY system easy-Online; External link, opens in new window. this is a legal requirement of the BMBF.
• the Swedish application must be submitted first to obtain a registration number in Prisma. The German application to the BMFB must refer to the registration number given to the Swedish application in Prisma when the call has closed.

You do not have to be employed by the administrating organisation at the time of application, but you must be employed at the start of and throughout the grant period and any further additional availability period. The employment must equal at least 20 per cent of a full-time equivalent.

Number of applications and previous grants

The requirements described in this section only apply to applicants (project leaders).

General information about overlaps between applications and grants

Your application must not cover costs for purposes that are already funded by the Swedish Research Council or any other funding body. Overlaps with other grants or applications may impact on the grant amount you are awarded, or be a reason for us to reject your application.

What grants may I apply for simultaneously from the Swedish Research Council?

You may only submit one application for this grant under this call. You may, however, apply for other project grants, but for another project concept. Further information about the grants you may apply for during the same year are shown in on the page Several grants simultaneously Opens in new window..

What requirements apply if I already have a grant from the Swedish Research Council?

There are certain restrictions if you are the project leader of an ongoing grant, that is to say where the grant period (payment period from the Swedish Research Council) overlaps the grant period of the grant the application relates to. Please note that the availability period, that is to say the time during which you have the right to use your grant, is normally longer than the grant period. You can find information about your ongoing grant in the “Approval of terms and conditions” you received from the Swedish Research Council.

If you already have an ongoing grant, then further information about the grants you may apply for are shown in on the page Several grants simultaneously. Opens in new window. Grants under this call are counted as ”Project grant with focus”. Please note that if you are the project leader for an ongoing project grant, this must have a different focus and a different project concept for you to be able to apply.

Note: If you have been the project leader for previous grants from the Swedish Research Council that have ended, final financial reports for all of these must have been submitted within the permitted time frame in order for you to apply for a new grant. Please contact your administrating organisation if you are unsure whether all your final reports have been submitted.

What applies for applications to or grants from other funding bodies?

If your application to the Swedish Research Council relates to the same project concept as a grant you have already been awarded by, or are applying for to another funding body, please describe this.

Participating researchers

Besides the required German applicant/international project leader, other researchers who are active in Sweden or Germany and who are connected to the project may be invited as participating researchers to the application. These are researchers with a doctoral degree or corresponding competence (not doctoral students), whose scientific competence will be crucial for the implementation of the proposed research.

At least 1 and a maximum of 10 researchers (5 from each country, including the international project leader) may be invited to participate in the application. They shall provide the required CV information themselves in Prisma, and upload these to the application.

Any further participating partners and their roles shall be described in the research plan (please see instructions under “Research plan” below).

Costs and grant amounts

You can apply for a grant for all types of project-related costs, such as

• salaries (including your own salary), however no more than corresponding to the person’s activity level in the project
• premises
• running costs (such as consumables, travel including stays at research facilities, publication costs and minor equipment)
• depreciation costs.

The grant amount includes cover of indirect costs as a percentage of the direct costs, according to the model used by your administrating organisation. Grants must not be used for scholarships. If a doctoral student participates, project funds may not be paid out as salary during teaching or other departmental duties.

The minimum amount you may apply for is 500 000 SEK per year, including indirect costs. The maximum amount you may apply for is 2 000 000 SEK per year.

Grant period

You may apply for a grant for a minimum of 1 year and a maximum of 4 years, starting in January 2024.

The first payment will be made in January 2024 at the earliest.

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

Language

International 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 (apart from the popular science description, which you must write in Swedish).

Sections of the application

The application form includes the following tabs:

• Descriptive information
• Research description
• Budget and research resources
• CV (full cv of all German participating researchers only)
• Publications
• Administrating organisation
• Participants
• CV (all participants)
• 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 aims
• How the research will be carried out: project organisation, time plan and scientific methods
• What is important about the planned research

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 planned research in such a way that a person who is not a researcher can understand it. Do this by answering the following questions:

• What is the research about?
• Why is it important to research this?
• In what way may the new knowledge be important?

The popular science description is important when we inform about the research funded by the Swedish Research Council.

The text must be in Swedish and may cover a maximum of 2 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately half an A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Other applications or grants

Describe the relationship between the different projects if

1. you are applying for or intend to apply for other grants from the Swedish Research Council
2. you are receiving an ongoing grant from the Swedish Research Council with a grant period that wholly or partly overlaps with the grant you are now applying for
3. there are applications or grants relating to the same project concept/purpose from the Swedish Research Council or other funding bodies (from you or another researcher).

In all cases, you should also justify why you are submitting one or several further applications. If there are no other applications or grants, please state so.

The description may cover a maximum of 2 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately half an A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Research description

Ethical aspects

Legal and formal requirements

State whether the research covers the handling of personal data, or experiments on animals and/or studies involving humans.

If the research covers any of the above, you must also describe/state the approvals and permits your research project requires, and how you plan to obtain these. Describe any other permits that affect your application, such as whether parts of the research will be done in a country other than Sweden. If no approvals or permits are needed, please state so.

The description may cover a maximum of 2 000 characters including blank spaces. This is approximately half an A4 page in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing.

Further information is available on the page Conducting ethical research Opens in new window..

Ethical considerations

Reflect on the ethical issues that may arise for your project, and describe these. 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. Examples of issues to reflect on:

• How do your research questions and expected results measure up in relation to the ethical issues?
• What (direct) risks (physical, mental, or integrity) will research persons or animals be exposed to?
• What long-term risks may arise from the research? Is there any risk that the research may be used in a way that is detrimental to animals, nature/the environment, or society (whole or parts of the same) in other respects?
• Is the research expected to contribute to other values over and above the knowledge gain? If so, to whom?
• How do you weigh up the risks (in particular short-term risks) against the value (which is often more long-term) of the research?

If no ethical issues are raised, please justify this. 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.

Research plan

The research plan shall be forward-looking and consist of a brief but complete description of the research task. It may cover a maximum of 17 page-numbered A4 pages in Arial, font size 11, single line spacing and 2.5 cm margins, including references and any images.

Please note that the German applicant/international project leader must submit an identical joint research plan to the BMBF/PT DESY system External link, opens in new window..

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 research 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 how the project relates to previous research within the area, and the impact the project may have in the short and long term. Describe also how the project moves forward 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. State also whether the project continues to build on research and scientific results from a grant awarded previously by the Swedish Research Council.
• 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. Describe also any crucial risks or obstacles that may impact on the implementation, and your plan for managing these.
  • Project organisation: Clarify how you and the participating researchers 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 other key persons (including any doctoral students) who are important for the implementation of the project.

• Need for research infrastructure: Specify the project’s need for international and national research infrastructure. If you choose to use other infrastructure that Opens in new window.those supported by the Swedish Research Council Opens in new window., and that are thereby open to all, you must justify this (also applies to local research infrastructure).
• Exploitation plan: Describe in a few sentences the project’s economic prospect of success, scientific and/or technical prospect of success and the ability to extend the project towards further scientific and economic development.
• Joint budget: State a joint applied budget for the total grant period for the Swedish and the German partners according to the template below. The budget for each partner shall correspond to the amounts presented in the Prisma application form (see below under the heading “Budget and research resources”) and EASY-online, respectively. Present all numbers in EUR, where 11 SEK = 1 EUR. Please also provide a brief justification of each cost in the budget plan stated.

Provide the following information also. 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 foreign and Swedish, German, and/or other foreign researchers and research teams.

Budget and research resources

Please note that the following instructions for filling out budget and research resources concerns the Swedish part of the research budget and are to be filled out by the Swedish applicant in Prisma.

Project personnel

State the activity level (per cent of a full-time equivalent) of all personnel active within the project, that is, you, any other researchers, doctoral students 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.

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 of the project

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).

Indirect costs follow the model that your administrating organisation uses. 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.

CV (German researchers)

Please attach the CV of the German applicant/international project leader and any other German participating researchers, each comprising no more than 2 A4 pages.

Please note that the publication list(s) shall be included under the separate “Publications” tab below.

Publications

Under this tab, please attach your and the participating researchers’ publication lists to the respective fields (Swedish and German participants sorted separately). 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. In each case, the project leader’s publication list should be the first of the lists from each country.

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.

Administrating organisation

Please state the administrating organisation and project site.

Participants

Here you invite the German applicant, any other participating researchers, or participating administrators to the application. The German applicant that represents the German part of the research collaboration is distinguished from other participating researchers by you giving her/him the status of international project leader in the table provided in the application form. You may assign full editing rights to the international project leader.

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.

Swedish project leader/applicant and any other Swedish researchers:

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, such as as lecture invitations, leadership positions, positions of trust, membership of scientific organisations and similar.
• Intellectual property rights: For example, patents and open access computer programs developed by you; state up to 10 of your most relevant.

German applicant/international project leader and any other German researchers:

The German participants are only required to upload their doctoral degree as well as current employment from the personal Prisma account. The full CV is attached in pdf-format as instructed above under “CV (German researchers)”.

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 Röntgen Ångström Cluster project call 2023 is evaluated by a review panel where the members are Swedish and international researchers nominated by the Council for Natural and Engineering Sciences and BMBF (PT-DESY).

At least three members review and grade your application individually. If extra competence is needed, your application might also be evaluated by an additional, external, reviewer. The entire review panel (not including any external reviewers) then meets at a review panel meeting to discuss and prioritise the applications, and to make a proposal for a decision to the Council for Natural and Engineering Sciences.

Review panel Opens in new window.

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). The purpose of using several components is to achieve a multi-faceted evaluation. The criteria are assessed on a seven-grade scale, except for feasibility, which is assessed on a three-grade scale.

An additional criterion is Relevance to the call - including synergy of the research collaboration, which will be assessed on a seven-grade scale. This criterion is outside the scientific criteria and is used in the final ranking by the panel.

The criterion Research plan, assessed on a three-grade scale, is an administrative criterion used by BMBF (a partner in the call) and is not used by the panel in the ranking.

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:

• Are the scientific questions addressed important in the context of existing scientific knowledge and ongoing research worldwide?
• When applicable, is the proposed development of methods or techniques of high scientific significance? Does this proposed development allow new scientific questions to be addressed?
• When applicable, are the ethical considerations for the proposed project properly described and addressed? Does the applicant adequately consider potential suffering of humans and animals, and the balance of risk and value to nature and/or society?

Novelty and originality (1–7)

Guiding questions:

• To what extent does the proposed project define new, scientific questions?
• To what extent does the proposed project use new ways and methods to address important scientific questions?
• ·When applicable, does the proposed project show a clear progression in relation to the previous research of the applicant?

Merits of the applicant (1–7)

The assessment should concern whether the merits of the applicant enable them to perform the proposed project. The assessment of the complementary expertise of the participating researchers is only of relevance for the grading of the feasibility of the project.

Guiding questions:

• How significant is the applicant’s scientific productivity, impact and other merits in a national and international perspective, in relation to the research area? Here the emphasis should be on recent (the last 8 years) scientific achievements.
• What is the applicant’s scientific competence within the research area of the application?
• When applicable, does the applicant have previous experience in the development of experimental or theoretical methods or instruments?
• Is the researcher a junior scientist?

Feasibility (1–3)

Guiding questions:

A high risk-high gain project is not considered to have a lower feasibility. It is the criteria below that should be evaluated

• Is the project feasible with the available equipment, infrastructure and other resources?
• Considering the project as a whole, including any participating researchers, does the applicant or project group have sufficient competence to perform the proposed research?
• Does the description in the research plan support the likelihood that the proposed project will be performed successfully?
• Is the applicant’s activity level in the project reasonable in relation to the proposed project?
• Does the applicant adequately consider relevant legal and formal requirements for the proposed research, such as ethical permits and guidelines?

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. The overall grade is not the same as an average grade or a summary of the subsidiary evaluations; instead, it shall reflect the scientific quality of the application as a whole. It is not a condition that the quality concept covers all aspects of the various criteria, nor that they have the same relative weight for all applications. In normal cases, however, a strongly positive evaluation of only one criterion cannot outweigh other weaknesses of an application when weighed together.

Relevance to the call - including synergy of the research collaboration (1-7)

(Contribution of the project to the research policy goals)

The synergy to the program objectives is evaluated separately from the scientific quality, and is not included in the overall scientific grade. The grant should strengthen thematic and physical cross border connections, knowledge exchange and research collaborations between Swedish and German researchers. The research should be of relevance for the focus areas.

Guiding questions:

• Does the proposed project provide added-value to national or bilateral research communities in the area including benefit for potential user groups?
• Has the proposed project the potential to widen the user community of the aforementioned large-scale facilities?
• Does the cooperation bring mutual added value to the research; compared to if the partners were not working together?
• Will the proposed development be made in collaboration with a large-scale facility?
• Does the proposed project increase the capabilities of the aforementioned large-scale facilities? Does this result in added value for scientific or economic use?
• Has the project potential to create new cooperation?
• Does the proposed project include cross-border mobility of postdoctoral researcher(s) to one of the mentioned facilities?
  

Research plan (1-3)

The criterion Research plan, assessed on a three-grade scale, is an administrative criterion used by BMBF (a partner in the call) and is not used by the panel in the ranking.

Evaluation of the work plan with regard to:

• Project-related resource planning
• Milestone planning
• Effort and time planning
  

Would you suggest any cuts in the resources applied for?