Career Establishment Awards
Career Establishment Awards provide five years of funding to enable new, non-clinical and clinical investigators who have just taken up their first Higher Education Funding Council-funded post at a UK university to establish their own research group.
What is covered
The purpose of this award is to encourage the best new investigators to develop a career in cancer research and to provide the core support required to enable successful applicants to establish their own research groups.
Applications are invited from those with interests in any area of basic, biomedical science (including biology, chemistry, physics and maths) and population research, providing the applicant is able to explain the relevance of their proposal to cancer research. All applicants must ensure that their proposed work fits within the remit of our Research Strategy.
Applications are judged on the basis of scientific excellence, innovation and relevance to cancer research.
To find out more about current holders of Career Establishment Awards, please see the case studies listed in left-hand navigation.
Eligibility
- Applicants seeking funding must be in a full-time post at a UK university which is fully funded by the relevant national Higher Education Funding Council at the time of application, and this post must be guaranteed for the duration of the award.
- Applicants will have an excellent track record in their previous work and the promise of becoming future research leaders in their field.
- Career Establishment Awards cannot be used to fund part of an applicant's salary.
- Applicants must be within three years of the start of their first academic post at the time of application.
- Applicants must not have previously held substantial funding that allowed them to establish a research group (for example, a Career Development Fellowship or equivalent, a Programme Grant or multiple Project Grants, or institutional funding to support multiple research staff).
- Applicants must be the sole Principal Investigator.
Period of funding
Funding is provided for up to five years.
Funding value
Career Establishment Awards supply funds for one junior postdoctoral position and one research assistant or technician, as well as running expenses that may include a supplement for the applicant's own bench costs. A separate amount can be requested for equipment (up to £25,000).
How to apply
Applications for this scheme are considered once a year. Application forms for the 2013 Funding Panel are now available online.
The application process has two stages. Preliminary applications will be reviewed by the New Investigator Awards Panel. The Panel will invite the best candidates to submit full applications, which will be peer reviewed. The best candidates at this stage will be invited to an interview.
All applications must be made online using the electronic Grants Management System. Please note that applications are only fully submitted to Cancer Research UK once approved by the host institution administrators.
Application guidelines are now available to download (PDF, 194KB).
Deadlines
The deadline for preliminary applications is Monday 16 July 2012. These will be considered in September by the New Investigator Awards Panel. A short-list of candidates will be selected to submit full applications with a deadline of Thursday 15 November 2012. These full applications will be peer reviewed and considered at the March 2013 panel meeting. A final short-list of candidates will be selected at this meeting and invited for an interview on the 25th or 26th April 2013.
Additional notes
The Award cannot be held in the Cancer Research UK core-funded Institutes in London (London Research Institute), Manchester (Paterson Institute for Cancer Research), Glasgow (Beatson Institute for Cancer Research), Cambridge (Cambridge Research Institute) or Oxford (Gray Institute for Radiation Oncology and Biology).
Review
The award is subject to a review after three years, with continuation dependent on satisfactory progress.
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