The Mid Career Stimulus and Diversification Scheme is currently closed.

 

Over the past decade, there has been a significant decline of funding for basic biomedical research, as a result of changes to the mandate of a number of national funding agencies.  This situation is even more acute for researchers who have needed to temporarily disengage from research, such as those who have taken maternity / extended paternity / adoption leave or career breaks. The aim of support under this particular ISSF scheme will be to find sustainable sources of funding to enable re-establishment of excellent work. The scheme will be open to two main cohorts of staff:

1. those who have lost track record due to changes in the national funding landscape
2. returners, notwithstanding the fact that there may be overlap between these two cohorts. 

The Mid-Career Stimulus and Diversification scheme will support excellent mid­career researchers who were previously highly productive, but whose activity has been impeded by radical post-recession changes in Irish research funding or has been lost as a result of extended leave, or indeed a combination of the two. This scheme will be open to academics working within the remit of biomedical and clinical sciences across the University, including researchers within the medical humanities field. 

 

Award features include:

• Seed funding of up to 12 months duration to help researchers generate pilot data to support larger-scale applications for external research funding.
• Mentorship to be provided by members of senior academic staff. To promote this, a Wellcome Trust Excellence Award in Mentoring will be awarded to the nominated Mentor to demonstrate the importance and prestige of mentorship in UCD’s culture, and inspire participation.
• Dedicated project management and grant writing support will be available to all fellows, linking in with the project management team within the ISSF Network of Excellence Scheme. This support will enable researchers to write competitive grants and, in particular, to enable diversification of funding.
• Fellows will link in with UCD Research’s dedicated Public Engagement & Outreach Project Manager to ensure participation in at least one event per year, which exposes both them and their research to a broad range of audiences outside of the academic sector.
• Fellows, where appropriate, will also engage in networking hubs funded through the Networks of Excellence scheme to generate ideas for integrated research and foster new collaborations.
• Awardees will be expected to engage with the Research Impact supports recently developed within the University, the outcome of which will be featured case studies on the UCD Research website.
• Fellows will be required to present their research at least once annually at an international conference, workshop or event in the Personalised & Translational Medicine or One Health field, as appropriate.
• Awardees will be required to upload publications stemming from their fellowship projects to the University's Open Access institutional digital collection of scholarly research publications.