Volkswagen Foundation “Pioneering Research” (apply by 3 Sept 2024)
With the program “Pioneering Research – Exploring the Unknown Unknown“, the Volkswagen Foundation supports groundbreaking and risky research ideas with high scientific relevance. They are looking for basic research projects that are not dedicated to the already ‘known unknown’, but that strive to explore the ‘unknown unknown’ thereby holding the potential for major scientific breakthroughs, but also for failure.
Available are up to 1.3 million Euro for max. 3-5 years per project. Eligible to apply are post-doctoral researchers and professors at German universities and research institutes (international collaborations are possible). The next deadline is 3 September 2024. For further information see below.
Read more: Volkswagen Foundation “Pioneering Research” (apply by 3 Sept 2024)Eligibility Criteria
Pioneering projects must fulfill the following criteria:
- radically explorative basic research
- new scientific ground
- research off the beaten track
- high scientific relevance
- high knowledge potential with the expectation of achieving important scientific breakthroughs or even triggering a paradigm shift
- if successful, providing impetus for the specialist community or even beyond
- conceptually or methodologically risky
Projects with the following criteria are not eligible for funding:
- incremental gain in knowledge or little progress in an existing field of research
- primarily application-oriented or aimed at translation (e. g. clinical studies)
- combination of established methods or development of methods without a scientific hypothesis
- continuation of own work or next logical step in own research
- overlap with the Volkswagen Foundation’s thematic funding
- eligibility of support from other funding organizations (e. g. DFG, BMBF)
Further details on the conditions and the application procedure can be found here