ERC Starting Grant (StG) supports talented early-career scientists who have already produced excellent supervised work. Applicants should have already shown evidence of potential for research independence (e.g. 1 important publication as main author or without their PhD supervisor).
As of 2025, researchers in CH can participate as beneficiary to the prestigious European Research Council (ERC) calls. Their proposals are evaluated by the ERC Executive Agency. In case of approval, if the EU Programmes Agreement (EUPA) is not yet in force, SERI will fund the projects.
ERC funds frontier research in any discipline. It welcomes proposals addressing new and emerging fields of research, or introducing unconventional, innovative approaches and scientific inventions. Applicants must demonstrate the ground-breaking nature, ambition and feasibility of their proposal.
Applicants must have successfully defended their PhD thesis between 1 January 2019 and 31 December 2023 included (ref. PhD defence/viva date). Both applicants with and without professorial position are eligible.
- Shorter proposal (Part I: <=5 pp, Part II: <=7 pp);- feasibility won’t be evaluated in Step 1. It will only be considered in Step 2; - up to €2M for non-Eu based researchers moving to EU/CH;- eligibility window extended for victims of gender-based or other violence.
Up to € 1.5 million for a period of 5 years (pro rata for projects of shorter duration) with an extra €1M possible for start-up costs, major equipment or facilities (€2M for researchers moving to EU/CH). Budget covers 100% of the project costs including 25% OHs. Funding is awarded as actual costs.
Proposals are evaluated by selected international peer reviewers and by discipline-specific panels in a two-step evaluation. - Step 1: Part I + CV&Track Record (TR); - Step 2: Part I+II, CV&TR, resources & time commit. Applicants invited to Step 2 will have an online interview in spring 2026.
Proposals are evaluated on the basis of excellence as the sole criterion that will be applied to both the evaluation of the project and the PI. Reviewers evaluate the ground-breaking nature, ambition, and feasibility of the project, as well as the intellectual capacity, creativity, and commitment.
Internal applicants with a professorial position must notify their expression of interest to servizio.ricerca@usi.ch by 25 August 2025 including provisional abstract and title of the project.The deadline for external applicants has passed.
Have a look at projects approved at the last call. The ERC database allows you to filter by discipline and grants you access to the abstracts.
Register now for the Euresearch info-event on the ERC Starting Grant call 2026. The event will be held on Monday, 18 August 2025, from 12:00 to 13:30. USI Research Service will participate in the Host Institution Q&A Sessions. Join our break-out room from 13:30 to 14:00.
