How to apply for funding
Frequently asked questions
How do I access current funding opportunities?
Idox GRANTfinder 4 Education
Furthermore here you have access to useful links:
- Research Councils UK (RCUK)
- Medical Research Council (MRC)
- Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)
- Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC))
- Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
- Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
- Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE)
- Higher Education Funding Council for Wales (HEFCW)
- Scottish Funding Council (SFC)
- Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS)
- Innovate UK
- UK Space Agency (UKSA)
- European Southern Observatory (ESO)
- European Space Agency (ESA)
- CERN
- Institut Laue – Langevin (ILL)
- European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF)
- Royal Society
- Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng)
- Institute of Physics (IOP)
- Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
How do I put together a multidisciplinary team?
Imperial College Expert Search Engine (EPIC)
This smart search tool deploys advanced artificial intelligence techniques, including topic modelling and natural language processing, to identify people in College matching user-given queries in natural language, and using information about these people as available on Symplectic and the RCUK repository as well as optional keywords from the users querying the system. It aims to explore whether we can have a more effective means to identify specific expertise at Imperial than a simple keyword search. Note this link only works from the College.
Find an expert
The Faculty of Natural Sciences also provides a wide number of services to maximize impact through collaborations. Please check Find an Expert and see what we can do for you.
How do I create a proposal?
Before the submission of proposals for both RCUK and non-RCUK calls, few steps must be done:
1. Departmental contacts (Research Operation Managers)
Departments have a contact to advise and ensure that research funding applications are prepared in accordance with sponsors’ terms and conditions and with College and Departmental procedures and policies and also that once awarded grants are managed in the same way. Below are the contacts to the research operations managers from each department:
Centre for Environmental Policy
3. For EU funders you will need to have access to the European Commission's main authentication service (ECAS)
The European Commission’s main mechanism for funding research and innovation in Europe is through Horizon 2020 which started in January 2014 and will run for seven years until the end of December 2020. Horizon 2020 has a budget of nearly €80 billion and offers a range of funding opportunities to UK HEIs. Details of the programme can be found at the EU Team's Horizon 2020 page. Horizon 2020 calls which are currently open to applications can be found on the Participant Portal.
4. For RCUK funders
Je-S is used by AHRC, BBSRC, EPSRC, ESRC, MRC, NERC and STFC (formerly CCLRC and PPARC), as well as the Technology Strategy Board (TSB), Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) and National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs), to provide their communities with electronic grant services
The Research Office has produced Internal User Guides for the most common online submission systems. See the section which includes general information and quick links to the online submission systems used by the main UK and non-UK funders.
How do I write a proposal?
- A helfpul list with Do's and Don'ts of proposal writing has been compilied by the Faculty Research Committee
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A checklist to help academic staff evaluate their grant proposal prior to submission ensuring that they have the best chance of success. This checklist is based on good practice outlined by the Research Councils and guidance notes identified within the College.
- Letters of Support are also an important part of a proposal. The Funding Strategy team in the Research Office will provide institutional statements where required and appropriate to the bid.
- The Faculty encourages and supports staff to work with industry, due to the range of benefits this can bring to our academic community. Please read Working with Industry at Imperial: Faculty of Natural Sciences Guide
Complementary information about preparing and costing a proposal can be found at the Research office's website.
Who do I contact for post award issues and support?
The Principal Investigator has overall responsibility for the technical and financial management of their research award. This includes the management of the project within the terms and conditions of funding, adherence to reporting requirements and timely communication of significant project changes. The College’s Research Office provides a central portal for support.
Research office provides all information towards budget management and contracts.
Below are the contacts to the research operations managers from each department:
Key contacts
Research strategy
Costing and contracts
Industry and funding
Research Office contacts
Internally Managed Calls
Contact the Research Office
Europe
Contact the Research Office Europe team