The European Research Council is the first pan-European funding body for frontier research, set up in 2007 to substantially strengthen and shape the European research system. The ERC is now part of the 'Excellent Science' pillar of Horizon Europe, with a budget of €16 billion and it aims at encouraging the highest quality research in Europe through competitive funding, and at supporting investigator-driven frontier research across all fields on the only basis of scientific excellence.

The ERC funding schemes are open to top researchers of any nationality or age who wish to carry out their research in a public or private research organisation located in one of the 27 EU Member States or in associated countries.  There are four core funding schemes:

• Starting Grants: for researchers with 2-7 years of experience since completion of PhD, with a scientific track record showing great promise (grants up to €1,5 million for five years);
• Consolidator Grants: for researchers with over 7 and up to 12 years of experience since completion of PhD, with an excellent mid-career scientific track record (grants up to €2 million for five years);
• Advanced Grants: for established and scientifically independent researchers with a recent research track-record and profile which identifies them as leaders in their respective fields of research (grants up to €2.5 million for five years).
• Synergy grants: 2-4 researchers working together to address a major scientific challenge which would require them working in synergy to tackle. (€10 million for up to 6 years)

In all cases, the sole evaluation criterion is the scientific excellence of the research proposal and of the track record of the individual applicant. Proposals are evaluated by selected international peer reviewers, who are in charge of assessing and scoring the proposals. The ERC uses a typical panel-based system, and each call (apart from the synergy call) has panels grouped into three disciplinary domains that cover the entire spectrum of science, engineering and scholarship: Social Sciences and Humanities (SH), Life Sciences (LS), and Physical and Engineering Sciences (PE). Each panel is composed of around18 high-level scientists and scholars selected by the ERC Scientific Council on the basis of their scientific reputation, who make the recommendations for funding. In addition, the evaluations rely on input from remote referees external to the panel.

The session will focus on the funding opportunities for researchers, and provide tips for prospective applicants as well as novelties to the 27 Work Programme. ERC grantees will be invited to join the session and share as well their experiences in applying to the ERC.