13 funding organizations participated in the first ERA-Net NEURON joint call for proposals "European Research Projects on Mental Disorders". They consented on a joint implementation process, which is depicted in the following summary.
Funding organizations
|
Name |
Country |
|
Austrian Science Fund (FWF) |
Austria |
|
Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) |
Canada |
|
Fonds de la Recherche en Santé du Québec (FRSQ) |
Canada |
|
Academy of Finland (AKA) |
Finland |
|
National Research Agency (ANR) |
France |
|
Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) |
Germany |
|
Chief Scientist Office, Israel Ministry of Health (CSO-MOH) |
Israel |
|
Ministry of Health (MOH) |
Italy |
|
National Research Fund (FNR) |
Luxemburg |
|
National Centre for Research and Development (NCBiR) |
Poland |
|
National Centre for Programme Management (CNMP) |
Romania |
|
Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN) |
Spain |
|
Institute of Health Carlos III (ISCIII) |
Spain |
Topic
The topic of the second NEURON call was shaped during a scientific workshop with renowned international experts in the area and the NEURON Scientific Advisory Board. The call addressed the breadth of research from understanding basic mechanisms of disease through proof-of-concept clinical studies in man. It included research on depression and bipolar disorders, phobia and anxiety disorders, schizophrenia and psychotic disorders, substance use disorders, and other mental disorders. Research on dementia was not included in the present call.
Timeline
|
May 04, 2009 |
Scientific workshop "Mental illness and neural dysfunction" |
|
January 19, 2010 |
Call for proposals published |
|
March 9, 2010 |
Deadline for submission of pre-proposals |
|
May, 2010 |
Selection of a short list of 32 pre-proposals |
|
June 15, 2010 |
Deadline for submission of full proposals |
|
September 7, 2010 |
Peer Reviewer Panel meeting, ranking list |
|
October 13, 2010 |
Funding decision |
|
February, 2011 |
Start of projects |
Proposal submission
Research consortia were to consist of 3 - 5 research groups from at least 3 NEURON partner countries. The two-step process required submission of short pre-proposals describing the research idea. From these a short list was selected and the respective consortia invited to submit full proposals. Both pre- and full proposals had to be submitted by the coordinator electronically. A proposal template and guidelines were provided by the Joint Call Secretariat in order to support the applicants in terms of the proposal format.
Peer Review
In order to properly cover all aspects of the broad topic, 35 experts were recruited from NEURON partner countries and beyond. Each pre-proposal was assessed in writing by at least 2, most of them by 3 evaluators. The assessments were based on the criteria listed in the call for proposals and consisted of a global score of 1-4 (1 being best) and additional comments. The assessments were used as a basis for selecting 32 pre-proposals whose coordinators were invited by the Joint Call Secretariat to submit full proposals. For each of those, 3 independent written assessments were collected from 11 experts who served on the Peer Review Panel (PRP). During a PRP meeting, each of the proposals was discussed thoroughly, and eventually 21 were recommended for funding and ranked.
Funding decision
The final funding decision was made by the funding bodies participating in the joint call for proposals. Starting with the best proposal and following the ranking list, as many proposals were selected for funding as the budgetary constraints of each funding organization allowed for.
In result of this step, 11 projects comprising 47 research groups (Principal Investigators) from 8 countries were successful. The total funding volume amounted to about 10 million euros for 3 years.
In the last step, the Principal Investigators were to contact the respective funding body in their country and to fulfill the legal and administrative requirements in order to receive the grant.
The projects started in February 2011.
Call statisticsPre-proposals
Fig. 1: Principal Investigators (research groups) per country
|
Coordinators (submitted pre-proposals) |
Coordinators (successful pre-proposals) |
|
- Germany (40) |
- Germany (15) |
- 40/129 successful research groups led by female PI (31%)
- 13/32 successful consortia coordinated by female PI (41%)
Full proposals
Submitted: 32 consortia, 129 research groups, 26.7 million €
Successful: 11 consortia, 47 research groups, ca. 10 million €
Topics of successful proposals:
Depression (3), Schizophrenia (3), Drug abuse (2), Autism (2), Impulse Control Disorder (1)
Fig. 2: Principal Investigators (research groups) per country
|
Coordinators (submitted full proposals) |
Coordinators (successful full proposals) |
|
- Germany (15) |
- Germany (6) |
- 14/47 successful subprojects with female PI (30%),
- 5/11 successful consortia coordinated by female PI (45%).
[PDF - 44.3 kB]
(URL: http://www.neuron-eranet.org/_media/NEURON_Call_Text_2010.pdf)
