The Carlsberg Foundation announces call and presents five-year plan for funding instruments

Excellent scientific work of the highest quality, strong international research collaboration and strengthening of the opportunities for the best research talents to set up their own research groups.

Those are some of the Carlsberg Foundation’s ambitions in its Autumn Call 2022, which offers, inter alia, two different Semper Ardens funding instruments, three types of funding instrument for postdocs and fellowship grants for preparation of scientific monographs or doctoral theses. Funding is also available for research infrastructure and field trips/research stays.

Semper Ardens funding instruments and postdoctoral fellowships

The Carlsberg Foundation will be launching three new funding instruments in the Semper Ardens category over the next five years. Semper Ardens means “passionate, always burning” and since 1876 the motto has been the beacon of the Carlsberg Foundation’s support to Danish research and to passionate and always burning researchers with exceptionally visionary research ideas. A distinct characteristic of the Semper Ardens instruments is that they are all targeted at projects carried out by research groups.

The current call includes Semper Ardens: Accelerate, which are three-year grants available to newly employed associate professors in tenured positions for setting up independent research groups or environments. In addition, the Carlsberg Foundation calls for applications for Semper Ardens: Advance, which are five-year grants for internationally acknowledged professors for conducting visionary research projects that could potentially lead to interdisciplinary breakthroughs. For the first time, it will now also be possible for groups of researchers to apply for this funding instrument.   

The third Semper Ardens funding instrument, Semper Ardens: Accomplish, will be launched in connection with next year’s Autumn Call, i.e. in 2023. The purpose of this funding instrument, which is targeted at newly employed professors in tenured positions, is to support innovative and ambitious research projects over a 5-year period.

For researchers at postdoc level, the Autumn Call 2022 offers Internationalisation Fellowships, which are one- to two-year grants for stays at leading research institutions abroad. Applications are also accepted for two-year Visiting Fellowships at the University of Oxford and two-year Reintegration Fellowships to be used at Danish research institutions following a research stay abroad.

Finally, monograph fellowships are available for research with a view to preparing ground-breaking monographs or doctoral theses within the humanities or social science.

Five-year plan and funding for researchers at different stages of their careers

With the launch of a new five-year plan, the Carlsberg Foundation wishes to give researchers a clear overview of the Foundation’s portfolio of funding instruments some years ahead. 

“I'm pleased that we at the Carlsberg Foundation are now, for the first time ever, able to present a plan for the Foundation’s funding instruments five years ahead,“ says Majken Schultz, Chairwoman of the Carlsberg Foundation. “First and foremost, we have sought to meet a pronounced need among both young and established researchers to be able to plan their work. That is, in itself, a prerequisite if researchers are to deliver not only the best applications but ultimately also the best research results. It's also important for the Carlsberg Foundation to emphasise more clearly that the Foundation’s funding instruments are aimed at supporting researchers on different rungs of the career ladder. That's why we're launching Semper Ardens: Accomplish for young professors, which supports our ambition to strengthen generational change in Danish research”.

The application deadline for the Autumn Call 2022 is 1 October.