The Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions – MSCA – are part of the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme. They are the EU’s reference programme for doctoral education and postdoctoral training, offering, amongst other things, excellent opportunities for researchers on the one hand side and universities seeking to recruit talents on the other hand side.
The Marie Skłodowska-Curie programme comprises five types of funding:
- Doctoral Networks
- Postdoctoral Fellowships
- Staff Exchanges
- Cofund
- MSCA and citizens
Funding is provided for bottom-up activities; it is hence not restricted to specific topics or research areas. The programme aims to train researchers at all stages of their careers while encouraging transnational, inter-sectoral and interdisciplinary mobility.
Find out more about the programme and its funding types on the website of the European Commission.
EuroTech Universities and MSCA
Marie Curie fellowships of all kinds are highly appreciated and widely used amongst the EuroTech Universities. As an alliance, we particularly support our researchers in applying for MSCA Doctoral Networks. Doctoral Networks allow consortia of at least three institutions to implement doctoral programmes. The standard Doctoral Networks are complemented by two specific types of doctorates, namely Industrial Doctorates (joint supervision between academic and non-academic partners) and Joint Doctorates (leading to a joint doctoral degree or multiple doctoral degrees).
As an alliance of universities of science and technology with close relations between our members and to industry partners, the programme offers many benefits to our universities, and we are keen to collaborate with excellent non-EuroTech partners to set up such networks. The concrete support EuroTech provides is the same as for any joint proposal including at least three EuroTech Universities and being coordinated by one of them. To learn more, click here.
Success stories of MSCA funding
Marie Skłodowska-Curie projects involving at least three EuroTech Universities that have received support by the alliance are for instance the following two, funded as so-called “Innovative Training Networks” (ITN) under Horizon 2020, the predecessor of Horizon Europe:
Futhermore, EuroTech has launched two flagship projects funded under the MSCA COFUND scheme:
Since 2017, we have hired in total 150 high-potential postdocs from all over the world under the EuroTechPostdoc and EuroTechPostdoc2 programmes, co-funded by the EU and covering the whole EuroTech Universities Alliance. These Marie Curie fellowships have acquired high esteem in the academic community.