Human Frontier Science Program - Research Grants

Eligibility

Research Grants - Program are designed to allow teams of independent researchers at any career stage to develop new lines of research through new collaborations. Priority will be given to novel research projects with the potential to extend the present frontier of the life sciences and to teams including members from outside the life sciences. Applicants for RG-Program are encouraged to include independent investigators early in their careers as team members and ensure a high level of diversity of backgrounds (gender, origin, and others) and approaches, as this often adds to the quality of the work.

Research Grants – Early Career (RG-Early Career) These awards are designed to encourage outstanding scientists in the initial period of their independent careers, to formulate novel and promising research projects. Recognising the challenge of establishing an independent research group at an early career stage, special consideration will be given to the overall level of interdisciplinarity in RG-Early Career applications. Early career investigators will be expected to propose projects with team members having distinct expertise and coming from different disciplines of the life sciences, if not from outside the life sciences.

 “Early Career” team members will have completed one or two periods of postdoctoral training and recently been appointed to independent staff positions that allow them to initiate and direct their own independent lines of research. Formal eligibility requirements for RG – Early Career (in addition to those valid for all RG) 
• Early Career applicants must be project leaders directing a research group. They must have full responsibility for the day to day running of their laboratories, and full control of the HFSP funds. In cases where the position of the applicant is unclear, written confirmation may be requested from the Head of Department (or equivalent) that the applicant is in the position to carry out the research independently. 
• Postdoctoral researchers are not eligible to apply. 
• All members of an RG-Early Career team must be within 5 years of obtaining an independent position and must have obtained their first doctoral degree (PhD, MD or equivalent) no longer than 10 years prior to the deadline for submission of the Letter of Intent. Exceptions may be made for periods of parental leave, compulsory military service or absence for medical conditions, but not for periods of unemployment. In cases where a team member has had a longer period of purely clinical service, applicants should contact the HFSP grant office (grant@hfsp.org). Applicants should clearly list periods of parental leave (or similar) in their CV ensuring to provide both start and end date(s) as well as the number of months, which will be evaluated to determine any extension of the eligibility criteria.

Summary

HFSP Research Grants support innovative basic research into fundamental biological problems with emphasis placed on novel and interdisciplinary approaches that involve scientific exchanges across national and disciplinary boundaries (see guidelines).

Participation of scientists from disciplines outside the traditional life sciences such as biophysics, chemistry, computational biology, computer science, engineering, mathematics, nanoscience or physics is recommended because such collaborations have opened up new approaches for understanding the complex structures and regulatory networks that characterize living organisms, their evolution and interactions.

Research grants are provided for teams of scientists who are based in different countries and wish to combine their expertise in innovative approaches to questions that could not be answered by individual laboratories. Preliminary results are not required and applicants are expected to develop new lines of research through the research collaboration.

It is understood that such research inherently contains risks and HFSP expects that teams of applicants address the risks and outline mitigation strategies for their research in case of failure and how they intend to achieve their goals.

Applications for applied research, including medical research typically funded by national medical research bodies, will be deemed ineligible (see guidelines). 

Applicants can check the HFSP Science Digest on recently awardee projects.

Overhead

No more than 10% of the direct costs covered by the award, at each research institution, may be used for indirect costs.

Pre-application deadlines

RSO internal deadline

Pre-application program deadline

Application deadlines

Program application deadline

NOTE: Consult your Faculty Associate Dean (Research) (ADR) regarding Faculty-specific deadlines and submission processes.

Principal Investigators: Complete a Research Management System (RMS) record, including a copy of your complete application, and submit this for approvals in RMS.

Postdocs, students, and trainees: For fellowships and externally-sponsored research training awards or opportunities, you must complete the Research Funding Application Approval (RFAA) Trainee PDF form, and submit it, along with a complete copy of the application, to Research Services at rsotrainee@ucalgary.ca. Trainees should not use RMS at this time.

Approvals: The University of Calgary requires that all funding applications be approved prior to submission. Approval requires signatures via either RMS or the RFAA Trainee form, in the following order:

• Principal Investigator
• Department Head
• Faculty ADR/Dean
• Research Services (on behalf of the Vice-President Research)

Read the Meaning of Grant Signatures policy to understand what your approval means. Please see the agency guidelines for details about which signatures are required on your application, as it may differ from internal requirements.

Late submissions: Late submissions will only be accepted in cases of medical or family emergencies, or other exceptional circumstances. If you submit your RMS record to Research Services after the internal deadline has passed, you must secure additional approvals. Please read: Late Applications Process.

For Applicants

Applicants must submit a letter of intent to apply for a research grant via the HFSP application site with a deadline at the end of March, and after review, selected teams will be invited to submit a full proposal.

Link to create an account: ProposalCentral

Step 1 : Letters of Intent

Deadlines

i. Compulsory initiation of a letter of Intent by obtaining an LOI ID number (1XXXXXX) by 17 March 2026 (updated for each cycle)

ii. Submission of Letters of Intent: 26 March 2026 (updated for each cycle)

Please read the guidelines, the document ‘Writing a letter of intent’ and other information on the HFSP Research Grant homepage carefully to establish whether your project is clearly in tune with the requirements and emphasis of the research grant program.

To apply for a grant, you must first submit a Letter of Intent online as described below. The main steps in applying are as follows:

1. The research team must designate one member as Principal Applicant, who will be responsible for final submission of the Letter of Intent. Note the requirement that the Principal Applicant must have his/her primary laboratory in a member country. See the guidelines (Item 3.2. “Principal Applicant”) for more detail.

2. In setting up the team, the Principal Applicant must ensure that no team member is a Principal Applicant or Co-Applicant on another proposal (see Item 3.5."Concurrent Applications" in the guidelines). Failure to ensure this will result in all those applications being withdrawn from the competition.

3. The Principal Applicant must obtain a 2027 proposal identifier (LOI ID) on the application site as early as possible and no later than 17 March 2026 (Item 11. How to apply and timeline). To this aim, The principal Applicant needs to connect to ProposalCentral  with their usual credentials or create an account, if not already registerted in the HFSP database. This will give them access to the online application form and further instructions concerning the online submission (including the addition of the other team members, the composition of the team can be modified up to the final submission date). This step is mandatory even for those re-applying from previous years.

4. All team members must be designated as co-applicants on the online form and all co-applicants must approve their participation by accessing the online form before the application can be completed and submitted. A brief explanation of the contributions of the different disciplinary expertise should be provided in the summary which will be used in guiding the review process.

5. The letter of intent must be submitted by 26 March 2026. No changes can be made to the letter of intent after final submission.

6. The Principal Applicant will be notified by mid-July on the outcome of the Letter of Intent. The deadline for the full proposal will be around mid - September 2026.

Step 2 : Full Proposals

For information only, see HERE the instructions for submitting Full Proposals in 2025. These are updated each year.

For Awardees

See HERE other helpful resources for Research Grant awardees.

INTERNAL RESOURCES

Reminder: The sooner the researcher engages with Research Services, the more help we can be!

Contact the following Research Service units for support with:

Projects Involving Indigenous Research:

Support with incorporating wise practices in Indigenous research, community engagement, and Indigenous data management is available through the Indigenous Research Support Team (IRST).

Applicants can reach out by email to IRST at IRST@ucalgary.ca in advance of the RSO internal deadline. For more information about IRST, please visit the IRST webpage.

Knowledge Mobilization, Research Impact Assessment, DORA:

Support for knowledge mobilization/engagement/translation, community partnerships, research impact, responsible research assessment (DORA), and open science, is available through the Knowledge to Impact team.

Applicants can reach out by email to the KI team at knowledge.impact@ucalgary.ca.

For more information and access to resource archives, please visit the KI team webpage.

Research Data Management:

For information on research data management plans, processes, or best practices for your research program, please contact research.data@ucalgary.ca.

EDI in Research:

RSO can provide resources and support to research teams on the integration of equitable and inclusive practices in research design and research practice.

Contact edi.rso@ucalgary.ca for more information.

Research Security:

The Research Security Division is available to ensure researchers adhere to research security guidelines and policies, including the National Security Guidelines for Research Partnerships (NSGRP) and the policy on Sensitive Technology Research and Affiliations of Concern (STRAC).

Visit the Research Security website to learn more or contact researchsecurity@ucalgary.ca.

Pre-Award Submissions:

RMS: Creating a Pre-Award LOI
RMS: Creating a Pre-Award Application