ApogeeBio 2022

The ApogeeBio post-doctoral fellowship program gives you an opportunity to join a research team at Genopole, a leading French biocluster for academic research and innovation located just south of Paris.

person

Participation
individuelle

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

FINANCIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE CONDITIONS

ApogeeBio has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research And Innovation Programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement N° 101034259

Timeline

Deadline for submission extended to February 28, 2023
First phase of selection (assessment of the full application dossier) March-April 2023
Second phase of selection (interview step) April -> May 2023: precise dates will be communicated asap so as you can anticipate in case of selection to this step
Notification of final selections May 2023
Grant establishment process and start of the research in the hosting team up to 6 month after notification (November 2023 at the latest)

Amount and duration

The fellowship is allocated over 24 months, corresponding to a net monthly salary of up to €3000; the net salary may vary across the public and private sectors due to applied taxes and charges. The fellows will benefit from applicable French labor laws (social security, vacation time, holidays, etc.).

The ApogeeBio secretarial service will inform the applicants retained for the fellowships and their hosting teams once their selection has been finalized.
A fellowship grant will then be established between each hosting institution/company and the successful applicant for the duration of the project. The administrative and financial conditions for the fellowship as well as the rights and obligations of the hosting supervisor and of the fellow will be spelled out in the grant agreement.

Reporting and follow-up

For contract follow-up, the fellow and the supervisor will complete a declaration (template provided) at the start of the project.
Thereafter, the fellow will provide a research declaration at the beginning of the fellowship, an intermediate scientific report at mid-term (12 months), and a final report at the end of the contract or within the three months after the end of the fellowship; a report template will be communicated accordingly.
The hosting institution in charge of contract management will provide a financial statement on the use of the fellowship amount at mid-term (relating to the 12 first months) and a final financial statement within the three months after the end of the fellowship.
Reminder: the fellowship budget is strictly dedicated to the salary of the fellow, including all related regulatory charges and taxes.

Resarch Areas

The fellows will have access to attractive positions among 14 academic laboratories or 77 companies, all located at the Genopole biocluster.
They will benefit from an excellent research and innovation ecosystem and its state-of-the-art infrastructures. The fellows will also have  training and networking opportunities that will enhance their career development potential. 
The research fields concerned by the fellowships are those applying to the health/life sciences or to the environment and biodiversity. They include:

Gene and cell therapies
Human and environmental genomics
Biophysics, structural and molecular biology, chemistry
Computational biology, including bioinformatics, biostatistics, machine learning and artificial intelligence 
Systems and synthetic biology, biotechnologies
Management of innovation, including intellectual and industrial property and ethics

Eligibility criteria

To participate in the ApogeeBio program, applicants must meet  the following eligibility criteria to ensure equal opportunities for the researchers. 

Criterion	Rules
Academic training/Experience	On the date of application, the candidate should have a PhD or four years of experience as a researcher; he/she must be among the first three authors for at least one manuscript, either published, in press or accepted for publication.
Career time frame	Candidates can apply within the four years following the obtainment of their PhD or after four years of research experience. The point of reference for this time frame is the application deadline. A one-year extension is accorded per pregnancy, parental leave or national service.
Research topics	The applicants are free to conceive their research projects and choose the most appropriate participating host institutions
MSCA Mobility Rule	Researchers must not have resided or carried out their main activity (work, studies, research mobility, internships, etc.) in the country of the recruiting beneficiary for more than 12 months, successive or not, in the three years immediately prior to the application deadline. Compulsory national service, short stays such as holidays, and time spent as part of a procedure for obtaining refugee status under the Geneva Convention are not taken into account in this mobility rule. A declaration on one's word of honor will be requested for the mobility rule
Nationality	The call is open to researchers of any nationality.
Formal proposal criteria	Any application received after the precise date and time of the deadline will be ineligible
	Applications must be complete.
	Applications must be submitted in English
	Only one application per call and per fellow

Selection Criteria 

All applications meeting the eligibility criteria in full will be sent for review by an Independent Expert Committee briefed beforehand on the evaluation criteria and selection process.

The committee will assess the applications, taking into consideration a range of criteria designed to evaluate the excellence of the research. They will furthermore assess the researcher's potential for delivering original, independent work with the vision and creativity necessary to develop his/her profile in a context of leadership in international and cross-sectoral research.
The extended CV, the research proposal and the personal statement will serve as the foundation of that assessment.

Evaluation phase 1: Peer review of the application file

The first phase of the evaluation will review the three key elements of the applications: the research project, the applicant's qualifications, and the applicant's career development path. The tables below illustrate respectively the evaluation process and the scoring of the evaluation criteria. This first evaluation phase will result in a short list of applicants having reached the evaluation criteria scoring threshold (17/25). Those short-listed candidates will then be invited for the interview step 

Evaluated element	Evaluation criterion (scored 1 to 5)	Considerations (sub-criteria)	Weight
Evaluation of the research
Research project	S&T Quality	Scientific and technical merit Clarity of objectives Originality of the proposed research and awareness of current debates and knowledge within the setting of the project	50%
	Feasibility	Comprehensive and appropriate theoretical and methodological framework Feasibility within the given timeframe Budget evaluation	30%
	Impact	Recognition of anticipated impact of work Publication, dissemination and exploitation plan Potential for non-academic / cross-sectoral interactions Openness to interdisciplinary collaboration Openness to international collaboration	20%
Evaluation of the applicant
Applicant qualification	Experience	Quality of the applicant's CV Research track-record Training Awards & Funding Capacity to carry out the research project Letters of recommendation Previous / current partnerships and international collaborations	70%
Career development	Relevance of the proposed actions	Relevance of a fellowship at the applicant's career stage Impact of the project on his/her future professional plans Commitment of the hosting team to the career development plan Engagement in cross-sectoral or interdisciplinary partnerships	30%

Evaluation phase 2: Short-list applicant interviews

Candidates short-listed in the phase 1 evaluation will be invited for an interview to present and discuss their research proposal. As a reminder, the phase 1 evaluation criteria threshold needed to reach the phase 2 interviews is 17 of a possible 25 points.

At this interview step, the short-listed applicants will be evaluated on their abilities to respond clearly to questions about their projects and to express how they see their careers and the impact of their research in line with their scientific and professional environments. The interviews will comprise a 15-minute presentation period (with up to 10 slides) and a 10-minute discussion period with the panel.

The Interview Panel will assess the retained candidates according to the following interview criteria. From these latter, a score will be generated for each interviewee and a ranked list of candidates will be established

Interview evaluation criteria
Criterion (scored 1 to 5)	Considerations	Weight
Presentation	Scientific knowledge Research Vision Confident and clear communication	30%
Research capability	Experience Technical capability Previous level of responsibility Understanding of ethics implications	50%
Leadership potential	Evidence of foresight, e.g. setting up networks, partnerships, seminar groups Recent examples of leadership Motivation	20%

Final selection phase and decision process

The independent expert committee will weigh both the phase 1 (60%) and phase 2 (40%) results to establish a ranked list of the short-listed applicants. The list established by the committee will be final and irrevocable.

Considering the committee's ranked list on one hand and the number of fellowships available on the other, the ApogeeBio governing board will issue its final decisions and the candidates will be informed of them by the call management team.