Short Term Scientific Missions
The call for Grant period 3: 1st November 2024 – 30 September 2024 (STSM must be fully executed before the indicated date).
Short-Term Scientific Missions (STSM) are institutional visits to support individual mobility and foster collaboration between researchers.
STSMs are great opportunities to strengthen existing networks and create new ones, facilitate the transfer of knowledge and contribute to the training in new techniques, fields and research equipment. Furthermore, they promote the career development of researchers.
An STSM should specifically contribute to the scientific objectives of the “Computationally assisted design of enzymes” – COZYME CA21162 COST Action and must directly fit within the scope of any of the Working Groups.
STSMs commonly last from 5 to 90 days, but can also be performed for longer periods within the current Grant Period. They aim to provide learning opportunities, preferably but not solely to Early Career Investigators (ECIs), through research exchange outside their home country on topics related to the COmputationally assisted design of enZYMes. STSM applicants must be engaged in an official research programme as a Masters student, PhD student or postdoctoral fellow or may be employed by, or affiliated to, an institution or legal entity with a clear association with performing research within its remit. Applicants preferably did not previously receive a grant for a STSM.
The financial support contributes to the costs of an STSM and may not cover all costs. The financial contribution for an STSM will be a fixed grant based on the Applicant’s budget request and the application evaluation by the STSM assessment committee.
The maximum budget for an STSM is 3000 EUR, with a condition that the grantee does not exceed the limit of 5000 EUR for the duration of the COZYME Action.
If the total STSM budget is spent before the end of the running Grant Period, the STSM shall be postponed to the following grant period. Grantees must make their arrangements for all provisions related to personal security, health, taxation, social security and pension matters.
Country rates to cover accommodation and meal expenses may be differentiated based on the perceived cost of living in the host country.
STSM awards may be combined with other funding sources, but these must be acknowledged in the application.
Please note that the awarded grant will be paid only after the STSM has been completed. Therefore the applicant must have approval and prior financial support, e.g., from their own institution.
In your application, you will have to describe the goal of the proposed STSM, how it contributes to the scientific remit of the COZYME COST Action, the planned expenses and the outputs planned as a result of the STSM.
1. Applicants must complete, submit and download their STSM application online at: https://e-services.cost.eu/activity/grants
2. Applicants must send their application form and the relevant supporting documents for evaluation to Nataša Božić (natasa.bozic@ihtm.bg.ac.rs), COZYME STSM coordinator.
The list of supporting documents to be included are:
- Letter of invitation from the Host Institution confirming that they can undertake the STSM on the given dates should their application be approved.
- Letter of support from the Home Institution.
- The submitted STSM application form.
- An overview of the proposed activities to be carried out, a work plan for the visit, justification for the choice of the Host Institution, in the scope of which WG(s) the planned work aligns to, benefits to the COZYME Action and benefits to the Applicant (maximum four standard pages).
- A full CV (including a list of academic publications – if applicable).
- For Master students: an official letter of enrolment to a research program signed by the Home University representative
3. The COZYME STSM coordinator organises expert assessment of the STSM proposal along with the Action’s Chair and Vice-Chair. If approved, the STSM coordinator sends the application to Grant Holder Manager.
4. The Grant Holder Manager sends the applicant a grant letter.
5. After the STSM, the investigator submits a scientific report to the STSM coordinator within 14 days of completing the STSM. This must include the purpose of the mission; description of work carried out; description of main results; plan of future collaborations with Host (if applicable); planned publications resulting from STSM (if applicable); confirmation of successful STSM by Host.
6. For dissemination purposes, the successful applicants will be required to prepare a brief for the Action’s website, including name, institution, research interest, and summary of research completed in STSM.
7. STSM Coordinator and Action Chair (or Vice-Chair, in case of any conflict of interest) approve the final report. The Grant Holder executes payment to the STSM Applicant.
The selection of successful STSM applicants will be made in consideration of:
- the scientific scope and quality of the proposed mission;
- relevance of the mission to the scientific objectives of the COZYME Action; in particular, how the proposal is related to a specific Working Group of the Action;
- feasibility of the work plan and outcomes;
- the academic excellence of the candidate (or promise of excellence in the case of the ECIs).
- whether the applicant has already received support from the Action for a different topic. It is possible to receive the new grant, but the advantage will be given to the participants who were never supported. It is not possible to receive the grant for the topic that has been previously funded.
Special considerations will be made to supporting COST policies on promoting gender balance, enabling Early Career Investigators (ECI), and broadening geographical inclusiveness.
Mission Period: 01 November 2024 – 30 September 2025
Application: Open continuously;
The STSM grantee must submit a report via eCOST to the Host institution, Action Chair, and Grant Awarding Coordinator for approval. The deadline to submit the report is 14 days from the end of the activity and at least 5 days before the end date of the Grant Period (or within a shorter timeframe as per the Grant Holder/Grant Awarding Coordinator’s request to meet reporting deadlines). The report should contain:
- A scientific report using the template available through the e-COST platform and describing the work carried out, the main achievements and the planned future follow-up activities.
- An official letter/confirmation by the host institution of the successful execution of the STSM.
The Action Chair and STSM Coordinator are responsible for approving the scientific report. Failure to submit the scientific report within 14 days will effectively cancel the grant. Once the report is approved and the payment request submitted, the payment of the STSM grant will be carried out by bank-to-bank transfer to the grantee.
Please be aware that the grantee will be asked to present the results of the STSM during webinars or internal meetings organized by COZYME Action. If applicable, when results from the STSM visit will be published in a scientific journal or presented at any national or international conference (oral or poster), please acknowledge the support of the COST Action CA21162 COZYME according to the COST guidelines on visual identity (see COST visual identity).
STSM Committee
- Coordinator: Nataša Božić (natasa.bozic@ihtm.bg.ac.rs)
