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Funding research:

Institute career path fellowships

The call for proposals is closed

Next proposal deadline: 2010 TBC

Aimed at

Early-career researchers wishing to be based at a BBSRC Institute and working in areas of high strategic importance to BBSRC.

Nature of award

Awards are for 5 years, and include personal salary and a significant research support grant.

Eligibility

• Applicants should not exceed 10 years in active postgraduate research studies and postdoctoral research employment
• Applicants should have no less than 3 years of active postdoctoral research experience
• The applicant's research programme should address the area of food security, a full remit description is provided in the downloads section.

How to apply

Submit a proposal electronically via the Joint Electronic Submissions (Je-S) system with the following mandatory attachments:

• CV (see downloads section)
  You should complete the standard CV template. We do not accept stand alone CVs.
• Case for support
• List of publications
• Head of department statement
• Justification of resources
• Impact plan

Fellowships are awarded under full economic costing (fEC).

You should submit costed research support grant proposals in line with the Grants Guide.

Detailed guidance on how to complete proposal forms and proposal attachments can be found on the Je-S system and in the Fellowships Handbook and in the Frequently Asked Questions document that are available in the Downloads section.

We do not accept late proposals. We recommend proposals are submitted 1 week before the proposal deadline.

Case study

Dr Jurriaan Ton started his research career as an MSc student at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, studying resistance to Fusarium wilt in radish plants following treatment with root-colonising rhizobacteria. After some time in Switzerland as a postdoctoral researcher, Dr Ton returned to Holland to study the molecular mechanisms of priming for defense.

Priming by specific environmental cues allows the plant to acquire an enhanced defensive capacity that protects against future attack by pathogens or insects. Over the past 3 years, Dr. Ton’s team has focused on the molecular regulation of priming, and has started to address more ecological questions concerning priming and induced resistance.

He was recently awarded one of BBSRC’s first Institute Career Path Fellowships at Rothamsted Research to further explore the regulation of priming. He will be working within the Centre for Sustainable Pest and Disease Management directed by Professor John Pickett, with opportunities to collaborate with colleagues in the Departments of Biological Chemistry and Plant Pathology and Microbiology.

“The multidisciplinary character of Rothamsted will provide an excellent environment to continue my study on the molecular mechanisms and ecological implications of priming, with the long-term objective to develop novel agricultural strategies to optimize the plant’s innate immune system against harmful microbes and insects,” Ton explains.

Understanding the mechanisms behind priming of the plant’s ‘innate’ immune system will lead to new insights in the field of plant stress biology. Critically evaluating this fundamental knowledge under field conditions could provide a first step towards future exploitation of the priming phenomenon in sustainable agriculture.

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