The results of the 2024 European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant call (call deadline 7 November 2023) were published. Starting Grants are open to researchers with 2-7 years of experience since completion of PhD (extensions are possible under certain documented circumstances), a scientific track record showing great promise and an excellent research proposal.

Proposals are evaluated in 28 evaluation panels in three research domains (Physical Sciences and Engineering, Social Sciences and Humanities and Life Sciences) composed of top scientists and scholars coming from all over the world and in addition by remote referees with necessary specialised expertise (two to five per proposal).

Of the 3474 submitted proposals 494 researchers with 51 different nationalities received an ERC Starting Grant: 146 In Life Sciences, 209 in Physical Sciences and Engineering and 139 in Social Sciences and Humanities. In the ERCEA news articles more background on the evaluation results, call statistics and several project examples are highlighted.

Among the 494 selected researchers are seventeen based at Flemish host institutions. The projects of these seventeen Principal Investigators (PIs) are presented in the news articles of Universiteit Gent, KU Leuven, Universiteit Antwerpen and VIB.

Inge Bellemans, Universiteit Gent, LUMOCX - sustainable LUnar Metal, Oxygen and Cement eXtraction methodology development, panel Physical Sciences and Engineering 8 

Pieter Beullens, KU Leuven, FitMA - Fluidity in the Medieval Aristotle. Readers and Readings of the Greek-Latin Translations, panel Social Sciences and Humanities 5

Diete Humblet, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, CAGED - Ageing in the Carceral Environment: The Existential Dimensions, panel Social Sciences and Humanities 3

Esther Klingler, Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie, EmoDevo - Building emotional circuits: interfacing intrinsic programs with early-life experiences, panel Life Sciences 5

Tijs Laenen, Universiteit Antwerpen, BI-RESPONS - Unravelling the Politics of Basic Income: How Responsive Are Policymakers to Public Opinion?, panel Social Sciences and Humanities 3

Pablo Marchant,  KU Leuven, Star-Grasp - STARs as GRAvitational wave Source Progenitors, panel Physical Sciences and Engineering 9

Emanuela Pasciuto, Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie, ENRICH T-BRAIN Immune mechanisms of experience induced brain plasticity: the contribution of brain resident T cells, panel Life Sciences 5

Eveline Pinseel, Universiteit Gent, DIADAPT Climate impacts on diatom genomes over micro- and macroevolutionary timescales, panel Life Sciences 8

Colinda Scheele, Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie, SUCCESSion Probing the malignant potential of mutant clones in healthy mammary tissue by successive mutagenesis, panel Life Sciences 4

Xin Shi, KU Leuven, MembraneMachines - Bioinspired Transmembrane Nanomachines, panel Physical Sciences and Engineering 3

Joseph Nelson Fodjo Siewe, Universiteit Antwerpen, VILARIA - Investigating virus-induced morbidity in filarial infections, panel Life Sciences 7

Hristo Svilenov, Universiteit Gent, PicoBody - Revealing the fundamental principles of picobodies with broad-spectrum and redoxresponsive antibacterial activity, panel Life Sciences 9

Thomas Tarnaud, Universiteit Gent, URENIMOD - Minimally invasive and closedloop ultrasound neuromodulation and recording for the treatment of focal epilepsy, panel Physical Sciences and Engineering 7

Ioulia Tzouvadaki, Universiteit Gent, NEFELI - Neuromorphic Flexible Electro/chemical Interface for inMemory Bio-Sensing and Computing, panel Physical Sciences and Engineering 7

Cedric Van Dijck, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, AFROPRESS - Recovering Global Exchanges from Sub-Saharan Africa's Cultural and Political Magazines in the Age of Black Internationalism, 1918-68, panel Social Sciences and Humanities 5

Doris Vandeputte, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, CoRe Defense - CoRe Defense: fortifying the resident gut microbiota’s colonization resistance to combat intestinal bacterial infections, panel Life Sciences 4

Cecilia Vergnano, KU Leuven, DE-CRIPT - An anthropological study of conspiracy theories from marginalized standpoints, panel Social Sciences and Humanities 8