The funding - totalling nearly €780 million this year– is part of the Horizon Europe programme and will support researchers at the beginning of their careers to launch their own projects, form their teams, and pursue their most promising ideas.
The application process for ERC Starting Grants is highly competitive: this year, around 14% of applications were successful, with 494 researchers selected out of 3,474 proposals.
Each of the researchers selected for a Starting Grant will receive up to €1.5 million for a period of five years.
Iliana Ivanova, Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, said: ‘The European Commission is proud to support the curiosity and passion of our early-career talent under our Horizon Europe programme. The new ERC Starting Grants winners aim to deepen our understanding of the world. Their creativity is vital to finding solutions to some of the most pressing societal challenges.’
MPLS's 2024 ERC Starting Grant winners are:
Associate Professor Christian Coester, Department of Computer Science
Associate Professor Coester’s work addresses questions at the forefront of theoretical computer science, both in classical algorithm paradigms as well as how machine learning can be leveraged to improve algorithms. Using the ERC Starting Grant, he will explore how to develop more effective strategies for handling the associated uncertainty of online algorithms – algorithms which receive their input over time and have to make decisions before future parts of the input are revealed. One strategy is to design learning-augmented algorithms that can take advantage of predictions when these are good, while simultaneously avoiding being misled if these predictions prove to be erroneous.
"I'm excited about receiving this support for my research, which will help me build a research group, strengthen international collaborations, and dedicate more time to my research agenda. I’m grateful to my mentors and collaborators, without whom receiving this grant would not have been possible." - Associate Professor Christian Coester
Associate Professor Berta Verd, Department of Biology
Using her ERC Starting Grant, Associate Professor Berta Verd aims to explore how developmental processes have evolved to generate diversity in the number of vertebrae, a highly variable trait amongst vertebrates which ranges from as few as ten in some frogs to several hundred in snakes. She will address this question using a highly interdisciplinary approach in Lake Malawi cichlid fishes, an emergent model system in evolutionary developmental biology studies. This project will advance our fundamental understanding of how phenotypic diversity is generated, with potential far-reaching applications such as predicting how animals evolve in response to climate change or improving organoid design for applications in regenerative medicine.
"I am very grateful to the many mentors and colleagues that have helped me over the years, but special mention goes out to my brave DPhil students who joined me when I first opened my lab. I also thank my family, in particular my husband Greg and my parents, for their unwavering support." - Associate Professor Berta Verd
See the full news story on all six Oxford University awardees.