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This year’s grant recipients are 27 younger health science researchers from both Denmark and abroad, all of whom hold a PhD in their respective fields and work on widely diverse topics and approaches within neuroscience or clinical research.

Professor John Cryan, Chair of Anatomy at University College Cork and Chair of the Lundbeck Foundation's Talent Panel, is part of the assessment process. According to him, selecting this year’s recipients was no easy task:

“The committee was particularly impressed with the quality of the projects this year which made it very difficult to choose the successful ones. Those funded addressed either important fundamental questions in neuroscience as well as projects focused on disease mechanisms with many benefiting from international collaborations.”

The grants are intended both to strengthen Danish neuroscience and to create better opportunities for young doctors who wish to pursue research in clinical settings. Therefore, the grants fall into two categories: Postdocs, who are expected to contribute to the development of neuroscience, and Early-Career Clinician Scientists, who can be from any clinical specialty.

Strong international focus

The Lundbeck Foundation’s Postdoc program aims to support and develop the next generation of neuroscientists at Danish universities and hospitals. This is done by allowing foreign researchers to apply for funding to conduct research at a Danish university or hospital, or for Danish researchers to carry out all or part of a project at an international academic institution.

“We want to motivate young Danish researchers to go abroad and develop their skills in strong international neuroscience environments. At the same time, we aim to attract talents from those environments to Denmark. Altogether, this enriches the Danish research environment with new perspectives, experiences, and knowledge,” says Anette Høye, Senior Scientific Programme Manager at the Lundbeck Foundation.

This year’s 17 LF Postdoc grants all have a clear international perspective: 11 researchers from abroad are coming to Denmark, while 5 Denmark-based researchers are performing research stays abroad.

Research close to the patients

An Early-Career Clinician Scientist (ECCS) research grant aims to provide young doctors, from all specialties, the opportunity to conduct research in parallel with their specialist training.

“With ECCS, we want to support doctors’ strong wish to conduct research alongside their specialist training. This research strengthens both the clinical work and vice versa – both for the individual doctor and in terms of developing new evidence-based treatments,” says Peter Thostrup, Scientific Programme Director at the Lundbeck Foundation.