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applying for funding

Research Exchange Funds    |    Undergraduate Internships    |    Symposium Attendance Funds

THIS FUNDING OPPORTUNITY IS NO LONGER AVAILABLE.

EDEN is no longer offering Research Exchange Grants.

Announcement date: 15 December, 2015.

Students and researchers based at non-US institutions ARE ELIGIBLE to apply for EDEN funding to perform research exchanges or internships in US labs. This is effective as of March 5, 2012.

Research Exchange Funds

The EDEN RCN will fund up to nine exchanges per year of lab personnel (graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and faculty) to develop and disseminate experimental techniques, build community resources, and encourage novel collaborations involving research on new and emerging model organisms. The ultimate goals of this program are the following:

  • To facilitate Interdisciplinary Opportunities Among Evo-Devo-Eco Researchers
  • To increase Visibility and Promote  Accessibility for Existing Systems
  • To enable Existing Collaboration
  • To foster New Collaborations and Development of Tools and Techiques for New Systems
  • To bridge the Gap Between Micro- and Macro-evolution

Eligibility Criteria

The visitors may be graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and faculty (with priority given to early-career faculty) of any nationality and from any institution (both within and outside the U.S.). If the applicant's home lab is based in the U.S., the host labs may be in the U.S. or abroad. However, if the applicant's home lab is based outside the U.S., the host lab must be based in the U.S..

The awards will support the travel and living costs of successful applicants during their exchange. Host labs will be expected to cover reasonable consumables costs associated with the exchange project. Exchanges may last for up to three months.

The host lab may be a lab working on the same or a different emerging model, or a traditional model lab that has developed a useful technique or other activities (for example, field collection techniques) that cannot be easily done at the applicant’s home institution. Conversely, scientists in labs using traditional models such as Drosophila, Arabidopsis, or mouse may propose to visit labs using emerging models to expand the evolutionary scope of their work. Exchanges between labs that both focus on traditional models generally fall outside the scope and intent of this RCN.

It is NOT a requirement that applicants for EDEN funding, or hosts of EDEN-funded researchers, be listed as EDEN Participating Labs. If you are applying for EDEN research exchange funding, you can propose to work with any lab in the US or abroad. However, we encourage all researchers to add their details to the EDEN Participating Labs database by completing this brief survey.

Terms and Conditions

Scientists may propose to visit an extramural lab for up to three months. The grant will support up to nine graduate student, postdoctoral and faculty research exchanges per year (from 2010 to 2015) to support travel expenses related to development of new research techniques or training in newly established techniques.

Stipend amount: up to $3000 towards travel, accomodation and subsistence costs

Deadlines for Applications

Applications will be due on April 30 and October 31 of each year, beginning in October 2010. Award decisions will be made and communicated to applicants by November 30 and May 31 of the application year. In years when the application due date falls on a Saturday or Sunday, applications will be accepted until midnight (EST) of the Monday following the deadline date.

Guidelines for Finding a Lab

EDEN supports different types of exchanges that advance the field of Evolutionary and Ecological Developmental Biology, as specified in the criteria above. If you need assistance in locating a suitable lab, please see EDEN participating labs. Contact us at if you have questions about the suitability of your proposed exchange, or need further assistance in finding a lab or planning an exchange.

Application Procedures

Our application procedure is completely electronic. Please do NOT send any hard copy materials by post; they will not be considered.

Applications must include the following:

  • Completed application form (click here to download). You will need to use Adobe Acrobat Pro to complete and save this form; if you use Adobe Reader, the answers you fill in will not be saved. Before submtting your completed application, double check that your answers are all visible in the saved application form by closing it and re-opening it.
  • A two-page proposal (see below). References do not count against this page limit.
  • A letter from the director of the host lab that indicates a willingness to host the visitor and an agreement to allow public release (via the EDEN website) of any experimental protocols arising from the exchange. You can (see examples of protocols previoulsy developed with EDEN funding here.)
  • A letter of reference from the applicant’s main advisor (for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows only).
  • A current C.V.

The two-page proposal must address all of the following issues in order to be considered for funding:

  1. Scientific Merit
    Applicants must demonstrate that the proposed work supports the goals of the EDEN RCN, as described above. If the proposed work involves learning a new technique at the host lab, the applicant must demonstrate that  published protocols are insufficient, and that local expertise is not available at the applicant’s home institution. Finally, applicants must assess the feasibility of accomplishing their goals within the proposed time period.
  2. Community Building
    Proposals must address how the proposed study will help build community resources and establish novel connections between labs or systems. Applicants should explain the expected short-term benefits to the current project, and the long-term impact of the exchange on the broader community.
  3. Dissemination Plan
    The proposal must address how the techniques developed during the exchange will be communicated to the broader community. At a minimum, participants will be required to submit written summaries or videos of their protocols for posting and dissemination on the EDEN website. However, proposals for additional creative dissemination plans are encouraged.

Compile all of your applicaton documents into single PDF file. Our application procedure is completely electronic. Please do NOT send any hard copy materials by post; they will not be considered. Do not send documents in any format except PDF format; word processor formats (e.g. .doc, .docx) or other image formats (e.g. .jpg, .tif) will not be accepted.

Click here to submit your application. Applications must be uploaded by midnight on the day of the submission deadline (April 30 and October 31 of each year).

Information for Host Labs

The grant will only cover travel, accomodation and subsistence expenses: host or home labs will be expected to cover reasonable consumables costs associated with the exchange project. The host lab is expected to provide a reasonable level of assistance to the EDEN exchange visitor in finding accommodation, or other practical needs. The host lab is also expected to engage with the visitor in a spirit of collaboration. The participants will be required to submit written summaries or videos of protocols for dissemination after their visit. Therefore, the host lab must be willing to have the techniques/protocols that their guest will learn and/or develop made publicly available (via the EDEN website), and should indicate this in their letter of support.

After Completing your Research Exchange

As a participant in EDEN-funded research, you will be required to submit two documents:

1) Report. This two-part report is described below. As part of the report you will be asked to describe techniques or protocols developed during your exchange. However, other creative dissemination plans are encouraged (for example, submission of video protocols to JOVE). The report will be posted on the EDEN website, so that the broader community can access the techniques and protocols you developed.

2) Evaluation of your exchange experience. The evaluation will remain confidential.

You are required to submit both of these documents within one month of the completion of the exchange.

To prepare and submit your report and protocol, please click here.

Participants should acknowledge NSF/EDEN grant number IOS # 0955517 in the "Acknowledgements" section of any arising publications.

 

Why is it important for me to submit a report?

A fundamental goal of this Research Coordination Network is to disseminate techniques to the broad evo-eco-devo community. To meet this goal, the techniques you develop or learn will be made publicly available on the EDEN website.

 

What do I need to do?

You need to write a report consisting of two sections, which are described below.

  1. Visit narrative
    Describe the context of your lab visit, including the organism(s) studied, your broader biological question and the specific problem that motivated the exchange, in 500 words or less. Please include a description of whether your experience was successful in terms of solving this problem, including what worked, what didn’t, and what you might do differently were you to do it again.
  2. Techniques and Protocol(s)
    Provide an easy to follow, step-by-step protocol for each technique that you developed or learned during your lab visit. This component of the report is required for research exchanges and optional (but strongly encouraged) for undergraduate internships. In addition to the written protocol, we strongly encourage participants to produce a video demonstrating the technique. To view examples of existing protocols, click here.

You also need to complete and submit an evaluation form to assess the outcome of the lab visit and the impact of the EDEN RCN on your research or education. Download the evaluation form here. You will need to use Adobe Acrobat Pro to complete and save this form; if you use Adobe Reader, the answers you fill in will not be saved. Before submtting your completed evaluation, double check that your answers are all visible in the saved form by closing it and re-opening it.

Save your report and your evaluation forms as separate PDF files. Click here to submit your completed report and evaluation.

 
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