Faith in the Wellcome Trust’s guidance can bring rewards
The Wellcome Trust overhauled its funding schemes in 2021 to give researchers “more freedom, time and financial resources to pursue their ideas”. Its early career awards are now among the most generous grants available to researchers with a maximum of three years’ postdoctoral experience (allowances are made for personal circumstances).
Each award provides a salary for the grantee and up to £400,000 (€455,000) in research expenses to cover up to five years of research.
The goal of the awards is that, by the end of the project, the research will have advanced understanding of human health and wellbeing, and the researcher will be ready to lead an independent programme of their own.
Awards may be undertaken at host institutions in the UK, the Republic of Ireland or low- and middle-income countries, excluding India and mainland China. But researchers can split their time with another institute in Europe or elsewhere. The scheme has deadlines every three or four months, with the next one set for 21 February.
Sara Mederos, a neuroscientist who completed a PhD at the Cajal Institute in Madrid, Spain, before moving to the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre in the UK in 2020, won her early career award in 2023. She discusses her path to a successful application.
What is your project about?
Brain circuits in an area called the ventral lateral geniculate nucleus (vLGN) have been shown to have strong control over fear reactions. I’m testing the hypothesis that the vLGN is a crucial hub for integrating external sensory signals with the internal state and knowledge of an animal.
How is this relevant to human health, which is the Wellcome Trust’s concern?
While it is normal to experience fear in certain situations, we can adjust our fear responses depending on our knowledge and circumstances.
Such control is crucial, since its impairment can lead to anxiety disorders such as phobias or post-traumatic stress disorder, in which the circuits in the brain associated with fear and anxiety are thought to become overactive.
Where are you doing your work?
My host institution is the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre. Part of the project is going to be carried out at the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown in Lisbon, Portugal.
This award encourages you to develop in preparation for an independent career. Having the possibility of visiting two labs and learning their different ways is relevant there. During the application process, involving both centres meant I got input from both sides. The more input, the better.
How did you find the application process?
The Wellcome team are responsive to queries and will give you a hand. The example model proposal they provide is also useful. Following the application guidance and process helped me think about my project: the elevator pitch, what I planned to do and why it is important.
Did you find costing the project difficult?
If you have not been exposed to these kinds of things before, you might find it tricky. But I got lots of help from Brian Fenelon [a finance manager] at the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre. Most research centres will have someone involved in project management who can help.
The Wellcome Trust encourages applicants to move away from their current host environment, but you did not. How did you justify that?
The focus of the award is not so much to move away from your research environment, but to show your proposal is in line with developing your own research identity.
In any case, at the moment I applied, I had only been in the lab for a year and it still felt like a novel research environment.
Also, I did change the focus of my science from my PhD.
In line with both aspects, in the proposal and at interview, I stressed that the research environments and collaborations proposed were those that would be the best support for reaching the goals of the research.
It is important to express how you build independence, in the proposal and at interview.
You need to specifically set out what you are bringing in terms of perspectives, ideas and research ideas.
What are your tips for the interview?
In the interview, just like in the proposal, you need to be clear, but you need to change how you convey your message. It is no longer a written proposal; you have to be persuasive. So try to enjoy it and show you are passionate about your research question.
It is also important to be yourself. During my interview, I had fun discussing the project.
Were you informed of who would be on the panel?
Yes, Wellcome lets you know who is on panel. It is important to research your panel because you need to know who you are conveying the message to and what background you need to provide them so they can follow you. That is true whether you are giving an interview or writing a proposal, of course.
This is an extract from an article in Research Professional’s Funding Insight service. To subscribe contact sales@researchresearch.com