Today, the EU Programmes Agreement (EUPA) was signed in Bern by Federal Councillor Guy Parmelin and EU Commissioner Ekaterina Zaharieva. It applies with immediate effect, meaning that Switzerland is associated to Horizon Europe, the Euratom programme and the Digital Europe Programme (DEP) retroactively from 1 January 2025, will participate in ITER from 1 January 2026 and will be able to associate to Erasmus+ from 2027. The EUPA signing has taken place ahead of the Switzerland-EU package but remains part of this package.

Grant agreements of positively evaluated projects of calls for proposals 2025 can now be signed and project funding will come directly from the European Commission, as Switzerland makes a mandatory contribution to the EU for this purpose. In terms of participation opportunities, Swiss actors can once again take on the coordinating role in collaborative projects since calls for proposals 2025. Participation in mono-beneficiary projects, particularly those of the European Research Council (ERC), the European Innovation Council (EIC) and the Postdoctoral Fellowships of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA), is also possible again.

The latest news and information can be found at the SERI dedicated page and on our Euresearch website.

If you have any questions, join the Euresearch information events on "Swiss Access to Horizon Europe: Confirmed and Secured".

1st Event: 17.11.2025

2nd Event: 11.12.2025

3rd Event: 12.01.2026

Source: Euresearch

According to their press release, the Computer Science (CS) category of arXiv has updated its moderation practices regarding survey articles and position papers. Before they can be considered for submission to the CS category of arXiv, survey articles and position papers must now have been accepted by a journal or conference and have undergone a successful peer review process. When submitting review articles or position papers, authors must include evidence of a successful peer review process in order for their contributions to be fully considered. Review/survey articles or position papers submitted to arXiv without this evidence are likely to be rejected and will not be published on arXiv.

This change is being implemented due to the unmanageable influx of review articles and position papers to arXiv CS. In recent years, arXiv has been inundated with articles. Generative AI/large language models have contributed to this flood by making it quick and easy to write articles, especially those that do not present new research findings. While all categories on arXiv have seen a sharp increase in submissions, this is particularly pronounced in the CS category of arXiv.

The European Commission has launched a public consultation and the Call for Evidence for the upcoming Circular Economy Act.

With the Circular Economy Act the EC strives to enhance the EU’s economic security, competitiveness, while promoting more sustainable production and circular economy business models and decarbonisation. The Act shall facilitate the free movement of ‘circular’ products, secondary raw materials and waste. It shall also increase the supply of high-quality recycled materials and stimulate demand for these materials in the EU.

Your contributions will be taken into account to further develop and optimise this initiative.

Take a deep dive into the cutting-edge technology developed by the i-EDGE project that aims at enabling ultra-low-power electronics capable of operating in extreme environments — including high temperatures and intense radiation.

Discover it on the i-EDGE project outcomes page - along with many other interesting outcomes - to learn more on how i-EDGE is shaping the future of resilient, energy-efficient electronics.

IHI published draft information on upcoming call topics a few months ahead of the official call launch. They do this to give you additional time to find or build a consortium and prepare a strong proposal. Note that as draft topics are still under development, the texts may change considerably between the versions published here and the call launch, and you should always check the final, approved topic texts once the calls are launched.

The following topics are under consideration for inclusion in IHI call 11, a two-stage call which is scheduled for launch in Q2 2025:

- Understanding how infections foster and induce non-communicable diseases

- Towards precision medicine: platform for transdiagnostic stratification of brain dysfunction

- AI-powered signal detection in pharmacovigilance

- Leveraging Europe's expertise to accelerate cell therapy for type 1 diabetes

- Establishing ortho and cardiology ambulatory surgical centres in Europe

For more information please visit the IHI website.

Great to see MEFISTO successfully completed, a project which SCIPROM accompanied for more than 6 years, from the first idea to the final review. Congrats and a big thanks to all!

MEFISTO has just held its final review meeting with representatives of the European Commission. The project was congratulated by the EC representatives for its achievements. In the final phase, novel coating technologies were used to functionalise resorbable and non-resorbable meniscal implants. These implants were then tested in vivo in partial meniscectomy models.

The resorbable collagen scaffold produced by Geistlich and functionalised by Tissue Click was tested by the team at the University Hospital of Regensburg. Meanwhile, non-resorbable meniscus implants from Active Implants and ATRO Medical BV, functionalised by Tissue Click and the Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, were tested by the Humanitas University team.

Analysis of joint tissues and explanted devices suggests that Tissue Click's biomimetic nanostructured coating may provide protection to articular cartilage following meniscectomy. In addition, this coating technology has been shown to be both easily applied to meniscal devices and sterilisable.

Read our publishable summary for more insight into our achievements and stay tuned for further updates and publications on the exciting results of this collaboration!

Moments from the MEFISTO project

The European Commission's DG CNECT is inviting experts in cutting-edge digital technologies to help shape future EU investment in research, innovation and deployment for the period 2028-2040. 

This is your opportunity to shed critical light on emerging areas such as AI, quantum technologies, cybersecurity, robotics, and more.

Deadline for submission of your expression of interest is 20 January 2025, 18:00 CET.

You can find more information and the application form here.  

Great news! The EC has fully activated the transitional arrangement as of 1 January 2025, which enables researchers and innovators in Switzerland to participate in almost all calls for proposals of Horizon Europe and the Euratom programme as beneficiaries, from the 2025 programme year onwards. This means also that they can submit project proposals in the role of coordinator. Switzerland's participation in calls for proposals in areas considered strategic by the EU (including quantum and space) are still subject of discussions with the EC.

Running applications or projects are not impacted by this.

The latest news and information can be found at the dedicated SERI page. 

The European Research Council (ERC) announced today that researchers in Switzerland can participate in the ERC Proof of Concept call 2025. The transitional arrangements allow Swiss legal entities to be treated as ‘entities established in associated countries’ for the call for Proof of Concept Grants under the ERC Work Programme 2025. SERI has updated their information accordingly.

The call is expected to open tomorrow, 13 November 2024.

IHI has a good habit of publishing drafts of future funding opportunities ahead of the call launch to give applicants extra time to start networking and preparing a proposal.

Now draft texts of IHI calls 9 and 10 have been published on the IHI website. Both calls are scheduled for launch in early 2025.

While call 9 is a single-stage, applicant driven call addressing the IHI Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda, call 10 is a standard two-stage call with topics on Per- and Poly-fluoroalkyl substance (PFAS), secondary use of health data and digital labelling. 

SCIPROM invites you to explore the different call topics and will be happy to support you from the project idea to the elaboration of the proposal and the implementation of the project in all aspects of management, communication and dissemination of the project.

The ERC has just opened its 2024 call for advanced grants with a proposal submission deadline of 29 Aug 2024. 

It's great to see that now also Swiss-based researchers are eligible to apply.

Researchers of all career stages who have a track-record of significant research achievements and are leaders in their field may apply for this 5-year grant with a budget of up to EUR 2.5 million.

SCIPROM will be happy to support you in your proposal preparation. 

Call 8 from the Innovative Health Initiative (IHI) will cover heart disease in cities, osteoarthritis and big data, regulatory sandboxes for breakthrough innovation, and clinical study endpoints from digital health technologies.

The following topics are under consideration for inclusion in IHI call 8, a two-stage call which will be launched in the coming months:

- A city-based approach to reducing cardiovascular mortality in Europe
- Ovel endpoints for osteoarthritis (OA) by applying big data analytics
- Modelling regulatory sandbox mechanisms and enabling their deployment to support breakthrough innovation
- Patient-centred clinical-study endpoints derived using digital health technologies

Detailed information can be found here

The European Commission opened a feedback opportunity for the development of the 2025 Work Programme of Horizon Europe. 

The feedback opportunity is open for 3 weeks from 15 April and closes on 6 May 2024 midday, CET.

You can contribute for multiple Destinations and/or Missions within the following topics:
- 6 Horizon Europe clusters
- Research Infrastructure
- European Innovation Ecosystem
- 5 EU Missions and cross cutting activities
- New European Bauhaus facility

Our new project FirstTo6G started on 1 Jan 2024 and will develop Fourier-Domain TRx solutions enabling widespread realisation of 6G! For more information, visit our website and follow us on LinkedIn !

Would you like to learn more about resilient beekeeping? Watch our Better-B introductory video series “Inside the Better-B hive” which we have launched today with this first video. Stay tuned, there will be a new video twice a week. Enjoy!