Scientific and technological research at Politecnico di Milano has different financing sources: as a public University a lot of the financing comes from the Ministry of Education; external financing is still gaining importance in the last few years, that is support coming from institutions or companies, weighting for around 147 million euros per year (one-third of the total budget for research).
Among the institutions most involved in research funding is the European Commission. Since 2014, through the Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe programs, the Politecnico has received around 262 million euros from the Commission, which were used to fund 580 research projects.
Most are collaborative projects between different research centers. A portion of the funding is instead dedicated to researchers who proved their excellence: among these, the Politecnico has welcomed 54 ERC e 46 Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship. These are grants that are granted to individual researchers for particularly promising projects, which concern frontier scientific fields or emerging technologies with great potential for innovation and collective interest.
ERCs are intended for established researchers, already at the top of their scientific fields (if you are interested in finding out more about the ERC projects that carry out frontier scientific research at the Politecnico di Milano we talked about it on MAP here). The Marie Curie grants, on the other hand, are intended for the "second generation"of researchers and are designed to encourage young researchers who deal with these crucial issues.
Young researchers applying for a “Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship” (MSCA-PF) can submit a project proposal in collaboration with a European academic and non-academic research centers and under the supervision of a scientific director who is part of it.
The best universities attract the best candidates, also thanks to the support of the supervisors: “older” scientists, with experience in the specific field, able to guide the winners in the various steps of the research project, which usually lasts 2 or 3 years.
In order to support youn reaserchers, Politecnico has launched a talent development program to support young people and make them more competitive in the acquisition of European grants and in general on the international research scene. One of the actions envisaged in the strategic plan is the MSCA Master Class, a training course designed for potential MSCA Postdocs, who can obtain support from the University and expert supervisors during the writing the proposal and submitting it in response to the call from the European Commission.
Only the best candidates are admitted to the Master Class, which maximizes their chances of success and at the same time encourages them to rely on the Politecnico di Milano.
