European Commission Call for Applications: Marie Skłodowska-Curie COFUND 2026
The Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) COFUND 2026 supports new or existing doctoral programmes and postdoctoral fellowship schemes. The aim of the action is to spread the best practices of the MSCA including international, inter-sectoral and interdisciplinary research training, as well as international and cross-sectoral mobility of researchers at all stages of their career.
Proposed programmes can cover any research disciplines (“bottom-up”), but exceptionally, can also focus on specific disciplines.
Types of COFUND:
- Doctoral Programmes – They offer research training activities to allow doctoral candidates to develop and broaden their skills and competences. They will lead to the award of a doctoral degree.
- Postdoctoral Programmes – They fund individual advanced research training and career development fellowships for postdoctoral researchers and offering training to develop key transferable skills and competences common to all fields.
Eligibility:
COFUND is a “mono-beneficiary” action. This means that only one organisation based in the EU or a country associated to Horizon Europe applies.
Organizations
Any type of organisation can apply to COFUND, including
- higher education institutions
- research centres and infrastructures
- national or regional funding agencies
- private sector organisations, including industry, businesses, and small and medium-sized enterprises
- public sector organisations, including national, regional, and local governments, agencies, and museums
- other socio-economic actors, including NGOs, foundations, charities, etc.
Researchers :
COFUND programmes will need to recruit at least three researchers fulfiling the following requirements.
Doctoral candidates must
- not have a PhD or have successfully defended their thesis by the deadline of the programme’s call
- be enrolled in a doctoral programme during their fellowship, leading to a degree awarded by an organisation in the EU or a country associated to Horizon Europe
- be employed for a period as of 3 months and for the length necessary to achieve a PhD
Postdoctoral fellows
- must have a PhD by the deadline of the programme’s call
- can be recruited for a period of minimum 3 months
- can be offered fellowships to
- carry out research in the EU or countries associated to Horizon Europe
- carry out a research project with an outgoing phase outside the EU or countries associated to Horizon Europe, followed by a return phase to one of these countries
In both cases, researchers
- can be of any nationality. For COFUND Postdoctoral Programmes where the main part of the research training activities is carried out in a country other than an EU Member State or Horizon Europe Associated Country, researchers must be nationals or long-term residents of an EU Member State or Horizon Europe Associated Country
- must follow the “mobility rule”: they must not have lived or carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in the country of the recruiting beneficiary or implementing partner for more than 12 months in the 36 months immediately before the deadline of the co-funded programme’s call
- can carry out secondments at implementing or associated partners for a maximum of half of their fellowship or outgoing phase for Postdoctoral fellows researching outside the EU or a country associated to Horizon Europe
Indicative budget:
- A beneficiary can receive a maximum of €10 million per call.
- If an applicant submits two or more successful applications totaling more than €10 million within one call, they will have to decide which of these proposals to implement.
Read here for more information.
Submission deadline, 8th of April at 17:00:00 Brussels time.
