Junior Research Group Leader -

An excellent opportunity for young scientists

Junior Research Group Leaders offer outstanding Postdocs an excellent opportunity to advance their careers in science.

They are an attractive alternative to a habilitation or Junior Professorship:

• Independent research with their budget
• Establishment of your working group
• Scientific independence at an early stage

Advantages

• Financial resources: Junior Research Group Leaders usually have their own staff positions and material resources.
• Independence: They are not bound by instructions and find almost ideal conditions
  for early profiling in research

Challenges

• Little involvement in institutional procedures and decision-making processes
  of the university/research institution
• Frequent lack of teaching activities
• As a rule, no admission to the assessment of doctorates
  
  To counteract these disadvantages, TU Dresden has established
  the TUD Young Investigators program.

Funding programs | An overview

The application procedures for independent Junior Research Group Leaders are highly competitive. The central award criterion is scientific excellence, which can be demonstrated above all by outstanding publication achievements in the early postdoc phase.

German Research Foundation (DFG):

• Emmy Noether Program
• Heisenberg Program

European Union:

• ERC Starting Grants of the European Research Council

Volkswagen Foundation:

• Lichtenberg Program

Alexander von Humboldt Foundation:

• Sofja Kovalevskaja Award.

Further programs:

• Max Planck Society
• Helmholtz Association