Call 2025 for selection of BOF postdoctoral fellowships

 *Nederlandse versie*

Duration and starting date

The positions start on 1 October 2025 at the earliest and last for a period of maximum 3 years.

Who can apply

Unsuccessfull FWO applications for a Junior or Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship are automatically submitted to the Special Research Fund. To be considered for a BOF postdoctoral fellowship the following admissibility requirements must be met.

Admissibility requirements for a BOF fellowship

  1. Candidates must still be able to submit an admissible application for a Junior or Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship at the FWO Flanders in a next application round. Candidates for a Junior Postdoctoral Fellowship who can no longer apply for a junior fellowship in a next application round, but who can apply for a senior fellowship , are still eligible for a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship.
  2. Candidates can obtain a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship only once in their career, either after applying for an FWO Junior Postdoctoral Fellowship, or after applying for an FWO Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship. If a candidate has obtained a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship after applying for an FWO Junior Postdoctoral Fellowship, this candidate can no longer obtain a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship after applying for an FWO Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship.
  3. Only candidates who are preselected by the FWO for the second application round (with an interview) and assigned a Z-score by the FWO are eligible for the BOF selection.

Funding

The fellowship holder will be appointed as dr. assistant with research assignment for the duration of the fellowship. The fellowship holder will receive a bench fee of €4.000/ year.

FWO resubmission

Candidates who obtain a BOF fellowship are obliged to submit a new application for an FWO fellowship no later than 2 years after the FWO deadline on which they postulated in the context of the obtained BOF mandate.

It is the responsibility of BOF fellowship holders to verify whether they have to submit their new FWO application within 1 or 2 years. The BOF fellowship holders must find out whether they meet the conditions of the FWO to submit an admissible FWO application. In some cases, an admissible FWO application can only be submitted 1 year after the previous FWO application, which must be done in that case. See Art. 6 of the Regulations of the Research Foundation – Flanders governing the Postdoctoral Fellowship for the seniority conditions of the FWO.

Attention: As a holder of an FWO post-doctoral mandate, one becomes a staff member of the FWO. If one previously held a contract at UGent, leave cannot be transferred from the UGent contract to the FWO contract.

How to apply

The application for a BOF mandate of Postdoctoral Researcher is done through the FWO Flanders.

Deadline

  • The deadline for submission to the FWO is  December 2 2024.
  • Current call with deadline December 2 2024: candidates who acquire a BOF fellowship are required to submit a new application to the FWO no later than December 2026.

For persons who already have a BOF fellowship, the following deadlines apply:

    • BOF fellowship holders who have obtained their BOF fellowship (2024) after the FWO call with deadline 1/12/2023 are obliged to submit a new application to the FWO no later than 1/12/2025.
    • BOF fellowship holders who have obtained their BOF fellowship (2023) after the FWO call with deadline 1/12/2022 are obliged to submit a new application to the FWO no later than 2/12/2024.

Results

 The results will be announced on the BOF website no later than July 4, 2025.

Contact

Call and application forms

website FWO 

Regulations BOF postdoctoral researcher

General regulations for Assisting Acamedic Staff

Final report


Final report : within three months following upon the end of the grant a final scientific/scholarly report has to be sent electronically to BOFapplication@UGent.be. The promoter and co-promoter (if applicable) are included in this e-mail (either as sender, or in CC).