A sizeable number of 44 proposals were submitted following the first call for Clinical Research Groups (CRG) by the Ludwig Boltzmann Gesellschaft (LBG). Martin Polaschek, Austrian Federal Minister for Education, Science and Research, is delighted: “This type of funding instrument for the clinical field is completely new in Austria. It is a great success that so many applications were submitted already in the first round. It is particularly gratifying that we are promoting an area with increasing importance, advancing medical progress and thus enabling the development of state-of-the-art therapy methods. With this funding instrument we are not only strengthening clinical research in the long term, but also Austrian research and innovation in general.”

Austrian medical universities were eligible to applyand and seized the opportunity to request funding amounting to a total of over 152 million euros. The available 24 million Euros in funding are provided by the BMBWF and the Austrian Fonds Zukunft Österreich.

LBG President Univ.-Prof. Dr. Freyja-Maria Smolle-Jüttner sees LBG’s path confirmed: “We are delighted with the great response to our first funding programme. Our goal is to contribute to securing Austria’s future positioning in clinical research, the life sciences and medical development. With the CRG, we can finally close the gap between basic research and application-oriented development and give Austrian research a boost in innovation.”

The international scientific expert committee chaired by Prof. Lieselotte Højgaard (Professor of Medicine and Technology at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and Head of the Department of Clinical Physiology, Nuclear Medicine and PET at the Danish Rigshospitalet) will now evaluate the submissions over the coming months and select those that will be invited to submit a full proposal. At the end of January, all applicants will be informed about the outcome of this first selection step.