NET Programme

‘Newly Established Teams’

The NoE has recognized the need to provide support for young colleagues in the field noting the limited resources made available by national funding programmes for this level of young researchers. Hence we have allocated a significant fraction (≥ 25 %) of the NoE funds to launch the ‘Newly Established Team’ (NET) programme, in which a total of 23 groups headed by 'young' (that is within their first 3 -5 years of holding an independent position) investigators were invited to participate in the network after being selected by a competitive call. NET integration was effected in two three-year rounds. 12 NETs joined the network in month 4 of the NoE (Asifa Akhtar, Vincent Colot, Edith Heard, Karl Ekwall, Giacomo Cavalli, Fred van Leeuwen, Valerio Orlando, Antoine Peters, Irina Stancheva, Bas van Steensel, Patrick Varga-Weisz, Anton Wutz) In a second round, 11 further NETs were integrated into the network in 2006 (Deborah Bourc’his, Miguel Constancia, Oskar Fernandez-Capetillo, Wolfgang Fischle, Philipp Korber, Andreas Ladurner, Ana Losada, Ortrun Mittelsten Scheid, Leonie Ringrose, Robert Schneider, Dirk Schübeler). The successful applicants have access to all NoE activities, workshops and data bases, and to potential collaborations with other members of the NoE.

As a means to select the NETs, the competitive call across Europe was publicised via advertisement in “Nature” and on the Epigenome Web site. The applicants were first evaluated by a panel of scientists representing the NoE’s work packages, the resulting short list was passed on to the external experts of the Epigenome’s Scientific Advisory Board, who re-evaluated the shortlisted candidates. Scientific excellence as well as coherence with the research goals of the NoE constituted the overriding criteria for selection. After the final decision the list with the successful candidates was formally agreed upon by the Governing Board and the General Assembly and subsequently presented to the EC for approval.