FWO Excellence Prizes

The prestigious FWO Excellence Prizes reward the scientific career of prominent researchers affiliated with a Flemish university or eligible research organisation.

Status

Open

31/10/2024

Salary

€ 100000

Announcement of results

25/06/2025

Objective

The prestigious FWO Excellence Prizes reward the scientific career of prominent researchers affiliated with a Flemish university or eligible research organisation. The Excellence Prizes are awarded every five years. The current call covers the period 2021-2025.

Two A. De Leeuw-Damry-Bourlart Prizes:
- 1 prize for exact sciences;
- 1 prize for applied sciences;
Two Ernest-John Solvay Prizes:
- 1 prize for humanities;
- 1 prize for social sciences;
Two Joseph Maisin Prizes:
- 1 prize for fundamental biomedical sciences;
- 1 prize for clinical biomedical sciences.

Features

Each prize is worth 100,000 EURO.
Candidates have to be nominated by an established researcher; one cannot put oneself forward as a candidate.

Profile and conditions

The prizes encompass all scientific domains and are to be awarded to researchers who have had a remunerated position for at least 5 years at:

a university in the Flemish community;
the Evangelic Theological Faculty in Leuven;
the Faculty for Protestant Theology in Brussels for research related to religious studies or theology;
the Maritime Academy for research related to nautical sciences;
the Vlerick Business School and the Antwerp Management School for research related to management sciences;
the Institute of Tropical Medicine for research related to tropical medicine, veterinary medicine or healthcare in developing countries.

The Excellence Prizes are intended to reward individual researchers; research groups are not eligible as candidates, nor can prizes be shared among multiple researchers. Candidates must not have previously received an Excellence Prize.

Procedure

One cannot nominate oneself; one has to be nominated by an established researcher.
The nominator submits your candidacy using the appropriate form which is available on the FWO e-portal.
The candidacy includes an expose of maximum 5 pages illustrating the scientific achievements of the candidate, as well as a detailed CV and complete publication list of the candidate.
The FWO will submit the applications to 3 external experts for peer review, whose reviews will be added to the nomination file for the jury. FWO is responsible for finding and contacting reviewers who are experts in the relevant domains for each application.
The person nominating a candidate may include in the application form maximum 3 names of experts that should be excluded as external reviewers due to a demonstrable conflict of interest which might impede an objective and fair evaluation of the candidate or because of a demonstrable risk of abuse by the external reviewer of the information given in the nomination file. Each request to exclude an expert should be properly motivated. Only individual people can be excluded, not institutions or organisations or their separate entities.
The Board of Trustees of FWO shall assemble three jury panels to conduct the scientific evaluation of the nominated candidates:
- one jury for the domain of science and technology, to evaluate nominations for the two prizes A. De Leeuw-Damry-Bourlart;
- one jury for the domain of social sciences and humanities, to evaluate nominations for the prizes Ernest-John Solvay;
- one jury for the domain of biomedical sciences, to evaluate nominations for the two prizes Joseph Maisin.

Composition of the jury panels will be determined after the nomination deadline has expired, in order to match the expertise of the jury members to the received nominations.

The three jury panels shall be composed exclusively of researchers that have no affiliation with any Belgian university or scientific institute. Persons who have nominated a candidate cannot be members of a jury panel.
The Board of Trustees decides on the allocation.