What is this?

A transnational funding initiative for bilateral research projects Germany–USA in Computational Neuroscience. It supports collaborative research projects and projects for shared use of data and other resources. Aim: accelerate methodological advances and understanding of complex neuroscience questions through international, interdisciplinary collaboration, data/software resource sharing, and training.

Who can apply (Germany side):

• Eligible: Public/state-recognized universities, non-university research institutions, and companies (including SMEs).
• Requirements: At the time of payment, German applicants must have a site in Germany (or a non-economic unit for HEIs/research orgs).
• University hospitals: Eligible if research/teaching competence is assigned by state law.
• Companies: Subject to state aid rules under AGVO/GBER; own contribution required for economic activities.
• Track record: Applicants must show relevant prior work in computational neuroscience.
• Bilateral setup: US partners must submit to NSF under CRCNS; German funding covers the German side.

What will be funded (high level):

• Collaborative research on theory, modeling, analysis, disease/normal function, multilevel organization and information processing of the nervous system; encourages complementary expertise across disciplines.
• Data/resource sharing projects to prepare and provide data, software, codebases, models or other resources that broadly enable progress (focus on using/extending existing datasets/services; not general infrastructure build-out).
• Education & training elements are explicitly welcome (e.g., student exchanges, capacity building).

Key standards & quality requirements:

• Projects must follow high methodological quality, consider international state of the art, and ensure continuous methodological expertise.
• Where applicable, adhere to recognized standards: Helsinki, ICH-GCP, EU 536/2014, 2017/745, 2017/556, CONSORT, STARD, PRISMA, ARRIVE.
• Open Science & Data: Open access encouraged; research data management plan required; FAIR principles and persistent identifiers recommended; deposit data post–first use in suitable repositories.

Collaboration rules:

• A German consortium coordinator is named; a cooperation agreement is required before funding decision.
• No indirect state aid to companies within consortia (follow FuEuI framework 2.2).
• Contact persons are the leaders of each subproject (nationally).

Funding form & duration:

• Non-repayable grants (project funding).
• Non-economic research: up to 100% of eligible expenses/costs (HEIs/research orgs); 20% project flat rate for HEI/medical faculties.
• Economic activities/companies: aid intensities per AGVO; partial funding; adequate own contribution required.
• Typical project length: up to 5 years.

Deadlines:

• Pre-proposal (to NSF): 12 November 2025 (electronic submission; not an exclusion deadline, but late sketches may not be considered).
• Full proposal: by invitation only after stage 1; no fixed date provided

Important participation conditions (selected):

• Bilateral DE–USA collaboration is mandatory (German + US group).
• Clear division of work, complementarity, and added value of international collaboration must be shown.
• Ethics approvals and standards as applicable; costs for university ethics committee opinions are not eligible.
• IP & dissemination: Publication/patent expected for each project; open access strongly encouraged (≤ 12-month embargo suggested).
• Science communication activities and reasonable CO₂ offset costs for travel are eligible.