Research and Excellence

The Faculty is committed to promoting research and excellence and allocates financial support for this purpose. Applications are not limited to a specific topic or project, but explicitly have to serve the purpose of promoting third-party-funded activities, visibility, publication efforts or excellence within the Faculty’s key research areas. Other projects may be funded in specifically justified individual cases.  In particular, the Faculty encourages to apply for projects that support links within these fields or between the thematic areas.

Examples of possible funding are the organisation of a workshop / conference at the University of Vienna or the invitation of a visiting researcher to complete a (verifiable) research proposal in due time. Funding of activities within the framework of cooperation agreements between the Faculty and foreign institutions (‘faculty agreements’) is possible to a limited extent.

Travel expenses attributable to personal trips as well as expenses for infrastructure or repairs are not eligible as these are already supported through other faculty programmes. Furthermore not eligible are publication costs (also not Open Access) - except costs for publications in the main journals of Nature and Science. In addition, subsequent debits of flight costs from the financing cost centre or internal order of the University of Vienna for reasons of sustainability are not eligible (see https://intra.univie.ac.at/en/sustainability).

Every researcher who is permanently employed at the Faculty, as well as every tenure-track professor, every Senior Scientist, and every senior lecturer each during temporary employment, and every university assistant post-docs and every third-party funded postdoctoral employee at the Faculty can submit one application per calendar year in consultation with the head of the subunit. There is no predefined financial framework; however, the financial resources available and possibilities of all are taken into consideration. Generally, funds are only granted on a pro rata basis (subsidy) and particular importance is attached to the presentation of the own contribution. Due to the administrative effort, applications for less than EUR 500 cannot be taken into consideration.

Please send your informal application including an explanatory statement at least two weeks before the start of the planned project to dekan.fgga@univie.ac.at. Please apply for a specific Euro amount. When non-permanently employed scientists apply, their remaining contract period has to run for at least twelve months. Moreover, s/he must be able to complete the project by the end of their contract period at the latest. Projects outside the eligible employment period cannot be supported.

The applicant accounts for its expenses for the approved initiative in due time via the subunit (covering the calendar year). The subunit pre-finances the share of funding approved by the Management of the Faculty. Of the expenses actually incurred, the Dean’s office will refund up to the (maximum) agreed amount of funding to the global budget cost centre of the subunit following the submission of a half-year report. 

If any additional costs are invoiced via other sources (e.g. via third-party funded budgets), the applicant has to notify this source in an informal manner that s/he has been granted funding through the programme for promotion of research and excellence of the Faculty of Earth Sciences, Geography and Astronomy and how much funding s/he received.

Please note that in case of doubt the German version of this directive is binding.