Imperial College Research Fellowships give outstanding young scientists the opportunities they need to fulfil their potential. To achieve this, the College needs the assistance of potential sponsors to mentor the fellows and help them develop their research.

As applicants need to identify a sponsor as part of their application, you may receive requests to act as a sponsor. This web page sets out your guidelines and obligations.

As a sponsor, you will play an important mentoring role, as well as providing the equipment and space that fellows will need for their research. Sponsors will be crucial in helping a new generation of exceptional scientists to establish their own all-important research independence.

To act as a sponsor you must be a senior, permanent member of staff within the Academic and Research Family at Imperial College, most likely a Principal Investigator, and must be in a position to provide equipment and space to a Imperial College Research Fellow. Sponsors must be permanent members of staff at Imperial College; Honorary members of staff are not eligible to be Sponsors.

If you are a Francis Crick Insitute member of staff interested in co-sponsoring an Imperial College Research Fellow please read about your obligations below.

Notes for sponsors

• Each application must be supported by a sponsor who is a senior, permanent member of staff within the Academic and Research Family at Imperial College, most likely a Principal Investigator
• Sponsors are limited to support a single fellowship application in each competition and may sponsor one Imperial College Research Fellow at any one time
• Sponsors are not obliged to accept a request for support. If they choose not to support a potential applicant it is at the sponsor’s discretion if they choose to give feedback
• Sponsors will be required to commit to and fulfil the following obligations with the support of their host Department:
  • Provide relevant equipment and laboratory space for the applicant’s research proposal and ensure that there is no additional cost burden on the College
  • Recognise that the fellowship is to promote the growth and independence of the applicant. This includes mentorship activities and contributions to career development as well as appropriate assignation of authorship
  • Understand the funding provided to fellows does not fund the full economic cost of research, only the directly incurred costs of the research project will be covered. These are costs that are explicitly identifiable as arising from the conduct of the project, are charged at cash spend and supported by audit records
  • Ensure that, before any research funded by the fellowship commences and during the full award period, all the necessary legal and regulatory requirements in order to conduct the research are met, and all the necessary licences and approvals have been obtained
  • Undertake the statutory obligations of ending a fixed term contract which include support with redeployment or the funding of any redundancy costs
• Applicants are required to move from their existing sponsor to a new one, to increase both their independence and their breadth of experience
• Where an interdisciplinary project is proposed it is possible to include additional sponsors but there is a requirement for a lead sponsor
• Applicants may also be co-sponsored by staff of the Francis Crick Institute; an Imperial lead sponsor will still be required.   As with Imperial sponsors, Crick co-sponsors are limited to supporting a single fellowship application in each competition and may co-sponsor one ICRF at any one time.  Crick co-sponsors will need to commit to fulfil the following obligations:
  • Recognise that the fellowship is to promote the growth and independence of the applicant. This includes mentorship activities and contributions to career development as well as appropriate assignation of authorship
  • Understand the funding provided to fellows does not fund the full economic cost of research, only the directly incurred costs of the research project will be covered. These are costs that are explicitly identifiable as arising from the conduct of the project, are charged at cash spend and supported by audit records
  • Provide access to relevant equipment and laboratory space as appropriate for the applicant’s research proposal