Deadline: July 10, 2026
Applications are open for the EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowships 2026. The EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowships support excellent postdoctoral researchers throughout Europe and the world for a period of up to two years. International mobility is a key requirement.
The fellowship includes a salary or stipend, a relocation allowance and support for fellows with children. Awardees can attend an EMBO Laboratory Leadership course and become part of the global network of EMBO Fellows. EMBO considers a first author refereed preprint equivalent to a first author publication as one of the eligibility and assessment criteria for the EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowship scheme.
Benefits
- EMBO provides grants for host institutions in EMBC Member States to issue employment contracts to EMBO Fellows. Fellows working in other countries than EMBC Member States will receive a stipend.
Eligibility
- Applicants must hold a doctorate or equivalent at the start of the fellowship.
- Applicants who already hold a PhD at the time of application are eligible to apply only if they obtained it during the two years prior to the date the application is submitted.
- Applicants must have at least one first author publication (research paper) accepted in or published in an international peer reviewed journal at the time of application. A first author preprint (research paper) with public in-depth peer reviews is also sufficient for eligibility provided the reviews were verifiably obtained from an independent peer review service. Informal comments, highlights and reviews posted by individuals are excluded.
- All applications must involve movement between countries (detailed information about mobility requirements is listed in the EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowships guidelines).
- Applications to go to the country in which the PhD was obtained will not be considered.
- Applications to return to a laboratory where the candidate has worked in the past for more than six months, either in one or in several visits will not be considered.
- Applications for an EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowship to be held in the laboratory, institute or department in which the candidate worked to obtain the PhD, or to work again with the candidate’s supervisor, no matter where the latter is located, will not be considered.
- Candidates who have already started working in the host laboratory can apply only if they have been working in the host laboratory for less than six months at the time the application is submitted.
- Candidates can only submit one application for one project at one host laboratory at each round of selection.
- Reapplication is permissible only once.
- Projects that are a direct continuation of the PhD work are not eligible.
Application
Applications accepted throughout the year (next cutoff date – hard deadline: Friday 10 July 2026, 14:00 CEST)
For more information, visit EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowships.
