FWF Principal Investigator Projects

FWF Principal Investigator Projects is the Austrian Science Fund's flagship bottom-up grant for curiosity-driven basic research. It replaced the older Stand-Alone Projects name in 2023 and now sits under FWF's PROFI institutional funding mode, with money flowing through the host institution rather than to the investigator personally. The programme is open to principal investigators at Austrian research institutions in any field of basic research. Projects can run for up to 48 months, use rolling submission through the elane portal, and are reviewed at five Scientific Board approval meetings each year. The award itself is project-specific rather than a fixed ceiling, covering personnel and non-personnel costs. This is the main FWF route for independent researchers who already have a host institution and a well-formed research plan. Successful proposals are likely to read as strong basic-science projects with clear leadership, a credible work plan, and budgets that fit the institutional PROFI framework.

Each grant below is a distinct funding opportunity with its own eligibility, scope, and deliverables.