Cyprus has some of the most successful researchers in Europe, relative to population size, according to European Commission data.

A press release by the Commission notes that “relative to population size the most successful researchers are based in the Netherlands, Denmark, UK and Cyprus of the EU countries, and Switzerland and Israel of the countries associated with the EU research programme”. “This reflects the high quality of the research in these countries, which generally follows from long-term investment in research”, it notes.

The Commission’s press release says that the European Research Council (ERC) is awarding 680 million euro to 302 senior research leaders in 24 different countries across Europe, in the latest competition for its prestigious `Advanced Grants`. With up to 2.5 million per project, the funding allows these scientists to pursue their most ground-breaking ideas at the frontiers of knowledge together with their own teams.

ERC grants target top researchers of any nationality who are based in, or willing to move to Europe. In this Advanced Grant call, the selected candidates hold 32 different nationalities, with British, German, French, Dutch and Italian researchers being the most numerous. They will conduct their research projects in over 160 institutions across 24 different European countries. As the largest countries in the EU, the UK, France and Germany host the greatest number of successful candidates.

Just over 15% of selected researchers are women, which is a rise from last year’s 12%. The average age of the researchers to be funded is 51 years. In this call, 45% of selected proposals were in the `Physical Science and Engineering’ domain, 37% in `Life Sciences’, and 18% in `Social Sciences and Humanities’. The grantees were selected through peer review evaluation by 25 panels composed of renowned scientists from around the world.