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ERA4HEALTH – Horizon Europe cofund partnership

This ‘InterHeart’ call is aimed at ‘Understanding the interactions between cardiovascular diseases and comorbidities and/or their therapeutic treatments.

Status

“Understanding the interactions between cardiovascular disorders and comorbidities and/or their therapeutic treatments.”

On 7 January 2025 a sixth joint transnational call for research projects has been launched within the framework of the Horizon Europe ERA4Health partnership. This partnership on health sciences will constitute a hub for public health research, in a broad sense. Up to date, the following thematic areas will be addressed in this partnership: prevention, social health inequalities and nutrition, nanomedicine and cardiovascular diseases.

ERA4Health has its origin in different previous H2020 ERA-NETs (ERA-CVD, EuroNanoMed, ERA-HDHL, HDHL-INTIMIC), and initiates a range of activities, of which calls for research projects form the most important part. The FWO, in its capacity as research funder, will try to engage itself within the research calls of this partnership, in order to support the research institutes from Flanders.

InterHeart call 2025

This specific transnational call is focussed on cardiovascular research and wishes to address the following aspects:

  • “Build our understanding of molecular and cellular mechanisms governing interactions between the cardiovascular system and the other organs/systems when at least one of the two presents a pathological state.
  • Build a comprehensive approach to understanding cardiovascular disease interactions, combining basic research, clinical translation, and digital innovation through international collaboration.
  • Enable transnational collaboration of multidisciplinary scientists from different countries to work together across borders, taking advantage of complementary expertise and leveraging diverse patient populations and sets of data.”

More information

More detailed information in view of the call thematic and objectives can be consulted within the call text, which is available on the ERA4Health ‘InterHeart’ webpage.

Al relevant call information can be consulted in this call document, also when it comes to the general rules for participation. In addition, the ‘national/regional’ FWO eligibility criteria have to be respected, which are taken up in the call text (from p. 28 onwards) and which are of importance when it comes to the eligibility of the subproject from Flanders (FWO).

Submission

Deadline for pre-proposal submission AND national pre-application via the FWO e-loket

7 March 2025, 12.00 CET (Brussels)

FWO-modalities

Both the national/regional FWO fundamental (FO) and Strategic Basic Research (SBO) funding channels are integrated within this multilateral call. The type and scope of the proposed research project will determine the choice of funding channel for the research performed within Flanders (e.g. more fundamental in nature, or more aimed at economical/societal valorisation). Non-compliance with the specific requirements per funding channel might lead to non-eligibility.

Please note, this is only an FWO requirement: European and/or international partners within the project consortium can choose their type of research freely, according to their own national regulations.

For the fundamental funding channel the respective regulations apply. For the SBO channel the SBO regulations have to be taken into account: these imply projects with a primarily economic and/or societal finality, for which ‘valorisation’ is a key - and mandatory - aspect.

Submission

Project proposals have to be submitted by European and international consortia through the ‘InterHeart’ call secretariat, by making use of the designated pre-proposal template and submission platform, according to the applicable procedures and eligibility criteria included in the call documents and regulations mentioned above.

In case the consortium includes more than one partner requesting funding from FWO, a single online form should be submitted containing all relevant information from the different Flemish partners.

The deadline to submit the administrative application to the FWO is the same as the deadline of the joint transnational call (pre-proposal stage). To ensure the eligibility of the proposal, it is recommended to consult the FWO administration at least one week in advance.

Mandatory FWO administrative pre-registration

Applicants for FWO funding must submit an administrative application via the FWO e-portal (only during the pre-proposal phase):

  • For fundamental research projects (FO) select the application type: ‘Research projects – European programme fundamental research’.
  •  For strategic basis research projects (SBO) select the application type: ‘Research projects – European programme strategic basic research’.

Call budget

The FWO is able to support two projects for a 36 months duration, with an available maximum budget of 350.000 EUR (overhead included) per project/consortium. The FWO budgetary rules, which differ per funding channel, are also clarified in the call text (from p. 28 onwards).

Key points and deviations from the ‘regular’ FWO participatory framework

Some key points and deviations from the ‘regular’ FWO participatory framework to consider:

  • Participation in the framework of the European co-funded partnerships does not interfere with the ‘regular/national’ FWO project submission framework, and is consequently not taken into account with regard to the max. available number of applications that can be applied for/run. However, researchers can only participate in a maximum of two different international consortia per call, provided they concern different subjects (additionally for this InterHeart call: “Each principal investigator can submit either 1 (one) proposal as project coordinator or up to 2 (two) proposals as simple partner (i.e. the coordinator of a proposal cannot be partner in another proposal)).
  • Diverging overhead arrangements apply for what the fundamental and SBO funding channels are concerned, which is clarified in the call text (from p. 28 onwards).
  • SBO projects aimed at developing a spin-off are not eligible in this context. As such, no mention of this option should be made in the FWO pre-registration document, nor within the Interheart proposal.
  • Projects have a max. duration of 36 months and should be budgeted accordingly. Automatic extensions/no-cost prolongations are not accepted in this framework. Consequently, article 28 of the FWO research project regulations and article 14 of the SBO project regulations are explicitly excluded.
  • The PI, for each of the participating institutions from Flanders, must hold an admissible appointment that fully covers the duration of the research project. With regard to the ‘FO’ projects, and more specifically regarding the ‘emeritus’ regulation (artikel 10, §7): it does not apply in this context.
  • In essence the FWO funds pre-clinical research.

Researchers are strongly advised to contact the FWO before submission regarding the eligibility criteria. This to avoid the ineligibility of a researcher individually, and the project consortium as a whole.

Contact

For additional information FWO participation, please contact:

Toon Monbaliu (General and ‘FO’)

europe@fwo.be  

+32 (02)2 550 15 70

Kristien Peeters (‘SBO’)

europe@fwo.be

+32 (0)2 550 15 95