The call is open to researchers and research groups with a research facility in Hungary whose scientific achievements have significant international impact, i.e. who have at least one excellent publication published after 1 January 2015 achieving an international citation index accounting for the top 5 percent in the given field of science within two years from the date of publication.

In order to strengthen the international visibility and reputation of Hungarian science, the NRDI Office announced this call to encourage individual researchers and research groups to strive for scientific results which are outstanding even by international standards, highly acclaimed by the scientific community and can be used by others as starting points for further research projects. The call intends to offer an opportunity for researchers who have no publications in the top impact factor journals but demonstrate a citation index that implies excellent publication performance with internationally outstanding impact.

The call is financed from the National Research, Development and Innovation Fund.

Submission of project proposals

Complying with its legal obligation, the NRDI Office enables applicants to submit their applications exclusively electronically. In this case, the documents required in Point “H” of the call to be submitted by regular mail / with electronic signature must be signed electronically as specified in Point “H” of the call and attached to the application on the Online Application Portal by the deadline for electronic submission, that is, by 29 March 2018 for the first assessment round and 13 September 2018 for the second assessment round, at 16:00 (CET).

Please note that all documents required to be submitted by regular mail/with electronic signature must be submitted in the same way, that is, all documents must be submitted to the NRDI Office either by regular mail or electronically provided with electronic signature.

In the case of regular mail, the submission is successful if the proposal was finalised electronically by the applicant and approved by the head of the host institution, and if the documents required in Point “H” of the call to be submitted by regular mail were sent to the Customer Service of the NRDI Office postmarked no later than 24:00 (CET) of the 7^th day from the electronic submission deadline.

In the case of electronic submission, the submission is successful if the proposal was finalised electronically by the applicant and approved by the head of the host institution by the electronic submission deadline, and if the electronically signed versions of the documents required in Point “H” of the call to be submitted by regular mail / with electronic signature were attached through the Online Application Portal.

Who can apply

Researchers (principal investigators) with Hungarian or foreign nationality have to apply jointly with the host institution which has to be

• a higher education institution, research centre, research institution, budgetary organ, or an institution thereof having legal personality if it qualifies as a research organisation;
  
• a non-profit organisation if it qualifies as a research organisation.
  

Throughout the entire implementation period, the principal investigator shall be employed full-time by the host institution under an employment contract, civil service contract or other work-related legal relationship.

Further requirements for principal investigators

The researcher who submits the project proposal has to be the first, last or corresponding author of the excellent publication on which the proposal is based. Members of one research group may submit only one project proposal.

At the time of application the principal investigator shall hold a doctoral (PhD/DLA) degree or a certificate issued by the university doctoral council, and has to be affiliated to a Hungarian host institution.

One researcher may only participate in one KH project proposal as principal investigator and may only assume principal investigator position in maximum two projects funded by the NRDI Office under any other of the research funding schemes (PD, FK, K, NK, NF or NN types) at a time. The principal investigator and the research group of a project funded under the KH_18 scheme may not receive further funding under the KH scheme for 24 months following the start of the funded project. Principal investigators in a KKP type project proposal are not eligible for funding under the KH scheme.

Eligible objectives and activities

The discovery research activities indicated in the research and work plan, and the actions required to implement the project plan submitted to the NRDI Office are eligible and not bound by any thematic priority or restricted to any field of science, if otherwise the application meets the conditions laid down in the call.

Available budget

In order to achieve the objectives of the call the NRDI Office has earmarked a total budget of HUF 1.2 billion from the NRDI Fund for the 2018–2020 period in line with the Act on the Central Budget and with regard to the programme strategy of the NRDI Fund. From this amount HUF 600 million can be disbursed in 2018 depending on the programme strategy for 2018.

Available funds

Up to HUF 20 million in non-refundable funding per project. Maximum funding intensity is 100%.

Duration of the project

The mandatory duration of projects is 24 months. Projects shall start between 1 July 2018 and 1 December 2018 (projects awarded in the second round may not start earlier than 1 December 2018).