The Challenge Programme aims to contribute substantially to the development of Danish and European research ecosystems within research areas of strategic priority to the Novo Nordisk Foundation. This Challenge Programme on “Unravelling the pathways of human invasive fungal diseases” aims to support highly ambitious and collaborative projects that are transformative and impactful in their aim to generate important new knowledge about human invasive fungal diseases and enable the development of better diagnostics and therapeutics.

Eligibility

• The Challenge Programme supports collaboration between leading scientific experts to form a consortium of 2-4 research groups (main applicant plus 1-3 co-applicants).
• The main applicant must be an independent tenured/tenure-track researcher with their own research group, employed at a European (European Union, Schengen Area plus United Kingdom) university, hospital, or non-profit research organisation, which will be the host institution and will be responsible for administration of the grant.
• The main applicant must be employed at the host institution with at least a 75% commitment and must be guaranteed their own salary for the entire project period.
• Co-applicant institutions may be located anywhere globally.
• At least one applicant (either main- or co-applicant) must be at least 75% employed and have their research group at a Danish university, hospital, or non-profit research organisation.

A total budget of up to DKK  150 million (ca. EUR 20 million) is available for grants up to DKK 75 million (ca. EUR 10 million) for projects lasting up to 6 years.

Call closes: 8 October 2025, 2:00 pm