Strategic Centres for Science, Technology and Innovation

The Academy of Finland supports the high standard of research carried out at the Strategic Centres for Science, Technology and Innovation (CSTIs) by funding researchers at universities and research institutes. All the Academy’s funding instruments are available to support research at the CSTIs and in their thematic fields.

In making funding decisions related to CSTIs, the Academy focuses on the scientific quality of the research. Funding decisions also pay attention to promoting research that serves the CSTIs.

The Academy takes the fields of the CSTIs and research that promotes them into account in launching research programmes and making decisions on Centres of Excellence in research (CoEs).

An applicant for CSTI funding from the Academy must have the qualifications of a professor or adjunct professor or be a researcher with a doctorate, unless the call for applications indicates or the call allows otherwise.

Funding is granted for CSTI projects or research in the fields of the CSTIs according to the same principles as all other funding granted by the Academy; on the basis of competitive applications, funding is granted to the best researchers and research teams and to promising young researchers for the implementation of scientifically ambitious projects. Funding decisions are made on the basis of evaluation of the scientific merits of the research plan and the researcher. Where applications connected with CSTIs or their fields are concerned, evaluation focuses especially on the significance and impact of research for society and the economy. The starting point is that funding should benefit Finnish research and society or international cooperation.

The Academy may channel funding into CSTI activity and the fields of the CSTIs on the initiative of one or more Research Councils or the Academy’s Board.