“Opportunity to intensify our participation in international research projects”

BME’s success in last year’s call for proposals by Central Europe Leuven Strategic Alliance; two research projects are among the winners.

We expect that BME’s successful participation in the CELSA projects will encourage our researchers to take advantage of further research opportunities and apply for even more calls, emphasised Krisztina László, Vice-Rector for International Relations to bme.hu, referring to the success of two BME research groups in being selected in CELSA’s 2017 call for proposals. She added: “We are proud to be able to work together with the Catholic University of Leuven (KU Leuven), which is in a prestigious 5th place in the global rankings of higher education institutions”.

Krisztina László explained: CELSA supports the international collaboration of its members by issuing calls for proposals for research projects every year. These projects involve the cooperation between KU Leuven and at least one of the other CELSA universities, in which the first step is to submit joint application documentation. The member universities have set up a virtual joint CELSA Research Fund (to which the Belgian university contributed with substantial financing), from which the projects of the winning research groups are funded for three years (two years of professional activities and in the third year the applicant consortium has to jointly apply for a call for proposals for a European competitive funding programme). Concerning the details she added that “BME committed to contribute to the joint fund for 3 years, paying EUR 60,000 every year. This is an earmarked sum in our university’s budget for research funding and having this format - our own research budget - is unprecedented at BME.”

The head of the Department of Research and Innovation (Rector’s Cabinet) explained that CELSA’s first call for proposals for collaborate research projects was issued in 2017. Of the more than 50 applications 7 came from BME.  The Evaluation Committee, composed of scientists from the University of Leuven and the partner universities (including Katalin Bagi, professor of BME’s Faculty of Civil Engineering), assessed and ranked the entries and, in the summer, submitted its proposal to CELSA’s Board, the alliance’s governing body, comprising the member institutions’ highest-ranking representatives, which then finalised the list of winning projects. “BME was very successful, since two of our applications were included among the 10 funded projects”, Anikó Csákány said about the results.

Krisztina László added that CELSA does more than just issuing calls for proposals, evaluating applications and funding projects. The members of the organisation decided to hold quarterly half-day workshops to help applicants with their applications and provide professional assistance for future applicants. “We are proud to have been the hosts of the first such event here at BME, which was organised in mid-November.

Professor Krisztina László pointed out that CELSA’s 2018 call for proposals for collaborative research projects had already been published and also included the expected scheduling. Key information for potential applicants from BME will be published shortly on one of the subpages of BME’s website, she added.

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Photo: János Philip