The Royal Society has announced a $40 million fund designed to attract global research talent to the U.K.
The Faraday Fellowship “accelerated international route” will provide up to $5.4 million per academic or group willing to relocate to British universities and research institutes, over a period of five to 10 years. The society said that it would be willing to consider larger awards “in exceptional circumstances.”
The announcement comes as countries around the world vie to attract leading scholars who are considering fleeing the U.S. in protest of President Donald Trump’s attacks on research funding and diversity initiatives.
Adrian Smith, president of the Royal Society, said that international science was “in a state of flux with some of the certainties of the postwar era now under question.
“With funding streams and academic freedom coming under threat, the best scientific talent will be looking for stability. The U.K. can be at the front of the queue in attracting that talent,” Smith said.
“Our new opportunity, combined with schemes from [UK Research and Innovation] and the Royal Academy of Engineering, is a step in the right direction.”
The society said that two-thirds of the initiative’s budget would come from the Faraday Discovery Fellowship Fund, part of a $335 million government endowment set aside in 2023 to support attempts to attract midcareer academics to the U.K. The society will top this up with $13.4 million of its own, enabling the plan to be widened to cover researchers at other career stages.
Full eligibility criteria will be published by the end of June.
The announcement follows the European Union’s unveiling of a $565 million fund to attract researchers, including doubling to $2.25 million the maximum grant available to those arriving from outside the bloc to set up a laboratory or research team.
Individual European countries and universities have also launched initiatives to attract international researchers following Trump’s election, including a $9.8 million scheme in Norway. France’s University of Aix-Marseille is providing nearly $17 million in grants for those seeking “scientific asylum” from the U.S.
Leading scientists have been calling on the U.K. to launch a similar initiative. However, the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee has warned that such attempts could be stymied by U.K. immigration policies, including high visa and health-care costs.
