Our Funding Portfolio

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The Volkswagen Foundation is dedicated to the support of the humanities and social sciences as well as science and technology in higher education and research. It funds research projects in path-breaking areas and provides assistance to academic institutions for the improvement of the structural conditions for their work. 

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Societal Transformations

Expanding knowledge about processes of transformation and developing possible courses of action together with stakeholders in civil society.

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Exploration

Breaking into previously unexplored research territory with unconventional ideas and experimental approaches.

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Understanding Research

Critically exploring and reflecting on the research system with a view to initiating positive change on areas such as career paths, governance, research and teaching.

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zukunft.niedersachsen

Funding program for top-level research in Lower Saxony.

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Funding portfolio

We focus our funding activities on selected initiatives. By means of these initiatives, we endeavor to provide effective stimuli for research and to establish forward-looking topics.

Area of research

Type of funding

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  • May 15, 2024 Deadline

    Circularity in daily life – Communication contest

    The call is directed at transdisciplinary project teams of scholars and practitioners.

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    • area of research: all disciplines
    • type of funding: science communication
  • May 31, 2024 Call for proposals (humanities and social sciences)

    zukunft.niedersachsen: Research Cooperation Lower Saxony – Israel

    Funding is provided for scientifically outstanding projects conducted jointly by researchers from Israel and Lower Saxony. 

    Website zukunft.niedersachsen.de
    • area of research: humanities and social sciences (call 2024)
    • type of funding: research projects
  • June 04, 2024 Deadline

    Scoping Workshops

    The Volkswagen Foundation’s scoping workshops are for scientists who want to take a step beyond their current research activities and think about the future of their field of research.

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    • area of research: all disciplines
    • type of funding: workshops at the conference center Xplanatorium Herrenhausen Palace, Hannover
  • June 30, 2024 Deadline

    zukunft.niedersachsen: Innovative diagnostic and therapeutic approaches to combat rare diseases

    The new funding offer within the framework of zukunft.niedersachsen is aimed at professors and postdocs at universities and non-university research institutions in Lower Saxony.

    Website zukunft.niedersachsen.de
    • area of research: rare diseases, personalised medicine, biomedicine, biotechnology, bioinformatics, data sciences
    • type of funding: collaborative and individual projects
  • February 01, 2025 Deadline

    Opus Magnum

    The funding offer is aimed at outstanding professors from the humanities and social sciences.

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    • area of research: humanities, cultural studies and social sciences
    • type of funding: funding of a substitute professorship
  • next deadline in 2025

    Circularity with recycled and biogenic resources

    The current call within the funding line 'Collaborative projects' of this initiative is primarily targeted at the natural sciences and engineering.

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    • area of research: natural sciences and engineering, if required social sciences
    • type of funding: research projects
  • No open call

    Earth System Sciences

    The offer is aimed at universities in Germany with a focus on geosciences that wish to establish one or two junior professorships with tenure track.

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    • area of research: Geosciences
    • funding for: 1-2 junior professorships with tenure track per University location
  • Currently no application possible

    Challenges and Potentials for Europe: Intergenerational Futures

    The call "Challenges and Potentials for Europe: Intergenerational Futures" is aimed at international research groups from the social sciences, cultural studies and humanities. 

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Completed 

And these are our completed funding offers.

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