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Martin Verbeek
Last update:
30/08/2010

Short-Term Scientific Missions (STSM)

Short-Term Scientific Missions (STSM) contribute to the scientific objectives of a COST Action and are aimed at strengthening the existing networks by allowing scientists to go to an institution or laboratory in another COST Country to foster collaboration, to learn a new technique or to take measurements using instruments and/or methods not available in their own institution/laboratory. They are particularly intended for young scientists.

Information on the COST site: http://www.cost.esf.org/participate/guidelines

Scientific Reports

Jelena Mitrovic 16/10/2009 to 15/11/2009

Luisa Filippin 29/11/2009 to 13/12/2009

Didem Canik 03/02/2010 to 26/02/2010

Duška Delić 16/03/2010 to 26/03/2010

Artemis Rumbou 10/02/2010 to 19/03/2010

Petra Nicolić 15/04/2010 to 31/06/2010

Daniela Bulgari 03/03/2010 to 03/06/2010

Procedures for applying for STSMs within the COST program:
Integrated Management of Phytoplasma Epidemics in Different Crop Systems (FA0807).

Applicants must apply using the COST STSM application website http://www.cost.esf.org/stsm and must then email copies of their application to the prospective host of the STSM and also to myself as this Actions STSM chair at matthew.dickinson@nottingham.ac.uk In addition, the applicants must email copies of supporting documentation including their full cv, list of publications, motivation letter, detailed workplan and letter of support from the home institute to matthew.dickinson@nottingham.ac.uk, and the prospective host must send an email confirmation that they agree to host the applicant to matthew.dickinson@nottingham.ac.uk.

There will be 4 application rounds each year, with deadlines of Sept 1^st, Dec 1^st Mar 1^st and June 1^st and all the applications that have been received in a particular round will then be assessed by the ‘STSM subgroup’ to determine which ones will be supported. The successful applicants will be informed within 1 month, and unsuccessful applicants will be informed at the same time and will then be given the opportunity to resubmit in the next round where their application will be reconsidered alongside any new ones that have been submitted etc. That way, we will be able to spread the number of STSMs that we support throughout the duration of the programme and hopefully make sure all the best ones will eventually get funded even if they all get submitted at the same time.

Please note that you must allow at least 2 months between the application deadline and the time of your proposed visit, to allow 1 month for a decision to be made by the STSM Subgroup and a further month that the COST centre at Brussels require once we have approved a submission. Please also note when making your budget request that ‘’the financial support is a contribution to the costs of the STSM and may not necessarily cover all the costs in each case. The grant should normally only cover travel and subsistence. The normal level of re-imbursement that should be applied for is up to 300 Euros for travel, and 60 Euros per day for subsistence with a cap on the total award of 1500 Euros. Any requests for budgets above this amount will require a full justification of all the costings.

The ‘STSM subgroup’ will consist of Bojan Duduk, Saskia Hogenhout, Phyllis Weintraub and Wolfgang Jarausch (as representative executive committee members for each of the 4 WGs), Assunta Bertaccini, Mogens Nicolaisen and Matt Dickinson. As far as possible, we will try to allocate awards evenly between the 4 WGs, but the number supported in each round will depend a little bit on how much money each STSM has asked for.

According to the COST contract and the Memorandum of Understanding, we are obliged to fund at least one STSM per year per WG, and we also stated that 'preference would be given to young scientists and scientists from less developed regions to facilitate technology transfer and share protocols and new techniques', so these will be our guiding principles in deciding which ones to support.

Matt Dickinson