In 2024, the IZKF Executive Board decided to reactivate the “IZKF Research Groups” funding format in order to attract excellent young researchers with innovative research ideas and to integrate them into the faculty's research networks. The funding format is designed to be equivalent to the DFG's Emmy Noether Program and provides a maximum of €250,000 per year per group. As early as the beginning of the 2000s, there were internationalization efforts at the Faculty of Medicine, which were supported by recruiting external applicants with new research topics for the IZKF.

For information on the first projects, please click here.
 

The Interdisciplinary Centre for Clinical Research (IZKF) Münster is a scientific alliance within the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Münster aiming to establish powerful structures for interdisciplinary clinical research and targeted promotion of young scientists. At the Medical Faculty, we bring together scientists and clinicians from different departments and theoretical institutes to integrate them into an innovative research and teaching environment. More than 2,000 researchers combine their efforts to study disease, explore biomedical principles, and develop novel tools for diagnosis and treatment. The scientists within the Faculty of Medicine actively combine clinical/translational research with strong interdisciplinary basic research. Not only do they cooperate with the University Hospital Münster (UKM), the researchers also work closely with colleagues from the University of Münster including the Faculties of Biology, Psychology, Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics and Computer Science as well as the local Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine.

To support emerging scholars early in their career path, the IZKF Münster invites all outstanding scientists with a doctorate to apply for a position as 

Independent IZKF Research Group Leader in Life Sciences (m/f/d).

Successful candidates will lead their independent Research Group at an institution of the Medical Faculty Münster of their own choice for a period of 4+2 years. The Research Group leaders shall have defended their doctoral thesis no longer than 6 years ago. Times of family leave (incl. parental leave or own long-term illness) will be added to these 6 years. Their research shall align with the focus areas of the Medical Faculty (inflammation & infection; vascular system; neural system; cell differentiation, regeneration, and neoplasia) and strengthen existing or planned research networks. For a list of ongoing networks please refer to the webpage of the Faculty of Medicine.

The total allocation for an IZKF Research Group amounts to up to 1.5 million euros for the total of six years. Start of funding is January 01, 2027 at the earliest.

Apply now via our career portal by using the IZKF templates until 23.04.2026.
Your application should contain:

•    a cover letter, 
•    a CV highlighting past research accomplishments, 
•    a list of publications in which the applicant should identify the three most important papers that they have written. If you are not the first author, you should quantitatively specify your contribution to the paper; 
•    a research summary limited to one page and written for a non-specialist, which explains the main goals of the research work; 
•    a research pre-proposal of no more than three pages total including all references, figures, and tables, written for a specialist. Please describe here why your proposed work would be a good match at the Medical Faculty and its research environment;
•    two letters of recommendation.
 

For inquiries, please contact:

Mail: Dr. Sabine Blass-Kampmann
Scientific Manager | IZKF Scientific Office
 

research proposal

CV and publication list