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Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA)

decra

What is the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA)?

The DECRA fellowships are three-year fellowships aimed to support talented postdoctoral scientists (scientists at an early stage of their career) who wish to build an independent research career at an Australian institution. For more details see DECRA Fellow 2025 Summary  

Who can apply for the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA)?

Postdocs of any nationality with no more than 5 years of research experience post PhD by the application deadline, i.e. a PhD completed on or after 01 Mar 2020. International applicants must obtain a legal right to work and reside in Australia for the duration of the Award.

Why apply for the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA)?

  • It provides you with three years of salary (can be extended up to six years if working part time) of AU$112,897 (including 30 per cent on-costs) annually
  • It provides up to AU$50,000 per year of project funding
  • It is an opportunity to establish your independent line of research at an Australian institution

When to apply for the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA)?

The application round for grants starting in 2025 will close on 18 March 2025; 5:00 pm Australian Capital Territory (ACT Local Time)


  Please inform the Project Office about your intention.  
  Do not hesitate anytime to contact us for consulting, discussion or help.  

How to apply for the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA)?

  1. Find and read programme guidelines:
  2. Contact an Australian university (your Australian Administering Organisation) and negotiate support for your project. Identify a Research Support contact, who will be able to work through the application process with you and also ultimately submit the application on your behalf. Find out the internal application timelines at your chosen university.
  3. Establish a login to the Australian Research Council’s RMS Grant management system with detailed instructions available in the manual   and instructions to submit an application. If you have an ORCiD ID, you can link this to your RMS user profile and import data. If you have an ORCiD ID, you can link this to your RMS user profile and import data.
  4. Prepare the content for your application as outlined below.
  5. Complete your online application form in the RMS system. The application form (see Instructions for Applicants   and Sample Application Form   for detail) includes 6 parts:
    1. Administrative Summary
      1. Title
      2. person participant summary
      3. organisation participant summary
      4. application summary
      5. national interest test statement
    2. Participant Details including ROPE (research opportunity and performance evidence)
      (This section will not appear until the DECRA candidate has been added/accepted in Part A. Note that this is the longest section, ensure entered data is frequently saved to avoid loss of data.)
      1. personal details
      2. current country of residence
      3. qualifications
      4. research load non-ARC grants
      5. current and previous appointments
      6. career highlights
      7. contribution to the field
      8. number of PhD, Masters and Honours students supervised
      9. research outputs
      10. 10 career-best research outputs
      11. currently held ARC projects
      12. relevant qualification
      13. eligibility: extension due to career interruptions
      14. certification by the DECRA candidate
    3. Project Description
      1. iproject description – max 7 A4 pages incl. project title, project quality and innovation, benefit, feasibility, communications of results, references, acknowledgements
      2. statement by the Administering Organisation supporting candidate
    4. Project Cost
      1. proposed budget for project
      2. justification of non-salary research funding requested form the ARC
      3. details of non-ARC contributions
    5. Classifications and Other Statistical Information
      1. is application within one of Australian Government priority areas
      2. field of research
      3. socio-economic objective
      4. interdisciplinary research
      5. international collaborations and their nature and countries involved
      6. number of PhD/Masters/Honours students involved
    6. Project Eligibility
      1. involvement of medical research
      2. medical research statement
  6. Once all sections have been completed and saved, they should be validated, which means the headers change from red (invalid) to green (valid). After reviewing all the components, return to the Action Centre homepage and click on Submit to Research Office.
  7. You can generate a PDF of your application to keep a hard copy by clicking the PDF icon next to the Save button.
  8. Ensure that the Australian Administering Organisation submits the application on your behalf by 18 March 2025; 5:00 pm (ACT Local Time).

Rejoinders (requests to reply to reviewers’ comments) are expected June 5 to July 8, 2025. The results will be announced between 14 to 27 November 2025. Fellowships are expected to commence in 2026.

Contact
Australian Research Council
E-mail: info@arc.gov.au, ☎: + 61 2 6287 6600
Address: GPO Box 2702, CANBERRA 2601 Australian Capital Territory


IOCB

IOCB participation (0) in the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA):