The award of a grant within the ILL PhD Programme follows a two-stage proces

Stage 1: Selection of projects

Who may submit proposals?

Any academic belonging to a university or affiliated institution in one of the ILL's Associate or Scientific Member countries with the authorisation to supervise PhD students. If the proposal is selected, the proposal owner will be the PhD supervisor.

On which subject?

Projects should be linked to those fields of science covered by ILL research. Our most important criterion for selection is the quality of the project.

When?

There is usually one call for proposals per year, in automn. Next deadline for submitting a PhD proposal is 5 December 2011.

How?

By sending the application form and the signed terms of agreement to: PhD@ill.eu. You must also enclose details of your research proposal and your curriculum vitae (see instructions below and in the application form).

Proposals

The proposal must provide technical information on the research to be performed: the state-of-the art of the research topic, any preliminary work already carried out, the project objectives and experimental plan, and information on the access required to ILL beamtime and instruments. The length of the proposal should be between 2 and 4 pages.

The assessment criteria for proposals are:
-    Scientific quality of the project,
-    Opportunity for collaboration with ILL scientists,
-    If relevant, complementary use of ILL support facilities (Deuteration laboratory, Partnership for Structural Biology…).

Co-financing of the project costs would be highly welcome but is not a necessary requirement.

The selection process

Selection is a two-stage process by a committee of experts. The final selection for the current call of PhD proposals will take place early next year. Notification of selected projects will occur around end of February 2012

What if the project is successful?

The ILL will advertise the selected project and centralise applications from students. However, the ILL and the external supervisors will be in charge of the recruitment of the student. After agreement on an appropriate application deadline, they will select the best 2 candidates and invite them for an interview at ILL. If supervisors already have a good candidate in mind, they can send in his/her application (which consists of a CV and a covering letter) together with the research proposal.

How will the PhD work be organised?

See PhD work at ILL

Note on individual applications

The ILL is a research institute that has no status for giving academic degrees. Students can be attached only to accepted thesis projects emanating from academic institutions, propositions from individual students are not accepted.
The projects looking for student are published on our web-site and the links give the contact persons, usually the responsibles at the university and at  the ILL.
It is their task to select the suitable student in the first place, after that the selection is approved during an interview here at our institute.

Stage 2: Selection of students

Who can apply?

Any student interested in one of the selected proposals.
Note that if a potential supervisor has a good candidate in mind, the student’s application may be sent together with the submission of the proposal.

The ILL is prepared to offer the student a placement related to the selected project if he/she has to complete a placement before preparing the PhD (as is the case for French students).

When?

The selected projects will be published on the "Open positions" page by the end of February 2012.

Contact:

Giovanna Cicognani
PhD(at)ill.eu

Fax: +33 (0) 476 207 930