Post-doctoral awards are designed to bridge the gap between a doctorate and applying for post-doctoral funding.
The Oxford BRC Post-doctoral Awards scheme offer up to £25,000 to enable early career researchers to write up research from their doctorates and apply for further funding to develop their careers and increase the impact of their work. All applicants should have recently completed a doctorate and priority will be given to nurses, midwives, allied health professionals, healthcare scientists, pharmacy staff and psychologists.
The duration can be flexible but grants usually last between six months full-time or up to 12 months part-time and should be used to cover your salary costs.
You must be employed by Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust or the University of Oxford in one of the Oxford BRC themes. You must have submitted your doctorate thesis before any award is made.
What we offer
The grant should be used mainly to claim salary costs for yourself, full- or part-time, and the amount should cover a minimum of 25% of your salary. You can also use the funding for publication costs where this is not provided by your theme.
You cannot use the funding for:
- training
- consumables
- conference registration
- travel
- subsistence
- other staff costs
- indirect costs
- overheads
- public involvement and engagement activities
You cannot apply if you want to:
- conduct a pilot study
- develop a health intervention
- organise a one-off event
- write up a book
- do an academic course, such as a Master’s degree or PhD
Apply here: https://forms.office.com/e/jj7cFaEHcd
Closing date for applications is 12pm on Wednesday 2 July 2025. Interviews will take place on Wednesday 16 July 2025 between 12pm and 5pm.
If you have any questions about this award, please contact [email protected]
Case Study
Here a previous Post-Doctoral Award recipient outlines how the award was used.
Tulika Nandi
Post-doctoral Research Assistant, Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences
My research focuses on non-invasive brain stimulation techniques which are used for probing neurophysiology and have the potential to complement conventional neurorehabilitation. I am particularly interested in the significance and sources of individual differences in responses to brain stimulation.
Transcranial direct current stimulation is an extensively researched and relatively inexpensive technique, but translation to clinical applications is limited by individual variability in responses. Several studies from our lab and our collaborators have examined the effects of direct current stimulation on concentrations of the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA. While there is a general trend for stimulation induced decrease in GABA, there are also significant differences between participants. The aim of this project is to run retrospective current modelling in a large number of participants (from multiple datasets) in order to determine whether stimulation induced GABA changes are correlated with current amplitudes in the motor cortex. The BRC award gave me the opportunity kick start this analysis with dedicated time commitment and computational resources.