Merck
Nonprofit organization, Browse similar opportunities
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Nonprofit organization, Browse similar opportunities
In celebrating its 350th anniversary, Merck offers a series of research grants to stimulate innovative research in challenging areas of future importance. Merck intends to provide several research grants of up toEUR 350,000 per year for 3 years in various research areas with the option of extension or expansion. Merck is a vibrant team of specialists in Healthcare, Digitalization, Life Science, and Performance Materials.
Drug discovery has made significant progress in recent years with immune checkpoint inhibitors revolutionizing the treatment of cancer or the emergence of completely new therapeutic approaches such as genetically engineered T-cells just to mention a few examples.At the occasion of our 350-year anniversary we are launching a call for research proposals on projects to identify and characterize the next game-changing molecule or technology to help cure cancer or autoimmune disease.
What are new breakthrough enabling technologies for drug discovery, which molecular targets or pathophysiological pathways have tremendous untapped potential to deliver the next big therapeutic breakthrough? How can translation from and predictivity of preclinical models to the clinical situation be enhanced?
You will look into the future for new generations of Intelligent Materials that will react and adapt to their environment, to bring exciting new properties and applications. Such materials would be designed or molecular engineered to react to an external stimulus and change their physical properties in a defined way. Examples could include self-healing materials that can automatically repair damage at a molecular level, sensing materials that change optical or electronic properties under defined stimuli, or materials that change shape or physical appearance under environmental changes (such as light, heat, electromagnetic field, pressure, chemical interaction, and so on). We look for ground-breaking materials science, but also for innovative applications that can bring these Intelligent Materials into real world use.
Understanding and harnessing the microbiome has the potential to impact the world around us and revolutionize human health, agriculture, and environmental restoration. However, understanding how we can harness and accelerate the promise of the microbiome is one of the toughest challenges in life science. The Merck 350 Research Grant recognizes the need for microbiome specific tools and methods to enable and translate microbiome research. This award would support the development of workflow tools, predictive models, culturing and imaging techniques, omics and informatics that enable technical advancements for deciphering the microbiome.
Deep learning has led to spectacular advances in computing over the last years, conquering fields which previously seemed to be reserved for human intelligence and creativity – for example, mastering the game of Go, recognizing images, or imitating the painting style of an artist. How can similar algorithms be applied to predictm the properties and behaviour of new chemical substances or to suggest substances that would fit a given purpose?
In ‘traditional’ in-silico research the simulation of a molecule is a difficult task due to the quantum nature of its particles, which leads to a very large number of degrees of freedom for the system. In quantum computing all information is stored in Q-bits, which behave inherently in a quantum-mechanical way. Is it possible to exploit this analogy and create super-efficient algorithms to simulate molecules?
Researchers from around the world may apply for the grants.
The research proposed for the grant must not:
Choose the country you wish to travel to study for free, work or volunteer
