Horizon Scanning

Horizon scanning involves looking for new opportunities and identifying trends in funding that will enable you to develop ideas and the teams needed to develop those ideas into a proposal for the right call at the right time. Tracking funding trends through watching what funders and sector news channels are highlighting is a good way to get a sense of what trends are emerging. Mailing lists and social media accounts are good sources of information on what is happening across the funding landscape.

Contact Us

Mailing Lists

Clicking on the links below will take you to the sign-up pages for the mailing lists of some of the UK's key funders:

Royal Society: https://royalsociety.org/stay-in-touch/email-newsletters/

UKRI: https://www.ukri.org/news/

Wellcome Trust: https://wellcome.org/news-and-reports/newsletters

NIHR: https://nihr.us14.list-manage.com/subscribe?id=570d86f9cb&u=299dc02111e8a68172029095f

UKCDR: https://ukcdr.org.uk/news-articles/ 

British Council: https://www.britishcouncil.org/education/he-science/contact/subscribe

British Academy: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/about/

GCID: E-mail Mary.Ryan@glasgow.ac.uk and ask to be added

X Accounts

Here are some of the X handles for useful funders, news outlets and professional bodies that offer insights into the UK and international funding landscape:

UKEuropeInternational

The Royal Society

@RoyalSociety

CIVIS Europe's Civic University Alliance

@civis_eu

Research Africa

@ResearchAfrica

Wellcome

@WellcomeTrust

The Guild

@GuildEU

World Health Organization

@WHO

Inside Higher Ed

@insidehighered

Horizon Europe Nine Framework Programme

@FP9_EU

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

@FAO

Leverhulme Trust

@LeverhulmeTrust

Horizon Europe

@HorizonEU

USAID

@USAID

The British Academy

@BritishAcademy_

The League of European Research Universities

@LERUnews

UN Development

@UNDP

 

Science Europe

@ScienceEurope

UK Collaborative on Development Research

@ukcdr

 

Young Academy of Europe

@yacadeuro

African Academy of Sciences

@AASciences

 

Academia Europaea

@acad_euro

African Research Universities Alliance

@ARUA_News

 

European Research Council

@ERC_Research

UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office

@FCDOGovUK

 

Marie Skłodowska Curie Actions

@MSCActions

UK Foreign Commonwealth & Development Office Science, Technology, Innovation, Research, Evidence

@FCDOResearch

 

  

Canada's International Development Research Centre

@IDRC_CRDI

 

  

UK's All Party Parliamentary Group for Africa

@AfricaAPPG

 

  

The World Bank

@WorldBank
   

Universities UK International

@UUKIntl
   

National Institute for Health and Care Research Global Health

@NIHRglobal

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LinkedIn Accounts

Clicking on any of the names below will take you directly to their LinkedIn page.

The Scottish Government 
The Medical Research Council
Wellcome
The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council 
The Natural Environment Research Council
The Royal Society
The Royal Academy of Engineering
Innovate UK
The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
National Institute for Health and Care Research
The Economic and Social Research Council
The British Academy
The Arts and Humanities Research Council
Universities UK International
European Research Council (ERC)
UK Research and Innovation
Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office

 

Additional Sources of Information

Funder Blogs

AHRC: https://www.ukri.org/councils/ahrc/blog/

Wellcome Open Research: https://blog.wellcomeopenresearch.org/

UKRI: https://www.ukri.org/blog/

NIHR: https://www.nihr.ac.uk/blogs 

Royal Society: https://royalsociety.org/blog/

British Academy: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/blog/?order=-published_date
Funder Strategic Plans, Delivery Plans and Published Priorities

UKRI Strategic Plan: https://www.ukri.org/who-we-are/our-vision-and-strategy/our-strategy-2022-to-2027/

UKRI Delivery Plans: https://www.ukri.org/who-we-are/our-vision-and-strategy/delivery-plans/

Wellcome: https://wellcome.org/who-we-are/strategy

NIHR: https://www.nihr.ac.uk/about-us/our-key-priorities/

British Academy: https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/about/the-british-academy-strategic-plan-2023-2027/

Royal Society: https://royalsociety.org/-/media/about-us/governance/royal-society-strategic-plan-2022-2027.pdf?la=en-GB&hash=DF6CDE5012A3BED373CDF366B1736988
UKRI Funding Finder - Lists all funding opportunities from across UKRI https://www.ukri.org/opportunity/
UKRI Gateway to Research - Details of all past UKRI awards. Very useful for landscape analysis. https://gtr.ukri.org/
Research Professional - includes a funding search function, but be sure to check details on the funder web pages as RP may include inaccurate or improperly categorized calls. Sign in with your GUID/institutional account. You can also set up e-mail alerts for funding. https://www.researchprofessional.com/funding.html