The European Commission has announced the final and biggest ever calls for proposals under its Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7). In total, €8.1 billion is available to support projects and ideas that will boost Europe's competitiveness and tackle issues such as improving human health, protecting the environment and finding new solutions to challenges arising, for example, from urbanisation and managing waste.

Universities, research organisations and industry will be among more than 15,.000 funding recipients in around 1,300 projects. Around €2.7 billion will help cement Europe's place as a world class destination for researchers, mainly through individual grants from the European Research Council (€1.75 billion), and Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (€963 million) for research training and mobility. Some €1.2 billion is available for SMEs.

All areas of the 2013 Work Programme are generally open to Australian research institutions. In most cases, however, Australian institutions have to bring their own funding unless their participation is deemed essential for the project.

For more information about the Programm, please click here.