FCT Call for PhD Studentships received 3130 applications

The application period for the Call for PhD Research Studentships 2022 ended on April 7, 2022. The Call aims to award 1450 Studentships and received a total of 3130 applications, of which 2107 were submitted on the last day of the application period. FCT expects the provisional results of the Call be announced at the end of July.

The average age of applicants for this Call is 30, with women accounting for 56% of all applications. As for the type of Studentship, 83% of applicants intend to do their doctorate in Portuguese institutions, 15% in a mixed regime (Portugal and abroad) and only 2% entirely abroad.

Foreign candidates represent 32%, 2% more than in the 2021 Call , and come from a total of 77 countries, compared to 71 last year. The countries with the most Call candidates are Brazil (47%), Italy (8%), Iran (7%) and Spain (4%).

The scientific areas with the most representation in the applications are Engineering Sciences and Technology (24.1%), Social Sciences (23.2%) and Humanities (16.7%).

This year, the Call had for the first time a specific line for research Studentships whose work plans take place totally or partially in non-academic entities, namely in companies, collaborative laboratories, technology and innovation centers, technology interface centers, public administration entities or third sector entities. There were 130 applications for this line, representing 4.2% of all applications received.

The FCT's Doctoral Research Studentships are competitively awarded grants to support advanced training in all areas of knowledge to obtain the academic degree of Doctor. These Studentships allow doctoral students to devote themselves exclusively to their research, thus contributing to the country's scientific and technological development. Currently, FCT has more than 7000 PhD Studentships underway. In 2021, 2,800 new PhD Studentships were started.

The FCT's support in the area of advanced training corresponds to an annual investment of around 100M€. To this funding is added the payment of tuition fees directly to higher education institutions and the personal accident insurance that scholarship holders benefit from, which together account for around €16.5M.

All information about this Call is published on the Call for PhD Research Studentships 2022 page.