BOF postdoctoral fellowships - call 2026

 *Nederlandse versie*

Duration and starting date

The positions start on 1 October 2026 at the earliest and last for a period of maximum 3 years.

Who can apply

Unsuccessfull FWO applications for a Junior or Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship are automatically submitted to the Special Research Fund. To be considered for a BOF postdoctoral fellowship the following admissibility requirements must be met.

Admissibility requirements for a BOF fellowship

  1. Candidates must still be able to submit an admissible application for a Junior or Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship at the FWO Flanders in a next application round. Candidates for a Junior Postdoctoral Fellowship who can no longer apply for a junior fellowship in a next application round, but who can apply for a senior fellowship , are eligible for a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship.
  2. Candidates can obtain a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship only once in their career, either after applying for an FWO Junior Postdoctoral Fellowship, or after applying for an FWO Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship. If a candidate has obtained a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship after applying for an FWO Junior Postdoctoral Fellowship, this candidate can no longer obtain a BOF Postdoctoral Fellowship after applying for an FWO Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship.
  3. Only candidates who are preselected by the FWO for the second application round (with interview) and assigned a Z-score by the FWO are eligible for the BOF selection.

Funding

The fellowship holder will be appointed as dr. assistant with research assignment for the duration of the fellowship. The fellowship holder will receive a bench fee of €4.000/ year.

FWO resubmission

Candidates who obtain a BOF fellowship are obliged to submit a new application for an FWO fellowship no later than 2 years after the FWO deadline on which they postulated in the context of the obtained BOF fellowship.

It is the responsibility of BOF mandatees to determine which FWO deadline applies to them. BOF mandatees must verify themselves whether they meet the FWO eligibility criteria to submit a valid FWO application.
In some cases, a valid FWO application can only be submitted 1 year after the previous one. If this applies, the application must be submitted accordingly. See Art. 6 of the Regulations of the Research Foundation – Flanders governing the Postdoctoral Fellowship for the seniority conditions of the FWO.

Attention: As a holder of an FWO postdoctoral fellowship, one becomes a staff member of the FWO. If one previously held a contract at Ghent University, leave cannot be transferred from the Ghent University contract to the FWO contract.

How to apply

The FWO application file is automatically sent to the Special Research Fund.

Deadline

  • Submissions are made via  FWO. The deadline is  17 November 2025.
  • Candidates who acquire a BOF fellowship in this call (2026) are required to submit a new application to the FWO no later than November/December 2027.

For persons who already have a BOF fellowship, the following deadlines apply:

    • BOF mandatees (2025) who have obtained their BOF fellowship after the FWO call with deadline 2/12/2024 are obliged to submit a new application to the FWO no later than November/December 2027.
    • BOF mandatees (2024) who have obtained their BOF fellowship after the FWO call with deadline 1/12/2023 are obliged to submit a new application to the FWO no later than 17/11/2025.

Results

 The results will be announced on the BOF website no later than 3 July 2026.

Contact

Team Flemish, Federal & BOF Projects

Call and application forms

website FWO 

Regulations BOF postdoctoral researcher

General regulations for Assisting Acamedic Staff

Final report


Final report : within three months following upon the end of the grant a final scientific/scholarly report has to be sent electronically to BOFapplication@UGent.be. The promoter and co-promoter (if applicable) are included in this e-mail (either as sender, or in CC).