Luxembourg’s national research fund publishes a series of profiles of early-career researchers to make research more accessible and to inspire young people in their study choices.  Photo: ThisisEngineering RAEng/Unsplash

Luxembourg’s national research fund publishes a series of profiles of early-career researchers to make research more accessible and to inspire young people in their study choices.  Photo: ThisisEngineering RAEng/Unsplash

As it did last year, Luxembourg’s national research fund FNR wants to bring attention to early-career scientists in 2023, this time including lab assistants and technicians in its call.

Announced at the end of December 2022, the next edition of the Spotlight on Young Researchers wants to honour people in research who have a connection to Luxembourg, regardless of where they are in the world. “We want to show the diverse range of important research going on in Luxembourg which young scientists are helping make happen,” reads the call for participants on the FNR website. “The research disciplines are as diverse as the nationalities, we want to put faces and photos to the science.”

Or, as Didier Goossens, the fund’s head of corporate communication, explains to Delano: “The aim is to present to a non-scientific audience different existing research subjects in Luxembourg, through the profiles of young researchers who are at the start of their career. This personifies research a bit more. The goal is to tell a story and to inspire, in the best case, young people.” He adds that the FNR also “wants to break the stereotype of the crazy lone scientist stuck in their laboratory”.

The early-career researchers, technicians and lab assistants selected for the series since 2016 have used their spotlight less to attract attention to themselves and more to share their passion and motivations with others. 

Candidates are asked to send photos and videos of themselves, their work environment and their research, as well as explanations for laypeople regarding their field of expertise. Eligible are those who currently or previously have been funded under an FNR funding instrument, and who at the time of submission are a PhD candidate, a junior postdoc, a junior principal investigator or an early career lab assistant or technician.

On their decision to include technicians and lab assistants in this edition, the FNR explained: “These are also scientific careers. Young people close to graduation might wonder about the types of jobs available in the sector, and even though many might just think there are only researchers, people who are in the labs are just as important. These profiles are needed, so we’re trying to cast our net wider to better represent the diversity.”

This year, the fund has also started reaching out to former participants, “to see whether people stayed in the academic field or if they left to join the private sector,” Goossens said. “It’s a way to observe what career path the students we fund end up on.”

Early-career scientists who are eligible for the initiative have  to apply for a chance of sharing the spotlight and their passion with a wider audience.