The last call form the European Research Council (ERC) for junior researchers recorded a total of 3,329 proposals, reaching almost 50% increase in relation to the 2,169 proposals registered for last year's call for proposals. This is the third consecutive year in which there is a significant increase in received applications.

The ERC grants for Starting Independent Researchers are aimed at supporting researchers who are at the beginning of their career or who are consolidating a research team or their own independent research program. According to the European Research Council (ERC) the expectations of the call for proposals published in July 2012 have been highly satisfied with a 50% increase in the proposals that have been received.

According to the president of the ERC this increase in the proposals presented reflects the urgent need to continue supporting research in Europe, especially in the case of young researchers. With the reduction of funding dedicated to research in Europe there is the risk of ignoring the talent of the best young researchers instead of supporting and growing it.

Of the 3329 proposals received under the last call, 1502 proposals were in Physical Sciences and Engineering, 1057 have focused on the field of Life Sciences and 770 fall within the scope of Social Sciences and Humanities. Proposals will be reviewed by the ERC's peer review evaluation and its results will be published in 2013. In its previous edition, the ERC provided around €800 million funding for more than five hundred projects.