The Transatlantic Research Partnership aims to encourage innovative research and new collaborations, with a view to supporting projects involving young researchers.
Created by the Embassy of France in the United States and the Albertine Foundation, the Transatlantic Research Partnership fosters forward-looking collaborative research that addresses pressing global challenges. To this end, the program will support projects related to one or more United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Responsible research and development, socially aware projects aimed at producing meaningful transformations while advancing peer-reviewed foundations for subsequent generations of scholars are all encouraged to apply. The SDG framework offers a broad set of priorities and applicants are expected to clearly demonstrate how their scientific efforts fall into this theme.
Applications are accepted in the three following fields:
Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS)Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM)Science for Society (interdisciplinary STEM-HSS projects)
The Fund considers projects jointly submitted by two researchers at the beginning of their careers.
US or French citizenship is not required. Applicants must provide proof that they are employed at either the US or French institution for at least the duration of the partnership, i.e. 2 years.
Senior researchers may be included as team members but not as project leaders.
PhD candidates are not eligible as project leaders. However, the involvement of PhD students in projects is an important criterion in the selection process.
Additional partner institutions may be added to the project proposal, but these additional partners will not receive any funding from the Transatlantic Research Partnership. Only the research or higher education institutions of the project leaders will receive funding.
Selected projects will receive a $20,000 grant, to be shared equally between the French and the American partners over 2 years.
All award funds will be wired in U.S. dollars to the grantees’ institutions.
The grant will be allocated in one instalment to each partner to be used over the two-year grant period.
The funds are to be used specifically to support the research partnership submitted to the Transatlantic Research Partnership.
The grant will cover:
Project Investigators (PIs) are encouraged to obtain « in kind » and/or « in cash » co-funding from their institutions or other sources of funding to cover all other types of expenses necessary to the successful implementation of the joint research project. Grants are not allocated to individuals, but to institutions. It means that if one of the PIs changes their position to a different institution, they will have to find a colleague in the initial institution to replace them as PI, and the grant cannot be transferred to a new institution.
No general overhead or administrative costs can be covered by the Transatlantic Research Partnership.
Grants cannot be used to purchase equipment, or to pay for release time for faculty.
Besides, grants cannot be used to pay salaries or stipends, or to cover everyday living expenses that would be incurred regardless of the project. It may be used for living expenses necessary for project-related travel.
The Albertine Foundation / Transatlantic Research Partnership does not manage intellectual property between institutions.
Publications of any kind resulting from the joint project will explicitly mention the support granted by the Transatlantic Research Partnership with the following sentence: “This material is based upon research supported by the Transatlantic Research Partnership of the Embassy of France in the United States and the Albertine Foundation.”
Joint applications will be reviewed and evaluated by independent experts.The criteria considered for evaluation are:
Following the announcement of the final decision to successful applicants, the respective universities of the grantees will sign an agreement with the Albertine Foundation.
The contracting phase will take place in the summer 2026, so that planned activities can start in September/October 2026.
The two project leaders will be responsible for the scientific, technical, and administrative management and coordination of the project.
The template of the progress and financial reports will be provided by the Transatlantic Research Partnership team to ensure the comparability of information. It will have to be jointly filled by the two project leaders. Complete tracking of all expenditures from the Transatlantic Research Partnership grant is expected as part of the progress report and final report. The reports should highlight the main results and outputs of the projects as well as any problems that have arisen and how they have been solved.
The reported financial activities must be in US dollars in the report, including the French institution financial report and use the exchange rate of the day of the grant transfer for both the first and second year reports.
In case of any significant changes in the work program, the project leaders must inform Transatlantic Research Partnership team, who will discuss with them the proper action to be taken before starting a new activity.
Projects must be completed within two years of their initiation.
Application must include:
— A Joint Cover Letter— A 1,500-word research proposal detailing expected outcomes and dissemination strategy— A Completed Budget [ Download Budget Template ]— CV of the U.S. applicant, including publication list— CV of the French applicant, including publication list— Letter of Intent (U.S. Institution) [ Download Template ]— Letter of Intent (French Institution) [ Download Template ]— Additional document (if needed)
David Do Paço | Academic cooperation attaché david.dopaco@villa-albertine.org
Sophie Marc | Program Officer sophie.marc@villa-albertine.org