What does the future hold for FET flagships?

Six more research projects have been selected by the European Commission to compete to be one of the next Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) flagships for Horizon Europe

The Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) programme is constantly evolving. Aside from the regular FET-funded projects are FET Flagships – long term and large-scale multidisciplinary research initiatives with billion-euro funding to provide ‘game-changing’ impacts towards the European economy and society.

 

So far, three FET Flagships are being supported by the European Commission: the Human Brain Project, the Graphene Flagship and the Quantum Technologies Flagship. Three more flagships will be launched on 2021 when the Horizon Europe funding scheme commences, and six pilot research projects are competing to secure these slots. Themes include enhancing human-artificial intelligence interaction, personalising medicine, developing cell and gene therapies, providing affordable renewable and preserving cultural heritage through time.

 

The future remains uncertain for these upcoming FET flagships, as pointed out by Daniela Corda, the director of the CNR Institute for Protein Biochemistry in Naples (Italy) and Italian delegate to the Horizon 2020 programme committee. Horizon Europe, in contrast to Horizon 2020, is mission-oriented. Scientists have yet to see how things will work out because the approach of the new funding scheme will also change the way research programmes like FET will be handled.

 

To read the full article from Nature, click here.