The Ethereum Foundation is sponsoring a wave of grants to support Ethereum-related academic work. This grants round has up to $750,000 in total available. Proposals are due May 8, 2022. All of the details you'll need to apply can be found below.
If you're still interested in pursuing grants for a project, you can still go through our standard applications.
We're calling all those interested in expanding academic knowledge throughout the Ethereum ecosystem!
The Ethereum community has grown immensely as developers, artists, companies, and even governments work together to make a positive impact with this technology.
With this grants round, the Ethereum Foundation welcomes more academics to the table to push forward formal academic research in related domains. Such domains include theoretical and applied cryptography and mathematics, zero-knowledge proofs, economics, computation, cybersecurity, protocol and consensus mechanisms, formal verification, P2P networking, and hardware, just to mention a few areas.
The Ethereum Foundation is excited to expand Ethereum's reach across more of academia through this grants round.
Submit proposal
Individual researchers with academic backgrounds, research centers, universities, think-tanks, educators and other stakeholders interested in research on matters related to Ethereum and its ecosystem are encouraged to apply.
Anyone is free to participate in this grants round, as an individual or with a team.
Research outputs are encouraged but not limited to the following wishlist.
We welcome research at any stage, whether it's a new idea based on the wishlist, a project that furthers Ethereum-related research you've already undertaken, or a lab experiment.
Grants will be awarded on a case-by-case and rolling basis. You may enter more than one proposal as long as each proposal is unique and meets the the requirements.
Deadline
The deadline has been extended. Submit by May 8, 2022. We will follow-up regarding your submission by email.
Requirements
Proposals must be in English.
Work must be open source.
Reports must be accessible by a url.
Selection criteria
Surprise us with your creativity! But here are a few selection criteria considerations:
Impact of the proposed research output.
Quality of work and experience of the research team.
Clarity, conciseness and organization of the proposal.
Contribution to the wishlist areas.
Potential of long-term involvement in the Ethereum ecosystem.
Analyses or visualizations that help a non-technical audience gain insight into the research.
Wishlist
The Ethereum Foundation is interested in research and academic output in the following domain areas, but don't let this restrict your creativity. Check out our wishlist.
Next steps and support
For any general support questions about your submission, please email [email protected].
Frequently asked questions
Academic institutions, consortia of universities, research centres, universities, think-tanks and individuals with prior research experience.
In short, we need enough information to understand your goals, the research problem you're aiming to tackle, the academic output, information on previous research work, who's involved and estimation regarding time and budget. The more details you provide, the more likely we'll be able to help.
For example:
Clearly showing the research area you're digging into.
Outlining the output. Is it a research paper or lab work that will culminate in an experimental report?
Clearly stating the impact your research will have and how you foresee your findings being used by the Ethereum community.
Detailed description of your project, milestones, the people involved and how much time you think it will take to complete.
If you have a follow-up idea of a previous research you conducted or if your research is aligned with the wishlist domains, we want to hear about it! The goal is to advance knowledge that pushes the Ethereum ecosystem forward.
We are aiming to receive academic and formal research outputs, be it a research paper, an experimental report or some sort of comprehensive research output. Whatever the output, the information should be open-source and available for the broader community to use. The Intellectual Property can still be owned by the research team, but it is key that the output is open source.
This grants round has up to $750,000 in total, which is to be distributed among selected projects.
We envision projects to take between 6 to 12 months, however, we are open to some flexibility depending on the project proposal.
Project submissions will be evaluated on a rolling basis and contact will be made with each applicant to inform about the evaluation outcome.
Costs related to academic research are eligible for the Academic Grants Round. We encourage you to itemize each cost on the budget section of the submission form.
No, the Ethereum Foundation does not require co-financing. Grants will be 100% covered by the Ethereum Foundation.
As projects may vary largely in duration, scope and outputs, grant amounts may also differ to a large extent. We suggest that you present a budget that covers your academic research and related outputs, itemizing each of the costs.
You may choose if you prefer receiving the grant in FIAT, ETH or DAI, but for the purposes of the project proposal and submission form, we kindly ask you to indicate the requested amount in FIAT.
Projects may vary in duration. We are estimating projects to last between 6-12 months, but it is an indicative timeframe. We allow for some flexibility as projects may vary largely in domain, scope, outputs and researchers involved.
Ethereum-related research will be supported through the Academic Grants Rounds. Your proposal does not need to be addressing one of the wishlist areas. The wishlist should be seen as guidance on the most pressing issues we have identified but is not exhaustive.
You should submit one application per project idea/ wishlist area. Multiple applications per institution are accepted for the Academic Grants Round.
It is the first time the Ethereum Foundation is launching a specific grants round to support Ethereum-related academic research. However, we do have an ongoing support Program - the Ecosystem Support Program - which supports Ethereum related projects in various scopes.
This is the first round of grants administered by the Ethereum Foundation that specifically supports academic research. However, the Ethereum Foundation has an ongoing support program - the Ecosystem Support Program - and you’ll be able to find some of the granted projects here.
Master's Students are eligible to apply for the grants round, should they have the academic support of supervisors. PhD level is not required.
We encourage you to submit an inquiry for support through the Ecosystem Support Program.
If you miss the deadline for this dedicated round of grants, but have a proposal that advances the Ethereum ecosystem, we encourage you to head over to ESP.
