Which research council should I choose?

Several of Independent Research Fund Denmark's funding instruments are offered by all of the research councils, which together cover all the scientific main fields of science. You must therefore consider which council you wish to submit your application to.

Scientific main areas the individual research councils cover

Delimitations between the research councils

There may be applications where it is difficult to determine which research council is best suited for the assessment. The delimitations between the research councils are outlined in the table below as a help in assessing this.

You also have the option to submit an application for a so-called cross-council assessment, allowing assessors from multiple councils to be involved. The Independent Research Fund Denmark | Cross-Council Committee consists of representatives from all five research councils and coordinates the review process for applications that fall at the intersections between the councils. You can read more about the cross-council assessment on the page Cross-council assessment.

Still in doubt?

You must submit your application to the research council that you deem to be best suited to assess your application. If the members of this research council judge that your application should be assessed by a different council than the one originally selected, the application will be transferred to that council, provided that you have granted the fund permission to transfer the application when you submitted it via e-grant.

Related: Research councils

Questions about your application?

Contact the secretariat
Weekdays from 9 am - 12 pm
Tel.: +45 72 31 82 00
Email: dff-opslag@ufm.dk

Council DFF | Natural Sciences DFF | Social Sciences DFF | Medical Sciences DFF | Technology and Production Sciences
DFF | Humanities   In the delimitation between DFF | Humanities and DFF | Natural Sciences, the decisive principle is that projects which predominantly concern humans’ culture-forming and culture-disseminating phenomena and activities (e.g. didactics, sports and archaeology) are covered by DFF | Humanities, whereas research projects primarily concerned with cognitive- forming activities which fall within the natural sciences, should be assessed by  DFF | Natural Sciences. In the delimitation between DFF | Humanities and DFF | Social Sciences, the decisive principle is that projects whichpredominantly concern relations between human behaviour and institutions (groups, enterprises,  organisations and society) are covered by DFF | Social Sciences, whereas projects which predominantly concern culture-analytical and  historical aspects, or  involve special language  and other communicative qualifications are assessed  by DFF | Humanities.  In the delimitation between DFF | Humanities and DFF | Medical Sciences, the  decisive principle is that projects which predominantly concern psychology are covered by DFF | Humanities, whereas projects mostly involving psychiatry should be assessed by DFF | Medical Sciences. There is a certain overlap between these disciplines, but generally speaking, the applications considered by DFF | Medical Sciences are characterised by a biological research theme. For example, medical history is usually covered by DFF | Humanities, but if a medical history project involves an element of biological research, it may in some cases belong to DFF | Medical Sciences. Projects investigating  humanistic aspects of medical science will be covered by DFF |Humanities. Generally, for a project to belong to DFF | Medical Sciences, it is not sufficient that the object of study is medicine – the applied methodology must also originate in medical science. In the delimitation between DFF | Humanities and DFF | Technology and Production Sciences, the decisive  principle is that projects which predominantly  concern humans’ culture- forming and culture- disseminating phenomena and activities are covered by DFF | Humanities. This applies e.g. to media research, design research and linguistics. Projects that primarily involve a technical research element will  generally be assessed by DFF | Technology and Production Sciences.
DFF | Natural Sciences  - In the delimitation between DFF | Natural Sciences and DFF | Social Sciences, the decisive principle is that projects which predominantly concern human behaviour, organisational matters or managerial processes are covered by DFF | Social Sciences, whereas projects that predominantly concern natural science activities are assessed by DFF | Natural Sciences. In the delimitation between DFF | Natural Sciences and DFF | Medical Sciences, the decisive principle is that research projects which predominantly have fundamental scientific, epistemological aim are covered by DFF | Natural Sciences. In the event that the primary objective of the project is of a medical nature, the project will be assessed by DFF | Medical Sciences. Both DFF | Medical Sciences and DFF | Natural Sciences cover areas such as biology, biochemistry and genetics. In the delimitation between DFF | Natural Sciences and DFF | Technology and Production Sciences, the decisive principle is that research projects which predominantly have a cognitive forming perspective, and where the application- oriented perspective is not necessarily clear in advance, are assessed by DFF | Natural Sciences. Fundamental research  that is primarily concerned with solving a specific development- and  application-oriented  problem, is covered by  DFF | Technology and Production Sciences.
DFF | Social Sciences  -

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 -

 In the delimitation between DFF | Social Sciences and DFF | Medical Sciences, the decisive principle is that  projects which predominantly concern relations between human behaviour and institutions (groups, enterprises, organisations and society), and where the biological/ medical content is limited, are covered by DFF | Social Sciences, while projects in which the research element is predominantly of a medical nature are assessed by  DFF | Medical Sciences. In the delimitation between DFF | Social Sciences and DFF | Technology and Production Sciences, the decisive principle is that projects which predominantly concern human behaviour, institutions (groups, enterprises, organisations and society) are covered by DFF | Social Sciences, whereas projects in which the research element predominantly concern technical/logistical solutions are assessed by DFF | Technology and Production Sciences.
DFF | Medical Sciences  -

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-

 In the delimitation between DFF | Medical Sciences and DFF | Technology and Production Sciences, the decisive principle is that projects which predominantly have a human biological aim and require the use of medical competencies and methods are covered by DFF | Medical Sciences. Projects that predominantly require the use of wider technologically oriented competencies, e.g. for the development and establishment of animal models, medico-technical products or medicine, are covered by DFF | Technology and Production Sciences.