12th January 2026
UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) have announced round 11 of the Future Leader Fellowships (FLF). These prestigious fellowships are for early career researchers who are transitioning to, or establishing independence.
The fellowship offers flexibility to support outstanding individuals and is open to researchers from all disciplines including researchers who are:
- from diverse career backgrounds
- returning from a career break or returning to research or innovation following time in other roles
- wishing to work part-time or in job shares in order to combine the fellowship with personal responsibilities
- coming to the UK from abroad
As the numbers of applications to previous rounds increased, UKRI put in place demand management measures to restrict the number of applications each university can submit. Here at University of Portsmouth, we will be undertaking an inclusive selection process to identify 3 applicants to submit to this call. When the details and timing of this internal process are available we will communicate this through the usual channels. If you feel this might be the right call for you and your research career you are encouraged to have a preliminary discussion with your Head of School or Associate Dean of Research and Innovation or Associate Head of Research for tentative approval to proceed with the notification of interest.
The call will officially open on February 2nd 2026 with a deadline of June 16th 2026.
How to Apply:
Informal discussion with HoS or ADRI to enable initial Faculty approval
Complete Notification of Interest – deadline 4th February 2026
***HoS & ADRIs will then select applicants to move to Expression of Interest Stage by February 4th 2026
Download and complete Expression of Interest Internal Application Form*** – deadline 4th March 2026
***Assessed by panel of peers (past awardees, UKRI council panel members, colleagues from PRC) and successful candidates informed by 18th March 2026
Complete ITA form & work with Business Partnering Finance team to start costings
Written application, submission to UKRI – deadline 16th June 2026 4pm
We would encourage prospective applicants to explore the call requirements and to assess their suitability against the ‘person specification’ annex in the ‘guidance for academic-hosted applicants’
- Pre-Announcement (Round 11): https://www.ukri.org/opportunity/future-leaders-fellowship-round-11/
- Full guidance (Round 10): https://www.ukri.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/UKRI-221024-Funding-Opp-FutureLeadersFellowshipsRound10-GuidanceForAcademicHostedApplicants.pdf
- UKRI FLF reviewer guidance:https://www.ukri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/UKRI-310725-FLF-ReviewersGuidance-V13-July2025.pdf
You may find it useful to see who has been awarded an FLF in the past; here are the awardees from the last round and the UKRI database of fellows.
Below are some resources (you must be logged into your University Google account to access them):
- Guidance on our Fellowships page including:
- Slides and recording from our fellowships event (January 2023) including a session with Laura Nuttall, from our Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation, who was awarded an FLF in round 3;
- Guidance from the UKRI FLF Development Network on round 11 of FLF;
- Guidance on preparing your Résumé for Research and Innovation (R4RI) iAn example* of a successful UKRI FLF bid in our Successful Bid Library. *please note that the application format will be different for this round as the application will go through UKRIs new application system, The Funding Service (TFS).
The University of Portsmouth is restricted to 3 applications, therefore the Department of Research and Innovation will be running a managed call process to enable the selection of applications.
Interested candidates should first speak with the school/Faculty research leads and complete the notification of interest form by Wednesday 4th February 2026. If you require further clarification please speak with harriet.parr@port.ac.uk or paola.palma@port.ac.uk.
Research and Innovation 