The NIHR Future Leaders Fellowship (FLF) is a seven-year award for senior postdoctoral researchers ready to make the move into research leadership. It funds your salary, a research project and a bespoke training and leadership development programme, and your host organisation commits to an open-ended independent position for you to step into. Cohort 2 is open now, with an Alzheimer’s Society partnership route for dementia researchers, and applications close at 1pm on 14 January 2027.
This is a career development award (reference 2026/536). You can’t apply on your own: your contracting organisation has to nominate you, so the first conversation to have is with your research office.
Who can apply
The fellowship is aimed at experienced postdoctoral researchers proposing research within NIHR’s remit. To be eligible you must:
- hold a relevant PhD or MD and have substantial postdoctoral experience (if you hold a Professional Doctorate, contact NIHR before you start to confirm your eligibility)
- not hold a tenured or permanent academic position at any career level, or a chair
- plan to hold the award at a higher education institution, NHS body, local authority or other provider of health or social care services in England
- have completed relevant pre-registration training, if you are a registered health and care professional, doctor or dentist
- have your contracting organisation’s commitment to significant support, including an open-ended UK-based independent research or innovation position to take up during or at the end of the fellowship
Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales are not taking part in this cohort.
Nominations
Your contracting organisation must be based in England and must nominate you. As well as the independent position, its support has to include contributing to tapered salary costs throughout the fellowship, in line with its own employment policies. Each organisation can nominate up to three applicants for this round, and if it puts forward two or three, they must be spread across professions, gender and ethnicity. Internal nomination deadlines usually fall well before the NIHR closing date, so check yours early.
What the fellowship provides
The award runs for seven years full-time equivalent, and you can hold it part time. It covers your salary, your research and your training and development, up to a maximum of £1,500,000, with separate caps on salary costs, clinical trials unit charges and conference costs. Every cost has to be justified as value for money.
Strategic priorities
NIHR particularly welcomes applications that build skills and experience in its strategic priorities:
- social care
- mental health
- public health
- health data science
- researchers working in a local authority setting
- applicants hosted by post-92 universities and non-university hospital practice settings
There is also a highlight notice on oral and dental hygiene. Applications in these areas still have to meet the same quality bar, but they get priority if there are more fundable applications than awards.
The Alzheimer’s Society partnership
NIHR offers partnership awards jointly with charity and industry partners, and Alzheimer’s Society is one of the partners this round. It funds research into all types of dementia and across all areas, including diagnosis and detection, treatment, support and care. For more information, contact Katherine Gray, Head of Research and Influencing Partnerships, at katherine.gray@alzheimers.org.uk. The other partner charities this round include Kidney Research UK, Moorfields Eye Charity and the MS Society; the full list is on the NIHR page.
Webinar
NIHR is running a webinar at 12pm on 9 November 2026, covering the aims of the award, what makes a strong application, important updates to the scheme and how committee assessment works, with a live Q&A. Registration is on the NIHR funding page.
Key dates
- 29 October 2026: opens
- 9 November 2026, 12pm: webinar
- 14 January 2027, 1pm: closes
- February to July 2027: funding committee review
- October 2027 to March 2028: fellowships start
Before you apply
If you’re weighing up whether this is the right step, our podcast on fellowship vs lectureship and our guide to securing a research fellowship are good places to start. For the writing itself, listen to writing the best fellowship application and read these fellowship writing and interview tips. If you’re based in England, the NIHR Research Support Service can help you develop your application.
Read the full details and apply
Visit funding web page
(https://www.nihr.ac.uk/funding/future-leaders-fellowship-cohort-2/2026536)