Final Report Summary - ICFONESTPLUS (ICFONest+ Advanced Postdoctoral Program) ICFO (http://icfo.eu) Barcelona (Spain), provides cutting edge facilities as well as stimulating, international and interdisciplinary environment. The ICFOnestPLUS programme, partially supported by the Marie Curie Co-funding of Regional, National and International Programmes (COFUND) action of the European Commission, offered top-class researchers access to excellent facilities, competitive salaries, research expenses and support from Group Leaders, and assisted them in becoming successful independent researchers.The goal of ICFONestPLUS was to provide outstanding young researchers with high level research training. Within the scope of this program, 28 Fellowships has been awarded offering fellows the opportunity to accomplish a stay at ICFO benefiting from its state-of-the-art facilities and resources, and also its outstanding research environment where collaborations and knowledge sharing thrive, and different fields converge. The ICFONestPLUS program build on previous experience and success of its predecessor and has served as a career-boosting opportunity for the awardees. A dedicated ICFOnestPLUS website (http://nestpostdocs.icfo.eu) was created at the beginning of the ICFOnest program, the very successful predecessor of this current second COFUND action at postdoctoral level at ICFO. It has served as a valuable tool to inform interested researchers about the application and selection process, as well as the conditions of the programme. A “Guide for Applicants” had also been made available for download (http://nestpostdocs.icfo.es/data/uploads/icfonestappguide2014.pdf) providing information about the programme and application process, including eligibility criteria, documentation required (CV, references, education records), selection process, etc.ICFO prepared dissemination material to promote the programme internationally, and calls for application were published via main jobsites, such as: Naturejobs, Eruaxess, Brightrecruits, PhotonicsJobs, PhysicsToday, Research Gate, Euro Science, national websites R+D positions.Starting January 2014, ICFOnestPLUS fellowship call for application were launched every 3 months, on a rolling basis. Batches 1-9 (until March 2016) of the programme performed very successfully, with a total of 635 applications from aspiring international post-docs. By eventually hosting 28 Fellows, we assigned more than the initially 25 available positions (of 24 months duration). The ICFO HRE Unit offered all the necessary support to help the Incoming Fellows in their relocations. The ICFOnestPLUS Fellows, have had opportunities to train and develop non-scientific skills, participate in outreach activities, as well as in social activities. ICFOnestPLUS fellows and their projects has been integrated in on-going research activities of an already existing ICFO research group and supervised by the corresponding Group Leader, advances scientific training-through-research had also been provided.
