Velux Foundation: Challenges in Healthy Ageing

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Event details

Date 24.11.2026
Category Call for proposal
IMPORTANT: As the call allows only a limited number of proposals per institution, candidates must first send an Expression of Interest to the Research Office by 28 September 2026.
Access our internal toolkit and submission instructions here:

Goals
  • Understand how environments and context influence health and shape functional ability in older age.
  • Examine how such factors affect whether healthy behaviours are easy or difficult, whether opportunities for participation exist, and whether older people can live independently.
  • Support conditions that enable people to remain healthy, contribute to society, and pursue what matters to them for as long as possible.
Research Scope
  • Go beyond single-cause thinking. Study how environmental and contextual factors interact to shape functional ability in later life.
  • Show the interaction, not just the factor. Capture pathways of risk and resilience, and identify which features are modifiable enough to act on.
  • Match method to ambition. Use systems thinking in established designs, or complex-systems methods directly and translate findings into scalable, context-sensitive solutions.
Priority Focus Areas
  • Changing the narrative of age and ageing
  • Heat and out-of-home mobility & activity in later life
Out-of-scope topics
  • Research investigating the biology of ageing to slow, pause, or reverse the ageing process itself.
  • Biomedical research on the aetiology, diagnosis, or therapy of specific age-related diseases.
Eligibility
  • At least two project partners (PI and co-PI) from different institutions.
  • PI must be a permanent employee
  • A maximum of 3 co-PIs is allowed. May be non-permanent employees.
  • The number of collaborators is not limited.
  • Co-PIs and collaborators from non-listed countries are permissible.
Funding and Duration
  • CHF 75,000/year
  • Projects can run for up to 4 years
  • Eligible budget categories include:
    • Salaries (for research staff – salaries for PI or other senior contributors to be covered through their employment)
    • Consumables
    • Knowledge transfer
    • Stakeholder engagement
    • Equipment
  • Overhead is not Eligible
Deadlines
  • Internal deadline to express interest: 28 September 2026
  • Submission deadline: 24 November 2026, 23:59 CET
  • Final decision: June 2027
More Information
 

Practical information

  • General public
  • Free

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