Overview of funding opportunities

The research award honours top international scientists whose discoveries, theories or understandings have had a lasting impact on their field and contribute to diversity issues.

Nomination and selection for the Carl Zeiss Humboldt Research Award takes place in the Humboldt Research Award Programme. Nomination via the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung is not possible. Applications can be submitted throughout the year.

Within the framework of the programme ‘CZS endowed professorships at universities’, the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung provides funding for professorships at universities for up to ten years.

Endowed professorships in the CZS focus topics of artificial intelligence, resource efficiency and life science technologies will be funded through the call for proposals. One selection criterion is the practical focus of the individual and their research.

CZS Plus is an exclusive funding programme for scientists formerly funded by the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung. Outreach and exchange projects can be funded.

Alumni of the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung can apply for funding for outreach, communication and exchange projects throughout the year to accompany their research and teaching activities.

As part of this Call for applications, funding for science communication measures can be applied for. Precondition is an existing funding from the Foundation.

Within the framework of the ‘CZS Breakthroughs’ programme, the Carl Zeiss Foundation funds top international research from Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Thuringia.

The aim is to explore how intelligent systems can communicate and interact better with their environment. To this end, interdisciplinary research projects are being sought that apply approaches from computer science to fundamental natural processes.

In the ‘CZS Transfer’ programme, the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung promotes outstanding research at universities of applied science.

The call for applications “CZS Transfer 2025: Resource-saving digitalisation” addresses research on technologies that improve the environmental impact of digitalisation. This includes hardware, software and IT infrastructure.

One ‘Wild’ Idea – Three Scientists – Maximum Freedom – With the CZS Wildcard funding programme, the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung gives interdisciplinary teams the opportunity to freely bring forward unconventional research ideas at a very early stage.

With this call for application the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung provides maximum freedom. The funding enables interdisciplinary research groups of at least three scientists to pursue with radically new, unusual, and therefore particularly bold ideas.

The Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung is providing funding for professorships at universities of applied sciences as part of the “CZS Professorships at Universities of Applied Sciences” programme.

Research professorships in the three CZS focus topics of artificial intelligence, resource efficiency and life science technologies will be funded through the call for proposals.

The CZS Centres are cross-location, interdisciplinary research collaborations in the Foundation's focus topics. They serve to establish and expand innovative, internationally visible research centres in the CZS funding states.

Germany needs highly motivated and well-trained young researchers to shape the scientific breakthroughs of tomorrow. That is why we support more than 150 scholarship holders at a total of 19 universities.

The funding programme supports outstanding young scientists who wish to implement exciting ideas at interfaces between various STEM fields.

The programme is intended to help scientists to develop prototypes from their research projects.

The program is designed to enable newly appointed professors at universities of applied sciences to successfully start their first research activities.

In cooperation with external partners, the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung offers further training with different specialisms for its current and former funding partners.