Open positions

The first competitive call in the frame of the MuSkLE programme, which aims at selecting 17 doctoral fellows, opens on 6th March 2026 and closes on 6th May 2026. The open PhD positions are listed below.

Key information:

Deadline for applications’ submission: 6^th May 2026

Eligibility criteria:

The recruited applicant must be a doctoral fellow (i.e., not already in possession of a doctoral degree at the date of application call deadline). Researchers who have successfully defended their doctoral thesis but who have not yet formally been awarded the doctoral degree will not be considered eligible.

The applicant should not have resided or carried out his/her main activity (work, studies, etc.) in the country where he/she is being recruited, i.e., France, for more than 12 months in the 3 years before the application call deadline, unless this time was part of a compulsory national service or a procedure for obtaining refugee status under the Geneva Convention.

Application process:

To guarantee the equal treatment of all candidates, applications must be:

• exclusively submitted through the application form. Applications sent via other means will not be evaluated.
• complying with the following requirements and formats, and meeting the standards of academic English used in international research, allowing independent experts to evaluate the scientific quality of the application without ambiguity,
• limited to only one application per candidate per call,
• submitted before the call deadline.

Each application shall include:

• The completed online application form, including the projects chosen by the applicant, with the corresponding preference order. Within his/her unique application, the applicants can select (from a drop-down menu) up to 3 projects they are particularly interested in. One of these projects can be proposed by the candidates themselves.
• A detailed CV of maximum 2 pages, including:
  – Contact details (email address and phone number),
  – Education and degrees,
  – Professional background,
  – Distinctions,
  – Current country of residence,
  – If applicable: A listing of the 5 most relevant publications, with a single-sentence statement detailing their relevance to the selected project,
  – A list of technical and scientific skills, as well as any other activity demonstrating impact (such as outreach, training, scientific communications, and general public engagement activities…),
  – A short description of the performed academic and/or industrial internships,
  – The contact details of two academic or industrial referees (name, title, affiliation, e-mail, and telephone number) who are willing to provide, upon request, detailed recommendation letters about the applicant.

This CV must clearly state where the applicants worked or studied / and or resided for the three years preceding the competitive call deadline (occupation, institutions, cities, countries) and from where they are applying, so that the Selection Committee can assess the application’s eligibility.

• A personal statement (max 1 page) detailing general motivation to participate in the programme, professional objectives of the applicant, career development objectives, as well as:
  – reasons for choosing up to 3 PhD projects among the proposed ones. A detailed justification of the choice of the project(s) is expected, especially if the academic background of the applicant does not fully match the topic of the project,
  – If the applicant opts to propose his/her own PhD project, the personal statement should include an additional 1-page description of the project proposal, which should fit within the research topics of one of the recruiting supervisors. The application should also include the completed ethics self-assessment tables (see annexes).

In any case, applicants may apply to no more than 3 projects in total.

One single file gathering all the supporting documents (ordered by CV, then personal statement, then self-ethical assessment if relevant) must be submitted. It cannot exceed 8 MB.

Copies or transcripts of academic degrees obtained will be requested upon selection.

Please make sure to read the Guide for applicants and check the frequently asked questions (FAQs) section before completing the application form. If you do not find the answer to your question, please contact us directly at recruitment[at]muskle.eu