Note: PLOS is pleased to once again partner with the Einstein Foundation Berlin for this awards program. Watch this space in the…
Call for Entries: 2026 Einstein Foundation Award for Promoting Quality in Research
Note: PLOS is pleased to once again partner with the Einstein Foundation Berlin for this awards program. Below is the Einstein Foundation’s announcement calling for entries.
The annual €350,000 Einstein Foundation Award for Promoting Quality in Research in cooperation with the QUEST Center for Responsible Research at the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH) is inviting applications and nominations again.
The international award is open to any researcher, or group of researchers, institution and organization around the globe whose work helps to fundamentally advance the quality, transparency, and reproducibility of science and research in all disciplines.
The deadline for entries is April 30, 2026 (10:00 pm UTC). The awardees will be announced by the end of 2026.
The award recognizes successful candidates in the following three categories:
Individual Award (€150,000): Individuals or small teams making a profound impact on research quality are eligible for self-nomination or nomination by others.
Institutional Award (€100,000): Organizations, large collaborative networks, or other entities that make an exceptional contribution to advancing research quality may apply or be nominated.
Early Career Award (€100,000): Early career researchers and small teams are encouraged to apply with bold, innovative projects that advance transparency, robustness, and integrity in research.
In 2025, personality psychologist Simine Vazire, Professor of Psychology Ethics and Wellbeing at the University of Melbourne, won the Individual Award for advancing methodological rigor, reproducibility, and collaborative research in psychology, and for shaping initiatives such as the Society for the Improvement of Psychological Science (SIPS) and the journal Collabra. The Institutional Award went to the Brazilian Reproducibility Initiative, a nationwide effort to systematically evaluate research results in laboratory biology and the largest coordinated replication effort in the field worldwide, showcasing the transformative potential of country-level research improvement efforts. The Early Career Award was won by Maximilian Sprang for his project Erring Rigorously, which improves reproducibility in functional genomics by distinguishing true biological signals from technical errors in high-throughput sequencing.
Learn more about all past winners and finalists here.
Selection
An international, interdisciplinary, and diverse panel of researchers and research quality activists will evaluate submissions and select awardees. Meet the jury here.
For questions, please contact Einstein Foundation Award Coordinator Dr. Ulrike Pannasch: award@einsteinfoundation.de
The award is bestowed jointly with the QUEST Center for Responsible Research at the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin. The individual and institutional awards are funded by the Wübben Stiftung Wissenschaft, while the BIH QUEST Center for Responsible Research supports the Early Career Award. Additional resources are made available by the State of Berlin. The publisher Nature Portfolio, the Public Library of Science (PLOS), the National Academy of Sciences, the Berlin University Alliance, the Max Planck Society and the Max Planck Foundation support the Einstein Foundation Berlin and the BIH QUEST Center in promoting and implementing the award.
About
The Einstein Foundation Berlin is an independent, not-for-profit, science-led funding organization established as a foundation under civil law in 2009. Since then, its task has been to promote cutting-edge international science and research across disciplines and institutions in and for Berlin. To date, it has funded eight Einstein Centers, over 70 projects, and more than 240 researchers, including three Nobel laureates.
The BIH QUEST Center for Responsible Research at Charité was founded in 2017 as part of the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité. QUEST develops and implements new approaches to support that biomedical research is conducted in a trustworthy manner, provides useful results, and meets ethical standards. The focus is on Open Science, Indicators & Incentives, Quality Assurance, Patient & Stakeholder Engagement, Education & Training and Meta Research.
Wübben Stiftung Wissenschaft is a private grant-making foundation based in Berlin. It aims to help strengthen Germany as an excellent, internationally visible, and competitive science and research hub. In addition to the Einstein Foundation Award, the Wübben Stiftung Wissenschaft supports the Einstein Foundation’s ‘Einstein Strategic Professorships’ funding programme.