Funding and Awards

The awards below require a campus nomination process. For questions on the next round of nominations, contact External Scholarships and Fellowships Advising at fellowships@stonybrook.edu.

NYAS Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists

Description

The New York Academy of Sciences Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists acknowledge and celebrate the excellence of the most noteworthy young scientists and engineers in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. The regional competition recognize outstanding postdoctoral-rank researchers who work in disciplines in Chemical Sciences, Life Sciences, and Physical Sciences & Engineering with unrestricted financial prizes for both finalists and awardees.

Eligibility

The nominee must:

• Have been born in or after 1984
• Hold a doctoral degree (PhD, DPhil, MD, DDS, DVM, etc.)
• Currently hold a postdoctoral position at Stony Brook University
• Currently conduct research in one of the disciplinary categories in Chemical Sciences, Life Sciences, or Physical Sciences & Engineering.

Evaluation Criteria

Nominees and their work as postdoctoral researchers will be evaluated according to the following criteria:

• Quality: The extent to which the work is reliable, valid, credible, and scientifically rigorous.
• Impact: The extent to which the work addresses an important problem, advances scientific progress, and is influential in the nominee’s field, related fields, or beyond, and/or has the potential to benefit society.
• Novelty: The extent to which the work challenges existing paradigms, establishes a new field or considerably expands on an existing field, employs original methodologies or concepts, and/or pursues an original question.
• Promise: The nominee has potential for further significant contributions to science, and the research program will generate further impactful and novel discoveries.

 

Campus Nomination

Applicants must be nominated by Stony Brook and may NOT submit directly to Blavatnik.

Campus Nomination Deadline: November 10, 2025 at 12pm/noon

• • • Nomination materials: Complete the SBU Online Nomination Form and submit your Nomination Packet (outlined below)
    • Nomination status will be confirmed by November 15, 2025; applicants will work with External Fellowships to finalize their materials for submission throughout November. Final deadline for SBU to submit nominee materials: December 3, 2025

      Letters of Support: In the application form, you will designate two letter of reference writers. Blavatnik recommends one be a current or previous supervisor and the other be someone outside Stony Brook who has never been your supervisor. 

      Note: Letters of Support will be solicited after the nomination is submitted and must be uploaded by the letter writers through the online nominations portal by December 17, 2025. Letters of Support are confidential—neither the nominator nor the nominee will be able to view the contents of the letters.

Nomination Packet Instructions

After completing the SBU Online Nomination Form, please submit the following to fellowships@stonybrook.edu:

• Research Summary: 1,000 words or less, not including citations with one figure allowed.

  The file should be labeled: LastName_FirstName-Summary.pdf.

  Research Summary Requirements

  • Be written in the first person by the nominee.
  • Describe up to five of the nominee’s most significant scientific contributions and research accomplishments from their postdoctoral career; doctoral work should be mentioned only if highly notable or relevant to the nominee’s accomplishments as a postdoctoral researcher.
  • Include key results, their impact on the nominee’s field of study, and the nominee’s specific role in the described work (especially where the nominee is involved in large collaborations).
  • Be written to be accessible to another scientist working in their overarching disciplinary category (e.g. Life Sciences) but not in their specific field of study (e.g. Neuroscience).
  • Exclude information about the nominee’s positions, awards, and service activities, or other information contained in the CV.
  • Include a brief description of how the nominee sees the current project progressing in the future.
  • What are the next steps for the project, and how will the key discoveries made during their postdoctoral career propel their research field forward?
• Full-text published papers or filed patents representing the nominee’s best work (four publications maximum).

  The file should be labeled: LastName_FirstName-Pub1.pdf, and so forth.

  • Each publication should not be larger than 10MB. 
  • Work published by the nominee during graduate training will not be considered in this part of the nomination materials.
  • Papers must be reviewed and published or in press—submitted manuscripts will not be considered.
• Professional Service and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Statement: 1 page or less.

  The file should be labeled: LastName_FirstName-DEI.pdf.

  Topics to discuss include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Teaching and Mentoring: Commitment to teaching and mentoring students, especially those of broadly diverse demographics and/or social backgrounds;
  • Collaboration and Leadership: Involvement or leadership in committees, task force groups, professional societies, and organizations;
  • Service, Engagement, and/or Outreach: A record of community engagement or outreach activities (e.g. volunteer activities, communicating science to the public, etc.);
  • Research: Current and/or planned research relevant to underserved populations or inequalities, or issues relevant to DEI, such as race, gender, sexuality, health disparities, human rights, educational access, ability, etc.
• Curriculum vitae: It is strongly encouraged that nominees follow the format shown in this example CV to ensure that all required information is included.

  The file should be labeled: LastName_FirstName-CV.pdf.

  There is no page limit for the CV, but reviewers appreciate using as few pages as possible to encompass the required information.

  Nominee's CV Required Elements

  • Name, current institution(s), and position title
  • Education and training, including doctoral and postdoctoral training and/or residency.  NOTE: Please include names of previous advisors.
  • Employment history.
  • Honors and awards, including granting organization and years in which they were received.
  • All peer-reviewed publications from entire research career: Please include published work or manuscripts in press authored during postdoctoral, doctoral, and undergraduate career
  • DO NOT include manuscripts that are submitted or in preparation.
  • Conference abstracts and proceedings should only be included if they are the primary way of disseminating new results in the nominee’s field, such as in computer science and mathematics.
  • Select patents and patent applications: Include the patent title, a 1 to 2 sentence synopsis, and the year submitted / approved.

  Research Grants

  • List funding, if any, for ongoing and completed projects on which the nominee is a PI or a co-PI.
  • Include name of funding mechanism, funder, and amount.
  • For grants on which the nominee is a co-PI, include total amount of grant as well as amount awarded to nominee.
  • Scientific Leadership: include any significant roles in the greater academic community. This includes major editorial responsibilities, service on external committees, conference organization, technology licensing (or company start-up), public outreach activities, and institutional administrative responsibilities (e.g. departmental or student committee).
  • Invited talks and lectures, listing notable invited talks, including the year the talk was given and the inviting organization/institution.  
• Rationale for nomination: 200 words or less written in the third person using language understandable to scientists outside your field.

  The file should be labeled: LastName_FirstName-Rationale.pdf

  A postdoctoral supervisor can often provide useful insight or may write this on the applicant's behalf.