Now open: Topic Table Call 2025 

Network and get active: The new Topic Tables format invites you to form interest groups and tackle research data management challenges together. Applications can be submitted until May 7, 2025.

Pooling expertise and thinking up solutions

The Topic Tables are collaborative, temporary forums in which experts from various institutions come together to work on specific issues. The aim is to develop solutions for existing challenges – for example in the form of a white paper, a roadmap or a guideline.

The format enables close networking within the NFDI4Biodiversity community and beyond in order to initiate concrete improvements in research practice. However, Sarah Fischer (Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology), who co-developed the topic table format, says that it is by no means necessary to immediately resolve the observed challenge. “The output of the topic tables doesn't have to be the finished solution; our intention is to encourage people to find a starting point and ask: What problem are we facing exactly? Who would benefit from the solution? What should the next steps be and who within or outside our network do we need for this?”

“The output of the topic tables doesn't have to be the finished solution. Our intention is to encourage people to find a starting point.

The results of these considerations are to be documented and prepared in a suitable form so that they can then form the basis for further steps. “A concept developed in this way could later be implemented as part of a Flexfunds project, for example,” says Fischer.

Interested parties can participate in the Topic Tables either by proposing their own topics or by joining the Topic Tables of others. Topic ideas can be submitted by all actors in biodiversity research, as long as they are jointly worked on by at least two institutions and one of them is an NFDI4Biodiversity partner institution.

Assumption of material costs possible

Funding can be requested for the implementation of the Topic Table, which can be used, for example, for workshops, travel or open access publications. The takeover of costs is subject to the approval of funds for the NFDI4Biodiversity project by the DFG in summer 2025. The standard term of a topic table is usually one calendar year from January 2026. The application deadline is May 7, 2025.

Call now open

The call is open as of today. Curious? You can find more information on possible topics, the further procedure, contact persons and much more here.

Another opportunity to get involved: the NFDI4Biodiversity Flexfunds

Another opportunity to shape NFDI4Biodiversity is offered by the parallel call for Flexfunds, which provides funding of 10,000 to 70,000 euros for smaller projects in the field of research data management. Further information can be found here.