Writing the ERC B1 extended synopsis

What the panel is actually doing

A panel member reads many synopses in a limited period, mostly outside their exact specialism. They are deciding whether your project is ground-breaking, whether the ambition is real, whether it can be done, and whether you are the person to do it. Everything in B1 should serve one of those four questions.

A structure that works

• Opening — the problem, in language a neighbouring field understands, and why it has not been solved.
• The idea — your specific insight or approach, stated plainly, early, and once.
• Objectives — a small number of testable objectives, not a list of activities.
• Approach — enough methodological detail to show feasibility without turning into B2.
• Risk and alternatives — the hard parts named, with credible fallbacks.
• Impact on the field — what changes in your discipline if this works.

Ambition has to be demonstrated

Words like ground-breaking, unprecedented and paradigm-shifting are free, so they carry no weight. Ambition is demonstrated by a precise statement of the current limit and a precise statement of where your project moves it.

Weak: "This project will radically advance our understanding of X." Stronger: "Current methods resolve X only at Y scale, which is why Z remains untestable. This project resolves X at a scale that makes Z directly testable for the first time."

Risk is a strength, if you handle it

The ERC funds high-risk research, so a proposal with no visible risk reads either as incremental or as naive. Name the two or three genuine failure points, say how you would detect failure early, and state what you would do instead. Show that the project still produces valuable knowledge on the fallback path.

The track record section

• Show independence: work led without the PhD supervisor, your own funding, your own students, your own research line.
• Explain significance rather than listing venues — what changed because of each key output.
• Account for career breaks factually and without apology.
• Match the track record to the project: the reader should finish it believing you specifically can deliver this specific project.

Before you submit

• Give B1 to a competent researcher outside your subfield and ask them to state your central idea back to you.
• Check that your central idea appears on page one, not on page three.
• Check that objectives in B1 and B2 are identical in number, wording and order.
• Cut every sentence that describes the field without advancing your argument.