2026 Canada Excellence Research Chairs Competition

On this page

• 1. Updates and information
• 2. Program objectives
• 3. Additional considerations
• 4. Science, technology and innovation priorities for the CERC program
• 5. Value and duration
• 6. Eligibility
• 7. Institution application limits
• 8. Employer-employee relationship
• 9. Information sessions
• 10. Infrastructure support request
• 11. Application process
• 12. Review process
• 13. Competition timeline
• 14. Planning and reporting requirements
• 15. Responsible stewardship, public accountability, fairness and transparency
• 16. Contact information

1. Updates and information

No significant changes have been proposed for the 2026 competition. The program and application reflect the following changes made in the previous 2022 CERC competition:

• streamlining the application process into a one-phase approach, in which the research program and nominee are presented together, to help institutions with their recruitment process
• establishing two award values, to allow participation from a greater range of research disciplines and continue to support the chairholder’s team, which includes students, highly qualified personnel, and early and mid-career researchers
• strengthening equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) requirements by ensuring EDI is incorporated in the research design, research teams and recruitment processes
• removing the one-to-one funds-matching requirement, instead focusing on the quality of research environments, emphasizing sustainability plans, and focusing on the institution’s ability to leverage funds

2. Program objectives

The CERC program is funded by the three federal research funding agencies: the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). The program offers eligible Canadian, degree-granting institutions an opportunity to recruit the top tier of world-class researchers in the Government of Canada’s Science, Technology and Innovation (ST&I) priorities for the CERC program.

The objectives of the program remain to:

• strengthen Canada’s ability to attract the world’s top researchers, in order to be at the leading edge of breakthroughs in ST&I priority areas expected to generate social and economic benefits for Canadians;
• help Canada build a critical mass of expertise in ST&I priority areas identified by the Government of Canada;
• create a competitive environment to help Canadian institutions, in their pursuit of excellence in their research, attract a cadre of world-leading researchers; and
• contribute to branding Canada as a location of choice for world-leading research, science and technology development, alongside other federal programs with similar objectives.

3. Additional considerations

This competition includes additional objectives aligning the program with priorities of the Government of Canada and/or the three federal research funding agencies (CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC), including the following:

3.1 Equity, diversity and inclusion

The three federal research funding agencies are committed to excellence in research and research training, and therefore to achieving an equitable, diverse and inclusive Canadian research enterprise. EDI is essential to creating the excellent, innovative, impactful research needed to seize opportunities and respond to global challenges. To be successful, applications must demonstrate and implement the highest EDI standards.

Equity, diversity and inclusion leadership in CERC Initiatives

EDI are embedded as foundational principles in CERC objectives, expected outcomes, and reporting requirements of the 2026 competition and forthcoming competitions. The three agencies expect that chairholders and their institutions will “demonstrate and implement the highest EDI standards”. 

Equity, diversity and inclusion, and early career researchers in research teams

Institutions are required to take active and rigorous measures to identify and prevent systemic barriers and ensure that excellent students, trainees, early career researchers and faculty from underrepresented, equity-seeking, rights-seeking populations, including racialized individuals, African, Caribbean and Black individuals, Indigenous Peoples, persons with disabilities, women and individuals from 2SLGBTQIA+ communities, can fully contribute to the research program.

Supporting early career researchers is a tri-agency priority, as it enhances Canada’s position as a world leader in building talent and strengthening the research ecosystem. Chairs and host institutions are expected to implement measures that specifically support a diverse cohort of early career researchers.

For more information, see: Creating an Equitable, Diverse and Inclusive Research Environment: A Best Practices Guide for Recruitment, Hiring and Retention.

Equity, diversity and inclusion in research design

Sound EDI principles must be applied to the research design, methods, analysis, interpretation and dissemination of research findings to ensure that the results are impactful and relevant to the diversity of the Canadian population.

For more information, see:

• Best practices in equity, diversity and inclusion in research;
• Canada Research Chairs best practices guide for recruitment, hiring and retention;
• EDI considerations at each stage of the research process;
• SGBA+ section of the CIHR website; and
• Women and Gender Equality Canada’s information on GBA+.

3.2 Indigenous research

If applicable, the proposed research program should take action to co-create Indigenous research that is co-led by and with First Nations, Inuit and Métis Peoples—as investigators, students, trainees, partners and collaborators.

If applicable, the proposed research program should demonstrate how it will value Indigenous ways of knowing, and how it will extend research knowledge in the field that is significant for Indigenous Peoples and communities and contribute to decolonization.

It is expected that nominating institutions will support nominees in integrating Indigenous research into their program if necessary. A rationale must be provided in cases where the application considers that no aspect of the research may benefit from the inclusion of Indigenous research components.

For further information, see:

• SSHRC's definition of Indigenous research;
• SSHRC’s Indigenous Research Statement of Principles;
• SSHRC's Guidelines for the Merit Review of Indigenous Research;
• "Chapter 9 – Research Involving the First Nations, Inuit and Métis Peoples of Canada", in the Tri-Council Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans – TCPS 2 (2022);
• the Government of Canada’s Inuit Nunangat Policy; and
• The First Nations principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (OCAP).

3.3 Knowledge mobilization and translation

The Government of Canada values knowledge mobilization and translation to help foster a culture of social and commercial innovation.

Chairs and host institutions are expected to promote co-creation with partners from all sectors (academic, public, private, not-for-profit and philanthropic), in order to increase research results uptake for the benefit of all Canadians. There should be an effort to promote and facilitate knowledge translation and mobilization of the Chair’s research results, to support economic growth and social innovation.

Each research program should pursue significant partnerships and collaborations with Canadian and international entities (academic, public, private, not-for-profit and philanthropic), as well as by and with Indigenous Peoples and communities, including First Nations, Inuit and Métis Peoples, if applicable, to ensure that the research design is co-created and that the benefits and advantages of the knowledge obtained through research supported by the CERC program are applied broadly to support social and economic growth.

3.4 Sustainability

Host institutions will be expected to leverage additional resources to sustain the research advantage created by the Chair after the award ends, including:

• retention of the chairholder beyond the award period;
• development of a leadership pipeline for faculty on the chairholder’s team;
• support for the advancement and future opportunities of students, trainees and other highly qualified personnel (HQP); and
• assurance that the momentum of the research program is furthered by other institutional initiatives in the future.

Additional contributions

While the program does not require institutions to secure matching funds from external partners, there is an expectation that institutions will support the sustainability of the Chair by leveraging additional contributions (cash and/or in-kind) through their own internal contributions, external partnerships with the private and public sector, research institutions, academic institutions, and/or not-for-profit and philanthropic organizations, both in Canada and abroad. Although the chairholder’s salary is an eligible cost for the CERC program, host institutions are encouraged to pay their chairholders using their own funds and count this towards their leveraged contributions to the chairholder’s program.

Note: The ability to leverage additional contributions from external partners will be evaluated during the peer review process in the context of the Chair’s research environment, including the research discipline, the type of research involved and stakeholder involvement.

3.5 Research security

It is the shared responsibility of nominating institutions and their respective teams to ensure that all possible steps are taken to address the risks involved with research and innovation, including theft, interference, or unauthorized transfer of knowledge and results in ways that individuals and teams do not intend. The Government of Canada reserves the right to exclude a partner or refuse to issue an award agreement on the basis of identified security concerns. The Government of Canada also reserves the right to implement additional security-related requirements, as appropriate, over the life of these awards. Nominating institutions and nominees should refer to the guidance provided on the government’s safeguarding your research website for further information on the identification and mitigation of security risks.

Sensitive Technology Research and Affiliations of Concern policy

On January 16, 2024, the Government of Canada published its Policy on Sensitive Technology Research and Affiliations of Concern (STRAC), which applies to this funding opportunity. Grant applications that involve conducting research and related activities that aim to advance a sensitive technology research area will not be funded if any of the researchers involved in activities supported by the grant are affiliated with, or in receipt of funding or in-kind support from, a university, research institute or laboratory connected to military, national defence or state security entities that could pose a risk to Canada’s national security. Read the tri-agency guidance on the STRAC policy to understand how this may impact your application.

4. Science, technology and innovation priorities for the CERC program

Chairs are awarded in the priority areas established by the Government of Canada.

This competition will use a challenge-driven approach to address priority areas. This approach reinforces the expectations of Chairs to pursue significant partnerships and collaborations with Canadian and international entities (academic, public, private, not-for-profit, philanthropic) as well as by and with Indigenous Peoples and communities, where appropriate, and to promote and facilitate translation and mobilization of their research results into various forms.

Applications are invited from a broad range of disciplines in the social sciences and humanities; natural sciences and engineering; and health and related sciences. These applications must explain how the proposed research program will advance one or more of the following challenge areas:

• Healthy People and Populations: Enhancing the health and wellness of Canadians across all life stages.
• Innovative and Resilient Communities: Creating vibrant communities that are affordable, inclusive, healthy, clean and secure.
• Sustainable Food Systems: Maximizing Canada’s agri-food potential to support economic growth and secure, equitable access to food.
• Clean, Sustainable and Prosperous Canada: Fighting climate change, promoting a resilient ecosystem and protecting Canada’s environment while harnessing the potential of our natural resources to advance net-zero and adaptation goals to support a resilient, sustainable economy, and high quality of life.
• Technologically Advanced Canada: Advancing transformative and enabling technologies that will support a technologically advanced economy and society.

Areas of focus have been identified under each challenge area. Proposals that could achieve the goals of a challenge area, but do not directly align with the areas of focus listed, would also be considered. The challenge areas, objectives and areas of focus are provided in more detail in the following table: ST&I priorities for the CERC program.

5. Value and duration

The program awards nonrenewable chairs of two award values, with no established distribution between the two award values in terms of the number of awards that will be funded:

• $8 million over eight years ($1 million per year); or
• $4 million over eight years ($500,000 per year).

The two award values recognize the varying costs of research within different research disciplines and aims to be inclusive of all areas of research. The funding supports expenses related to compensation, as well as research activities for the chairholder and the chairholder’s team, and up to 25% of the direct costs of research (not including compensation and relocation costs of the chairholder) for the indirect costs of research.

6. Eligibility

6.1 Eligibility of institutions

Only Canadian degree-granting institutions are eligible to apply to the program. These institutions are eligible only if they have received, annually, an average of $100,000 or more from the three federal research funding agencies:

• CIHR;
• NSERC; and
• SSHRC.

To be considered degree-granting, an institution must meet both of the following criteria:

• It must be authorized by a provincial or territorial government to grant its own university degrees. A postsecondary educational institution affiliated or federated with another degree-granting institution will be accorded its own independent eligibility, if it receives its operating budget directly from the provincial or territorial government (Ministry of Education or Higher Education or equivalent) and has its own board of directors.
• It must have conferred degrees during the two calendar years prior to application or have students enrolled who will receive degrees during the calendar year of application or within the three succeeding years. The institution must provide evidence of its authority to confer degrees and evidence that degrees were or are expected to be granted within the required time period.

6.2 Eligibility of nominees

Nominees must be full professors or associate professors expected to be promoted to full professor within one or two years of the nomination. Alternatively, if they come from outside the academic sector, nominees must possess the qualifications necessary to be appointed at these levels.

The program imposes no restrictions on nominees with regard to nationality or country of residence. Employment and Social Development Canada and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada have established procedures to allow non-Canadian chairholders to work in Canada. Refer to areas of the Global Skills Strategy process and dedicated service channel, where the “Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council – Tri-Agency Institutional Programs Secretariat”, which manages the CERC program, is identified as a referral partner.

Researchers who hold a full-time academic appointment at a Canadian institution are eligible to be nominated; however, they may not be nominated by the institution at which they currently hold their appointment. If an institution nominates a researcher who is currently at a Canadian institution, the nominating institution must demonstrate the net benefit to the country in moving the researcher from one Canadian institution to another.

Successful nominees will have up to 12 months to take up their appointment as chairholder at the host institution after the Notice of Award has been accepted by the nominating institution and the nominee. If a successful nominee declines an award or fails to take up their position in Canada at the host institution within this timeline, the award will be terminated. These terminated awards may be offered to other institutions that were placed on a list of alternates, following availability of funding (see Review process).

CERC chairholders are expected to maintain their primary affiliation at their host institution in Canada. Refer to the CERC administration guide for more details about eligibility. A primary objective of the program is to enhance research capacity in Canadian universities by bringing world-leading researchers to Canada. Therefore, positions at other institutions must not interfere with a chairholder’s ability to carry out their program of research at the level of dedication expected of a CERC.

7. Institution application limits

The CERC program provides a comprehensive table listing all institutions that are eligible for the 2026 CERC competition as well as the maximum dollar value per year for which they may apply (any combination of the $500,000 and $1 million award values, up to the dollar limit). See Eligible Institutions and Applications Limits.

8. Employer-employee relationship

Chairholders are subject to their host institution’s employer policies. Chairholders are not employees of the program or the Government of Canada. During the term of the Chair, matters that fall under the employer (institution) and employee (chairholder) relationship fall outside of the program’s mandate. Institutions and chairholders are expected to discuss and negotiate employee-employer considerations before the start of the Chair, and as needed during the term of the award. Institutions that are awarded a CERC are expected to support their chairholders by honoring the commitments made in the application and facilitating the success of their work.

9. Information sessions

Nominating institutions are encouraged to attend CERC program information sessions about this competition. More details will follow regarding the schedule for the information sessions.

10. Infrastructure support request

Nominating institutions may submit, at the same time as their application, a request for infrastructure support from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI). The CFI is an independent corporation established by the Government of Canada to strengthen national research capability through investments in research infrastructure in Canadian universities, colleges, hospitals and eligible not-for-profit organizations.

This request is a distinct funding request separate from the budget for the Chair. Through its John R. Evans Leaders Fund (JELF), the CFI will contribute 40% of the total cost of the infrastructure project, while the nominating institution and its partners are responsible for securing the remaining funding.

Nominating institutions must submit the application for these infrastructure support requests directly to the CFI. The CFI portion must be submitted via the CFI’s contribution management system. The CFI will share the JELF applications with the CERC program for inclusion in the external review process. The CERC program will share the assessments of the external reviewers with the CFI.

The CFI’s board of directors is responsible for the funding decisions related to the requests for infrastructure support for successful Chair applications. Following its review process, the CFI will communicate the decisions directly to the nominating institutions.

11. Application process

11.1 Online portal (Convergence Portal)

All applications and required forms must be submitted electronically through the Convergence Portal following the instructions outlined in the recruitment and nomination, registration, and application guides. No registrations or applications will be accepted after the deadlines outlined above and no extensions to the deadlines will be provided.

11.2 Recruitment and nomination

Nominating institutions will first conduct an open, transparent and accountable recruitment and nomination process following the Requirements for Recruiting and Nominating Canada Excellence Research Chairs.

Institutions must submit all job postings that advertise the chair position to TIPS no later than the day they are publicly posted online.

11.3 Registration

Nominating institutions must submit registrations to the Convergence Portal by 9:00 p.m. (eastern), January 21, 2026, following the Instructions for submitting a registration using the Convergence Portal.

Nominees must have accepted their invitation to participate through the Convergence portal prior to submitting the registration.

11.4 Application

Nominating institutions must submit applications to the Convergence Portal by 9:00 p.m. (eastern), March 18, 2026, following the instructions for submitting an application using the Convergence Portal.

12. Review process

The program will use a rigorous and competitive peer review process to assess the CERC applications. All applications submitted to the competition, regardless of award value and/or the career stage of the nominee, will be evaluated using the same selection criteria.

12.1 External reviewers

All applications will be peer reviewed by external experts in the nominee’s field of research. These external experts will be asked to provide a written assessment of the application, based on the program’s selection criteria. The multidisciplinary selection board will take these assessments into consideration in making their funding recommendations.

For more details, see the Review Guidelines for External Reviewers.

12.2 Multidisciplinary selection board

A multidisciplinary selection board composed of a diverse group of national and international members will assess all applications using the selection criteria, taking into consideration the expert reviewers’ written assessments and the application materials.

From an overall ranking, based on a full consideration of the selection criteria, the multidisciplinary selection board will make funding recommendations to the program’s steering committee for their consideration and approval, along with a ranked reversion list in the event that any awards are declined or terminated early in the process.

For more details, see the Assessment Guidelines Multidisciplinary Selection Board.

12.3 Tri-agency Institutional Programs Secretariat Steering Committee

The Steering Committee is composed of the presidents of CIHR, NSERC, SSHRC and the CFI (as an observer), and the deputy ministers of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, and Health Canada. The committee will ratify the multidisciplinary selection board’s funding recommendations, ensuring that the selection process was rigorous, objective and transparent, in keeping with the standards of peer review excellence expected by the three federal research funding agencies and consistent with the program’s objectives.

12.4 Results

Institutions and nominees will be informed of competition results via the Convergence Portal. In addition to a notice of decision, all institutions and nominees will be provided a summary of the evaluation of their application, with the final overall score for each criterion.

13. Competition timeline

14. Planning and reporting requirements

Continued funding during the term of the award will be subject to the submission of a formal, comprehensive EDI action plan within one year of the chairholder’s appointment date. Host institutions are encouraged to collaborate with EDI experts to develop their plans in order to ensure they are evidence-based and impactful. Action plans will be assessed by TIPS to ensure they meet requirements, which will be communicated after funding decisions are released to institutions. Plans must be intersectional and grounded in equity expertise and lived experience to help support their success. Plans should address EDI across the duration of the award in the composition of the chairholder’s team, research environment and research design, and all other activities organized by the CERC, such as conferences, meetings, outreach and knowledge translation.

Six months following the chairholder’s appointment date, the following documents will be required to be submitted: 1. Governance Plan (including a sustainability plan); 2. Detailed Research Proposal; and 3. Data Management Plan. These documents will not be evaluated at that point; however, they will be available to peer reviewers during the midterm evaluation.

At the midterm of the eight-year funding period, the progress of each funded initiative will be assessed against the milestones identified and commitments made in the host institution’s application as well as the documents mentioned above. This includes EDI action plans, sustainability plans, financial and resource commitments made by the institution in the proposal, and the partnerships and collaborations described. Host institutions must submit a midterm report. The midterm review involves an in-depth assessment by a panel of experts assembled by TIPS. The results of the in-depth assessment will in turn recommend a course of action to the Program’s steering committee. If the assessment of progress at midterm determines that progress is unsatisfactory, the CERC Steering Committee reserves the right to impose additional oversight measures, or suspend or terminate the funding.

CERC awardees will be required to meet additional annual reporting and public accountability and transparency requirements. Failure to meet reporting requirements will result in the suspension of payments until the requirements are met.

15. Responsible stewardship, public accountability, fairness and transparency

CERC awardees are required to manage all program funds using robust financial management practices and open and transparent processes. The principles of responsible stewardship of public funds, public accountability, and fairness must be respected within all stages of the initiative.

For more details regarding the roles and responsibilities for appropriate use of CERC funds, see the CERC and C150 Administration Guide, the Tri-agency Guide on Financial Administration, the Tri-Agency Framework: Responsible Conduct of Research and the Agreement on the Administration of Agency Grants and Awards by Research Institutions.

16. Contact information

If you have questions:

• about the application process, email information@cerc.gc.ca;
• about the Convergence Portal, email websupport@convergence.gc.ca; or
• about requests for accessibility and adaptive measures, email information@cerc.gc.ca or communicate with the nominating institution’s accessibility contact included in their job posting.