Other Student Opportunities

The Donders Institute (DI) and the Western Institute for Neuroscience (WIN) are pleased to announce their internal call for proposals to support the exchange of Master students for research visits, to be performed during the duration of their study program.

The funding, secured primarily by the DI through the Erasmus⁺ Programme, is intended to allow students to gain international research experience and extend their skillset, and to help establish new collaborative research programs between PIs at both institutes. You can find associated researchers via Research at WIN or Research at Donders Institute.

Student visits should be at least 2 months and can be funded up to 90-days in a period until July 31^st 2026; longer visits are possible, but will require co-funding. Grants may be awarded up to the cost of the flight (up to €1180/C$1700) and a living allowance (max €900/C$1340 per month + €8/C$12 per day), following the guidelines of the Erasmus program.

Applications include:

1. Individual background details, including study duration.
2. A statement outlining the overall objectives of the training, the research activities to be carried out during the visit and expected outcomes and impact. The statement should also include details on the added value of the mobility, for DI and WIN, and for the applicant (max 2 pages, 12 points times new roman, line space 1.5)
3. Start and end date of the intended visit.
4. Estimation of the costs, including details of any other available sources of funding.
5. Curriculum vitae (max 1 page; e.g. NIH Biosketch format);
6. A letter of support from the hosting PI with whom the collaboration will be established.

Only one application per student is permitted. Applications should be sent as a single pdf document containing all the required documents. Application deadline is July 1st, 2025. The funding must be spent before 1 July 2026, and before the end of the student’s Master program. Following the completion of the exchange, successful applicants, working with the respective PIs, will provide a short report detailing research outcomes.

Applications will be reviewed by a committee of members of DI and WIN who will rank them in terms of research project, feasibility, research and training goals, motivation, CV, career development, novelty of the collaboration, and benefit for DI-WIN partnership.

For more information, please contact:

Donders Graduate School (gradschool@donders.ru.nl)

Dr. Emma G. Duerden (WIN, eduerden@uwo.ca)

This mini conference will occur prior to the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology conference hosted this year by Western and Waterloo (Oct 15^th to 18^th).

Join this conference to experience exciting speakers planned from across Canada and Europe. More information, including the final agenda, speaker bios and pictures for Tuesday and Wednesday can be found here. 

Free Registration information will be forthcoming, however, please save the dates – Tuesday Oct. 14^th and Wednesday Oct. 15^th.

Special to this mini-conference is the invitation for trainees to submit an abstract (250 words) for poster presentation (see link for abstract submission details – Deadline is June 30th) that involves Pregnancy or Child health behaviours.  The abstract can be a proposal or in any stage of data collection. Selected trainees will have the opportunity to present a poster on Tuesday Oct. 14^th during lunch and will have the opportunity to network with the speakers.  There will be monetary prizes for the best trainee poster (abstract) in each of the 5 categories (Clinical Residents, Postdoctoral Fellows, PhD Students, Master’s Students & Undergraduate Students and also a monetary prize for the best proposal).  Submit your abstract here.

Funding for the trainee awards is provided by Western VP Research, Schulich Research and the Children’s Health Research Institute.

We encourage scientists and trainees to attend for a fun filled two days of research relating to “Health Behaviours in Pregnancy and Childhood”.