Our strengths
Scientific background
PhD in molecular and cell biology and seven years of postdoctoral experience in international research teams helps to reconcile and understand the real needs of the scientists. From the personal experience, we are well aware of common research career challenges including scientific mobility, financial instability, the struggle to gain independence or difficulty to achieve a work-life balance. Importantly, we are familiar with the specialized terminology used in life sciences
Project management skills
Our project management experience draws on several years of work in research grant management at the internationally recognized CEITEC research institute. I obtained thorough training in preparing, negotiating and implementing projects of various international funding schemes supporting research, innovation, and scientific collaboration (for details see the LinkedIn). I have contributed to number of multilateral research projects, ERC projects, international research initiatives, and research infrastructures.
Grant writing skills
The best writing skills training is ensured by actual practicing grant writing, reading as many project proposals as possible and analysing the evaluation reports. Having a critical mind and visionary creative thinking also significantly contribute to acquiring good grant writing skills.
Enthusiasm for science
We passionately follow current trends in research and maintain a keen interest in the progress and advances in science. We are proud to collaborate with talented scientists who have potential to change our future for better. SCIOTHECA understands how precious the client researcher’s time is.
Our motivation
The motivation and the driving force of our work is great enthusiasm for science and the satisfaction of implementing amazing projects with the capacity to change the world around us for the better. We focus the consultancy on ERC and MSCA PF for the following reasons:
- ERC and MSCA PF are a flagship for H2020 and HORIZON EUROPE
- they are the most prestigious funding resources
- both target talented individuals with the potential to leave an indelible mark in the world of innovations and scientific research
- importantly, we have acquired extensive experience and great joy preparing and implementing both types of grants.
Let´s name few reasons why we consider establishing new COST Actions important and benefitial for science:
- COST Actions bring new emerging topics to the broader research focus
- they enable networking of scattered experts in the same field and make their research more effective
- COST Actions’ aim is to turn competition into collaboration
- COST Actions are often an entrance gate for a long-term, internationally recognized collaboration, also at a grant level.
Our experience
The blend of solid project management and scientific background pose an ideal skillset to provide high quality project consulting . We are well familiar with research funding schemes supported by:
European Union – H2020 and FP7, EMBO (European Molecular Biology Organization), COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology), NIH (National Institutes of Health), EHA (The European Hematology Association), AICR (American Institute for Cancer Research), Marsha Rivkin foundation, JPND (Neurodegenerative Disease Research), GAČR (Czech Science Agency), TAČR (Technology Agency of the Czech Republic), AZV (Agency for Biomedical Research), Trio (from Ministry of Industry and Trade), NAZV (from Ministry of Agriculture) and various grants of MŠMT (Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport of the Czech Republic) e.g. OP VVV, Large research infrastructures, Norway Funds, Inter-Excellence etc.).
The most important insights and our recommendations based on long-term practice are summarized in following two guides that you can DOWNLOAD for free:
OUR TEAM
Veronika Mikitova, PhD.
Founder of SCIOTHECA, research project manager and science enthusiast with a research background
After Master´s degree studies in biology at Charles University in Prague Veronika completed PhD in plant molecular biology and genetics at John Innes Centre in Norwich (UK). As a postdoctoral fellow she had opportunity to be member of three different research groups, at the University College London (UK), CICBioGune institute (Spain) and in Fundación Caubet-CIMERA (Spain). After ten years of work in research, Veronika decided to completely reverse the direction of my scientific career and focus on managing research and innovation projects. Since she swapped the lab bench for an office desk in 2013, Veronika has worked as research project manager at the recently established CEITEC research institute at Masaryk University.
As grant officer, Veronika assists in preparing R&D projects to young and less experienced students, early career postdocs as well as senior scientists. She advises researchers on how to select the most appropriate grant scheme from the available funding landscape, how to develop the proposal from formulating the initial idea to successful submission of the competitive grant proposal. During last six years she has gained valuable experience with preparing, negotiating and implementing various types of funding schemes supported by many different national and international funders.
During her maternity leave Veronika continues providing support for candidates for ERC grants. From here it was just a step to setting up her own business offering consulting services also to researchers outside my home university.
Charles University in Prague, CZ
John Innes Centre, Norwich, UK
University College London, UK
CICbioGUNE, Spain
Fundación Caubet-CIMERA, Spain
CEITEC, Masaryk University, CZ
foundation of SCIOTHECA
Lada Fialova, PhD.
Experienced research project manager with scientific backround
From education and training, Lada has a master’s degree in General Agriculture (Czechia), followed by a Ph.D. in Plant Breeding (Czechia and Germany) and several years of research in plant molecular biology (Germany). For the last nine years, she has been working as grant manager. The path leading to this position started after she decided to quit her scientific career and go to industry. Lada spent two years as Product Development Manager at Syngenta, a global company developing and producing plant protection products. There she collected her first managerial experiences, which proved to be essential for her next career development.
After maternity leave, Lada started a new job as grant manager, a position combining both research and project management. First, she supported international scientists at CEITEC (Central European Institute of Technology in Brno, Czechia) with focus on basic research, followed by Vienna Biocenter Core Facilities (Austria), whose focus is applied research with the use of research infrastructures.
Lada has an advisory role in the whole process of a grant preparation including proposal review, budget creation, and communication with funding agencies. Her further expertise is in the post-award grant management, i.e. activity- and financial reporting, project coordination, organizing project, negotiations with funding agencies. We are happy that Lada has accepted our offer to cooperate in Sciotheca as grant consultant and can share her long-term experiences in reviewing grant proposals and making them highly competitive.
Mendel University in Brno, CZ
Mendel University in Brno, CZ
Ludwig–Maximilians–Universität München, Germany
Syngenta Czech, Prague, CZ
CEITEC, Masaryk University, CZ
Vienna Biocenter Core Facilities GmbH, Austria
Matthew Smith
Proofreader, editor and English language teacher
Matthew originally studied Mechanical Engineering and after working in the industry for almost 10 years he started teaching English in 2004 in Brno (Czechia). This was a major turn in his career and this job has taken him to work in Spain, Turkey and Indonesia among other places and he has been teaching ever since. He is now a DELTA qualified teacher and teacher trainer working at an international school in Brno.
In addition to teaching, Matthew first started proofreading and editing work in 2012 and later started a small but successful family company, Brno Editing, Proofreading & Translation Services, which he runs with his wife.
