About
About BHF Research Professorships
The British Heart Foundation (BHF) Research Professorships launched in 2025 and are the BHF’s largest and most prestigious personal awards. The BHF will award professorships to individuals with outstanding cardiovascular research achievements and leadership qualities to support and enhance their current and future research activities. BHF Research Professors will lead and conduct internationally competitive research, and will be committed to training future cardiovascular scientists. Awards are for a 5-year period, with a renewal for a second 5-year period subject to review and a site visit. Awards will be for a maximum of 10 years.
BHF states that the fundamental criterion for a BHF Research Professorship is outstanding scientific excellence. Additional important considerations are how the candidate supports and enhances the profile of cardiovascular research nationally and internationally, and the Professorship’s alignment with the BHF research strategy. BHF Research Professors will devote the majority of their time to research, with limited administrative, clinical or teaching duties.
Awards are made for discretionary funding of up to £400,000 per year (£2m total in the initial period of the Professorship) with the award amount determined by the ambition of the proposed use and scope of the research. An indicative budget will be requested and may include project staff, scholarships, technical and support staff, directly incurred research costs, translation/commercialisation activities, equipment, PPIE costs, travel, etc. However these are flexible awards and the use of funding may be modified post-award at the Research Professor’s discretion, within the remit of the application.
The Professorship is not designed to support the Professor’s salary, as BHF expect the holder’s position to be tenured and funded by the host institution. In exceptional circumstances and if fully justified by the host institution, BHF may consider the use of Professorship funding to support the Professor’s salary for up to 5 years.
About the Internal Selection
BHF will only consider applicants for Research Professorships who have first been nominated by their host institution. To facilitate nomination and ensure that candidates from Oxford are not competing against each other unnecessarily, anyone wishing to apply for a BHF Research Professorship must first submit an internal expression of interest (EOI) for consideration by an expert internal panel.
Anyone expecting to be in position to apply for a Professorship within 24 months of the internal deadline should apply. It is expected that no more than two candidates from Oxford will be given the go-ahead to apply to BHF in each nine-month period following circulation of outcomes.