Huo Early Career Fellowships Grant

Huo Early Career Fellowships Grant

Status: ACTIVE
Funder: Huo Family Foundation
Amount: Up to US $507,000
Last Updated: January 30, 2026

Summary

The Huo Early Career Fellowships, funded by the Huo Family Foundation, aim to support postdoctoral researchers focusing on the impact of digital technology on brain development and mental health in children and young people. Researchers are encouraged to explore causal pathways and methods to enhance understanding in this rapidly evolving field. Fellowships provide up to £130,000 annually for three years, fostering multi-disciplinary collaboration in addressing critical questions surrounding technology's effects on youth.

Overview

The Huo Family Foundation Since its inception in 2009, The Huo Family Foundation has pledged over $75 million to support projects in the UK, US and China. The Foundation’s mission is to support education, communities and the pursuit of knowledge. Its current areas of focus are education, the arts, and science. Through its donations, the Foundation hopes to improve the prospects of individuals, and to support the work of organisations seeking to ensure a safe and successful future for all society. Call for Proposals: Effects of the Usage of Digital Technology on Brain Development, Social Behaviours and Mental Health in Children and Young People A long-standing interest of HFF has been the effect and impact of usage of digital technology on young people. The rapid rise and use of this technology has permeated much of society and transformed the way many humans interact.  There has been a broad array of research efforts that mostly have involved relatively crude measures of the amount of usage of digital technology (e.g. total screen time) and the observed effects and impact on health. Despite these efforts, the full implications – both positive and negative – on human physiology, psychology, behaviour, well-being and mental health remain unclear. We believe there is an opportunity to help advance the research and the field of knowledge in this area, both by strengthening existing as well as creating new methods and approaches to better model and unpick the complexities of this topic. We welcome applications for Huo early-career fellowships, junior faculty research grants and special projects. We are keen to support multi-disciplinary work. We want to help train the next generation of exceptional scientists in this rapidly evolving field.  Applications should attempt to understand mechanisms, causal pathways and directions. Huo Early Career Fellowships The Huo Family Foundation invites applications for early-career fellowships to support talented and promising postdoctoral researchers on the path to independence. These fellowships are to allow early-career researchers to design, plan and deliver their own innovative research project, and to make the transition to independent researcher. Proposals should be tackling key questions within the broad topic of the effects of usage of and exposure to digital technologies on brain development and function (including physiological responses), social behaviour and interactions, and mental health of children and young people. Remit, Definitions and Expectations We are interested in research on the effects of usage of and exposure to digital technologies on brain development and function (including physiological responses), social behaviour and interactions, and mental health of children and young people.Study designs should attempt to understand causal pathways and directions.Digital technology typically means digital devices, systems, tools and resources that generate, process and store data. For this call, digital technology refers to devices, systems, tools and services used by children and young people. For example, this would include smart phones, tablets, computers/laptops, gaming consoles, online games, the internet, social media, other digital environments, instant messaging, video-sharing, etc.The research should focus on children and/or young people within the age range of 7-24 years old.We encourage the use of existing population (epidemiological) cohorts and data sets. We also encourage precision and deep-dive studies within these existing cohorts and data sets.We encourage randomised approaches to studying the effects of the use of digital technologies on the brain, mind, physiological responses, and behaviour of children and young people. This may include the use of Randomised Controlled Trials (RCT) methodology.Given the scarcity of longitudinal evidence, we encourage work that involves follow-up and repeated observations.We will consider mechanistic studies of smaller, well-defined participant groups.Public and Community Involvement, Engagement and Participation (PCIEP): proposals are expected to involve and engage young people (children, adolescents and/or young adults) in the study design and during the delivery of the proposal.We are keen to support multi-disciplinary work to help advance the research and the field of knowledge. Applications are welcome from researchers from all relevant fields, which may include but is not limited to neuroscience, psychology, psychiatry, epidemiology, public health, computer science, social science, economics. We welcome applicants with training in one or more of these or related disciplines.We want to support the training of the next generation of exceptional scientists in this rapidly evolving field.Studies should produce new knowledge that contributes to the understanding of the occurrence, distribution, causes, mechanisms and impacts (e.g. social, behavioural, physiological, health and well-being, economic) of the effects of the usage of digital technology on children, adolescents and young adults. Examples of Research We Want to Support We have identified various scientific areas and approaches that are of particular interest to the Foundation: Pathways and mechanisms of the effects of the usage of or exposure to digital technology on brain development and function, social interactions and behaviour, and on mental health.The effects of usage of or exposure to digital technology on key processes such as arousal, attention, learning, reward system, resilience, sleep.How different developmental time windows (childhood, adolescence, early adulthood) might involve different neurodevelopment processes that can give rise to different susceptibilities.Developing and using new tools for more accurately measuring exposure (i.e. usage information) for different forms of digital tech and environments to reduce bias and improve precision to look at causal pathways and relationships.Sufficiently powered studies, and those that take appropriate account of potential confounding effects.Work that involves data-sharing partnerships with digital tech companies to have access to better data.Combining disciplines and approaches.Using the latest methods, such as machine learning/AI to help analyse data to make better inferences/predictions that will generalise. Funding Fellowships are for up to a three-year term. The fellowship amount is up to £130,000 / US$169,000 per year. The fellowship is intended to support (or contribute) to the fellow’s salary (including on-costs fringe) and to provide research costs for them to develop their own research project. Fellowship funds may be used by the fellow for any expense judged supportive of the fellow’s research including staffing, lab expenses, equipment and access charges, and professional travel.

Eligibility

You can learn more about this opportunity by visiting the funder's website. The applicant(s) must hold a PhD or equivalent degree in a relevant field, which may include but is not limited to neuroscience, psychology, psychiatry, epidemiology, public health, computer science, social science, economics.At the time of award, applicants must be within four years of completing their PhD.Allowances will be made for part-time work, career breaks (for example, parental leave or long-term sickness) and other significant amounts of time spent outside research (for example, clinical training).Applicants must not have their first permanent/ tenure-track position. If your institution has both academic and research fellow tracks, they are considered equivalent.The applicant(s) must be based at colleges, universities and research institutes in the UK or the US.The lead institution is the college, university or research institute where the lead applicant is located.The organisation should have charitable status or a nonprofit status such as 501(c)(3).On overhead/indirect costs, up to 12.5% of the total grant is permitted for US-based work, while UK-based work should be based on direct costs only, given HFF funding would be eligible for UK government charity research (QR) support. The grant can be used to conduct research outside of the US and UK (e.g. a study involving a well-defined group or a cohort of adolescents in another country). However, there would need to be a clear rationale why this is necessary (e.g. particular or unique characteristics of the cohort or specific exposures) and the work would need to be delivered by applicants and collaborators as defined above. Applicants must identify a sponsor at your host institution. The sponsor must hold an established post (or an honorary academic appointment) at the organisation for the duration of the award. The sponsor will be expected to guarantee the space, facilities and resources you’ll need from the start date to the end date of your award and ensure the research environment will support you to complete your project. The sponsor should provide a letter of support.Applicants must also identify a mentor for the period of your award. The mentor should have a track record in training and mentorship, and support and guide you on how to manage your application and grant, develop your research career and progress with your personal development. The mentor should provide a letter of support. Your sponsor can also be your mentor.Collaborators can be included in this application and award.

Ineligibility

Work that is out scope:We will not support the establishment of new population (epidemiological) cohorts.We will not consider applications that look at the development and/or deployment of digital technology (to include, but not limited to, web-based programmes, mobile applications, applications of generative AI, chatbots, extended reality, wearable devices or video games) to deliver treatment for mental health problems.We will not consider applications that look at the development and/or deployment of digital technology to deliver educational learning.Proposals including randomised controlled trials or similar methodologies should not include the testing of drugs, medical treatments, medical/healthcare/well-being devices or diagnostic procedures.We will not consider applications on clinical service provision/reorganisation.Studies should not include work involving animals.We will not support systematic reviews.Grant funds are not to be used to support the lead applicant’s salary or that of the co-applicants. It is expected that their employing college, university or research institute will cover the salary of the applicant(s) for the duration of the grant.Co-applicants are not possible on this application.