Doctoral Consortium

Overview

The aim of the FG’26 Doctoral Consortium is to provide a forum for PhD students to discuss their research and career objectives with other students and senior researchers working in relevant fields and get effective and timely feedback from the international research community. The FG’26 Doctoral Consortium also aims to:

Provide a networking environment that will enable the doctoral students to establish new contacts and collaborations with other international junior and senior researchers; Equip the new generation of bright researchers with career options and inform them about the possibilities in academia and industry.

The Doctoral Consortium will be a half-day event that will take place in parallel to the tutorials and workshops on the first day of the conference on 25 May 2026. The event will feature networking opportunities with established senior researchers, presentations by the accepted PhD students, Q&A sessions, and a joint lunch. Accepted PhD students will also be given the opportunity to present their work during a poster session of the main conference, helping to increase the visibility of their PhD research. Attendance at the consortium is strictly by invitation.

Eligibility

We invite eligible students to apply for the Doctoral Consortium, with the expectation that successful applicants will actively participate in the entire program in-person.

Eligible students are those pursuing a PhD who have made progress in their dissertation, with some results already published or nearing publication. We value diversity and equality in terms of research topics, participating institutions, and individuals involved. We particularly encourage women and individuals from underrepresented groups to apply. We do not expect more than two students to be invited from each institution to represent a diverse sample. Although having a paper appearing in FG’26 is not a prerequisite for participation, it is highly encouraged for applicants to have a paper associated with the conference, whose topics could be summarized during the Doctoral Consortium.

Submission

To apply for the Doctoral Consortium, please submit:

• A research statement summarizing the thesis research topic, the working plan, and the progress to date (max 2 pages).
• A CV (max 1 page). The CV should highlight any publications and conference presentations that are related to the thesis topic.
• A supporting letter from the thesis advisor that endorses the student’s application to this Doctoral Consortium and briefly describes the progress or status of the student’s thesis work.

All materials should be prepared in a single PDF file and submitted through the Doctoral Consortium Track of the FG 2026 CMT instance: https://cmt3.research.microsoft.com/FG2026

Review and Selection Process

Applications will be evaluated based on:

• Quality of the application and thesis topic.
• Anticipated benefits (current/potential contributions to science) of the student’s research.
• Student’s contribution to the diversity of topics, backgrounds, methodology, etc.
• Endorsement by the thesis advisor.

There will be no papers published from the Doctoral Consortium in the proceedings of FG’26.

Financial Support

The students selected to participate in the Doctoral Consortium may be considered for financial support. However, the availability and extent of financial support are subject to the availability of funds and are not guaranteed. Applicants should be prepared to attend FG’26 without financial support in the event that funds are not available. It is important to note that the lunch session with senior mentors will be fully covered by the conference anyway, and no expenses associated with lunch will be incurred by the Doctoral Consortium participants or mentors.

Important Dates

Questions?

For questions and queries, please contact the Doctoral Consortium Chairs:

Yasutomo Kawanishi, RIKEN, Japan

Kalin Stefanov, Monash University, Australia