MOSCOW, November 1. /TASS/. Foreign scientists, including from unfriendly countries, are showing interest in acquiring permanent residency in Russia through the Mega Grants program, Russian Minister of Science and Higher Education Valery Falkov said.

"Today, we can see that leading global scientists seem increasingly interested in acquiring permanent residency in Russia, even though we have tightened the program’s requirements. We have now raised the grant amount to 100 million rubles per year ($1.02 mln - TASS) and introduced the requirement that participants must move to Russia permanently in the second year, while before that, it was possible to come here only temporarily," Falkov pointed out.

The goal of the Mega Grants program is to create world-class laboratories headed by leading researchers within Russian universities and scientific organizations.

In 2024, the Russian Ministry of Science and Higher Education held the tenth competition for grants in two sections, aimed at funding research projects headed by leading scientists and supporting young promising researchers. The first section involved 59 universities and 17 research organizations, with researchers from 36 countries filing applications. The Grant Council selected eight projects that will be implemented under the guidance of leading researchers from Belarus, France, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Seventeen applications from 13 countries were received for the second section. The two winning projects were presented by young researchers from Singapore and South Korea who will now also work in Russia.