SystemsX.ch is currently the biggest research initiative underway in Switzerland with the mandate to promote Systems Biology. It is a consortium with nine universities and three research institutions as partners. SystemsX.ch is funded with a federal budget of CHF 100 Mio for the period of 2008 - 2011. This sum is only available if matched by the same amount by the partners receiving funds. This way the total investment in Systems Biology will be at least CHF 200 Mio for 2008 - 2011, supplemented by third-party funds by industry and other funding agencies. The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) supervises and safeguards the quality of the research and the initiative as a whole.

Five different project types are sponsored. Research, Technology and Development Projects (RTD) are the 14 flagship projects of SystemsX.ch lasting for four years with budgets of up to CHF 20 Mio. SystemsX.ch also looks to the future – young researchers on their way to becoming the first generation of specially educated systems biologists – and supports special Interdisciplinary PhD Projects (IPhD) with two complimentary mentors. Seed and high-risk Systems Biology research projects which might not find funding using traditional channels are supported for one year as so-called Interdisciplinary Pilot Projects (IPP). Any breakthrough here would be especially exciting. SystemsX.ch also launched two new project types to encourage industry interactions with our academic partners. These are projects limited to about a year in duration. The Bridge to Industry (BIP) and Industry Sabbatical in Academia (ISA) projects provide a novel way for industry to get some insight into Systems Biology by collaborating with one of our partners.

SystemsX.ch supports about 750 researchers from 250 research groups in 62 approved projects. Out of the 250 research group leaders, about 50% are biologists by training. The other 50% comprised are of chemists, physicists, engineers, computational scientists, medical scientists, mathematicians and even economists.

The map of Switzerland below shows the partner institutions collaborating with SystemsX.ch. Please click on the respective logo to be redirected to their homepage.