Candidates must hold a tenure track (or equivalent) position at a college, university, or other degree-granting institution in the United States or Canada.  Tenure track faculty positions at the candidate's institution must include a yearly teaching requirement.

Candidates must hold a Ph.D. (or equivalent) in chemistry, computational or evolutionary molecular biology, computer science, economics, mathematics, neuroscience, ocean sciences, physics, or a related field;

Candidates' most recent Ph.D. (or equivalent) must have been awarded on or after September 1, 2012.  Exceptions may apply. 

See https://sloan.org/fellowships/#tab-eligibility-requirements for details.

In order to be considered for a Sloan Research Fellowship, a candidate must have a letter of nomination from a department head or other senior researcher. Submissions unaccompanied by a nomination letter from a senior researcher are not accepted.

More than one candidate from a department may be nominated, but no more than three faculty from the same department may be nominated.
UM Department Chairs considering nominating one (or up to three) qualifying faculty from their department should discuss their intentions with their respective Deans and make the determination about who to nomiate. (ORSP is not involved in this nomination/decision process). The nomination (letter) does not necessarily have to come from the UM Chair, but the UM Chair must institutionally approve the nomination. Note that anyone nominating more than one candidate may be asked (by the sponsor) to rank these candiates at a later stage in the selection process.

Nomination Letters and Letters of Support are important elements of the selection process and are read carefully by Selection Committees. The letters allow nominators and support writers to give Committee members insight about nominees that is not present in their other application materials (CV, publication list, etc.). Selection Committees recommend that letters of support be submitted by someone who can speak objectively and knowledgeably about the quality and significance of a nominee’s work. Letters submitted by co-authors, personal associates, or professional mentors are, in this sense, less useful to Selection Committees than letters submitted by those with more professional distance from a nominee’s work.     

An official letter of nomination from a department head or other senior researcher, nominating the candidate and descripbing his or her qualifications, initiative, and research;

The candidate's curriculum vitae (including a list of the candidates scientific publications);

Two representative articles by the candidate;

A brief (one-page) statement by the candidate describing his or her significant scientific work and immediate research plans;

Three letters of support from other researchers (preferably not all from the same institution) written in support of the candidate’s nomination.