Competition for third-level researchers intensified yesterday with the University of Limerick announcing plans to pay some of its researchers salaries of between £25,000 and £68,000 a year.
The university is planning to recruit 24 researchers to mainly high-tech disciplines over the next few months. It will pay four new professors between £50,000 and £68,000.
The remaining 20 will be paid between £25,000 and £40,000 a year as research fellows. Postdoctoral fellows in most universities get between £12,000 and £22,000, depending on the discipline.
Each researcher will also get £25,000 a year for support services. The posts will be advertised here and abroad. The university's president, Dr Roger Downer, has raised £8.3 million of mainly private-sector finance to fund the research drive.
The researchers will do virtually no lecturing and are being hired for five-year contracts. Dr Downer described the funding as "an unprecedented move in Irish third-level education".
The 24 researchers will carry out work in the following areas: materials and surface science; quality, productivity and work; and humanities and social science.
Dr Downer said: "We are confident that the research scholars programme will yield significant and far-reaching benefits for the university, and for Ireland's business and technological communities."