Your call for simplification of European research funding (Nature 463, 999; 2010) is timely. In February we started a pan-European petition for simplification of the funding rules, addressed to the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers. So far, more than 7,300 researchers have signed up at http://www.trust-researchers.eu.

The petition aims to give a voice to researchers all over Europe who want to change the way research is funded (see page 349). Right now, many stakeholder discussions are taking place inside and outside the European Commission to simplify the rules. That is promising. We welcome feedback from the broad research community.