Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet NovelTopo (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Topological phases are exotic states of quantum matter characterized by a topological invariant of their ground state that guarantees the existence of unusual surface or edge modes with many special properties. In the last decade, the discovery of topological insulators has lead to a revolution in this field, in a remarkable joint effort between theory and experiment. Besides realizing a novel phase of matter, these materials can be exploited for many applications like in spintronics, and can serve as a platform to realize even more exotic phases like topological superconductivity and Majorana fermions. In this project, we combine the input of very recent experimental breakthroughs with theoretical guidance to propose realistic setups to characterize and manipulate these phases. First, we will study novel platforms for the realization and manipulation of Majorana fermions. We will study how elemental Bismuth, a trivial and well studied semimetal, may host them in vortices when interfaced with a superconductor. We will then evaluate how to manipulate them when they are coupled in a vortex lattice, proposing the use of vortex dislocations as the carriers of unpaired modes. Then we will propose topological insulator edges as platforms to study fractionalized Majorana zero modes, known as parafermions. We will analyze current experiments in strongly interacting InAs/GaSb quantum wells, evaluating the feasibility of a fractional Josephson effect. We will also propose the edges of two dimensional topological crystalline insulators such as SnTe as candidates for the formation of a fractionalized helical liquid resembling fractional quantum Hall edges. Finally, we will propose how the topological character of Weyl semimetals such as TaAs can be observed experimentally via the photogalvanic effect. A general analysis of the topological structure of photovoltaic responses will be performed to identify further robust signatures of other topological phases.

Mots clés : topological insulators and superconductors  majorana fermions  weyl semimetals

Participants :
- University of Oxford (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 195454.8 €
Projet HEALTHYFOETUS (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Uterine receptivity and the dialogue between the embryo and the mother in early pregnancy is mainly driven by the concentrations of the steroid hormone progesterone (P4). Work from the host laboratory has shown that divergent P4 concentrations early in pregnancy strongly influence embryo growth and survival in cattle but are not always associated with improved pregnancy rates. Importantly, the consequences of suboptimal P4 for later foetal development are largely unknown. This project proposes four Research work packages (WP) to interrogate the effect of P4 concentration early in pregnancy on the development of the maternal-placental-foetal unit in the cow. The first three WP are built around two groups of cows, manipulated to have high or low P4 during the first days of pregnancy, and a third untreated group, as control. In WP1, foetal growth will be followed through ultrasound scanning until four months of pregnancy (~40% of gestation), when the foetus and associated membranes will be recovered for WP2 and 3. Development of the placenta and amniotic fluid composition will be assessed through transcriptomics and metabolomics, respectively, in WP2. Foetal maturity will be determined in WP3, through organ measurements and histology, and transcriptomic analysis of the hypothalamus (a pivotal organ for development). In WP4, endogenous P4 in dairy cattle across pregnancy will be correlated with calf birth weight. In addition, WP5, 6 and 7 will deal with Management, Training, and Dissemination, respectively. Modelling of metabolomic and transcriptomic data will increase knowledge of the functional and molecular regulation of bovine pregnancy and foetal physiology. Furthermore, this novel information could lead to new therapeutics to optimise the development of a healthy offspring. This truly multidisciplinary project will be accomplished thanks to the facilities in the host institution, the vast experience of the supervisor, and the complementary expertise of the Fellow.

Mots clés : trophoblast, placental programming, maternal foetal communication, foetal maturation, transcriptomics, metabolomics

Participants :
- National University of Ireland (Irlande) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 196590.72 €
Projet SVNanoVax (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Vaccines are the most effective way to protect humans from infectious disease and may save over 2 million lives per year (Delany, 2013). A key issue for future vaccines is how to improve immunogenicity without reducing safety (Bachmann, 2010). Another challenge is that high antigen sequence variability enables pathogens to escape the host response. To overcome these challenges, this proposal combines Structural Vaccinology and bionanoparticle (BNP) design, to generate novel self-assembling BNPs with multi-copy antigen display for the development of safe vaccine antigens with enhanced immunogenicity and breadth of coverage. We will generate antigen-BNPs for a 2nd generation vaccine against Neisseria meningitidis serogroup B (MenB), a major cause of sepsis and invasive disease (Pace, 2012). This research may also potentiate antigen-BNP technology suitable for other vaccines. Firstly, we will use functional (bactericidal) monoclonal antibodies to map the most protective epitopes on the 3D structures of two key MenB antigens, fHbp and NadA, which contribute strongly to our recently-approved 1st generation MenB vaccine, Bexsero (O’Ryan, 2014). To aid this, we have developed wide expertise in structure-focused epitope mapping (Malito, 2013). Secondly, we will design optimized antigens stably displaying the best epitopes, an approach that we have pioneered and termed ‘Structural Vaccinology’ (Scarselli, 2011). Finally, self-assembling protein bionanoparticles displaying ordered arrays of the optimized antigens will be prepared, in order to generate novel highly-immunogenic, broadly-protective MenB vaccine candidates. The proposal offers an exciting career development opportunity encompassing novel high-quality research to combine and deliver the promises of Structural Vaccinology and nanobiology, with a high probability of success to generate innovative new vaccine antigens for products to protect humans against meningococcal and other infectious diseases.

Mots clés : healthcare, pathogen, meningococcus, vaccine, structural vaccinology, nanoparticles, bio nanoparticles, protein engineering, antigen design, molecular biology, antibody antigen interaction

Participants :
- GlaxoSmithKline (Italy) (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 168277.2 €
Projet VADEMA (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Doctoral Networks - Industrial Doctorates
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Vaccines discovered from empirical approaches and consisting in killed, live-attenuated microorganisms or purified components have led to the successful control of many devastating diseases. Several novel technologies, such as recombinant DNA technology, glycoconjugation, reverse vaccinology have opened the possibility of designing vaccines previously considered impossible to make. Despite decades of efforts, vaccines have not yet been developed against several of the most life-threatening infections. Based on the observation that an efficacious immune response only require protective epitopes, structural vaccinology combined with human immunology are therefore rapidly emerging as a powerful alternative strategy for the rational design of vaccines bearing multiple protective epitopes and offering the opportunity of developing broadly effective immunity. The proposal is focused on the development of a Structural Mass Spectrometry platform and its application to compare conformation and dynamics of antigens in their native states (membrane) with their recombinant soluble forms (vaccines) and to get a better understanding of the humoral response raised against the two forms. The outcome of such studies will be to identify antigen portions accessible to the host immune system and those epitopes that can be recognized in the native form of the antigens to design efficient vaccines. Structural Mass Spectrometry is a very new science in Europe and the proposal represents the unique opportunity for 4 PhD students to be trained by an academic and an industrial group, leaders in respective parts of the field. The program will be complemented with a number of training courses. The students will receive a PhD degree in structural mass spectrometry applied to vaccinology. It represents a good occasion to spread this technology in Europe and good opportunities for students that are willing to grow both in basic science as well as innovative and applicative experimental research.

Mots clés : structural mass spectrometry   hydrogen deuterium exchange   epitope mapping   humoral response   polyclonal antibodies   monoclonal antibodies   membrane proteins

Participants :
- GlaxoSmithKline (Italy) (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 516122.64 €
- University of Copenhagen (Danemark) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 580163.76 €
Projet TranspvdW (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Van der Waals (vdW) hybrid structures, new systems formed by stacking layers of two-dimensional crystals on top of each other, are a promising route towards the tailoring of material properties at will. Understanding the properties of individual layers and how they interact with each other to obtain the desired properties is the main focus of both experimental and theoretical research of the community working in this area. Due to the extreme high quality, atomically sharp, interfaces between different layers in vdW structures, lattice mismatch and the relative alignment between consecutive layers play a fundamental role in determining the properties of the vdW structure, governing the electronic coupling between different layers. Graphene – insulator/semiconductor – graphene vdW structures have recently received a lot of attention from the community, due to its potential for applications, having been shown to operate both as transistors and photodetectors. It is not clear however how device operation is affected by lattice mismatch effects. The aim of this project is to develop theory and models, both analytical and numerical, to describe the vertical current and photocurrent generation, both in the steady state and in the transient regime, of the vdW hybrid structures referred above. Special attention will be given to the effect of lattice mismatch and crystal-momentum conservation in the vertical current flow. In the duration of this project, Bruno Amorim will work under the supervision of Prof. Eduardo V. Castro in the multidisciplinary environment provided by the Center of Physics and Engineering of Advanced Materials at Instituto Superior Técnico, in Portugal. This project will generate high impact results, useful in interpreting current and future experimental results and in guiding the design of new vdW devices. As such, this project will greatly contribute to the career development of the applicant.

Mots clés : 2d materials, van der waals structures

Participants :
- University of Lisbon (Portugal) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 148635.6 €
Projet SunPro (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Vegetable oils are an essential commodity for the European society. Sunflower oil is one of the main sources of high quality vegetable oil in the European Union and associated states. Production of sunflower oil is seriously endangered by parasitic plants (Orobanche cumana) that highly reduced sunflower yields (up to 80%). Weed control in sunflower is based on chemical herbicide treatments, but the use of these chemicals is under debate due to concerns related to the harmfulness towards consumers, impact on ecosystem and high risk of weeds developing herbicide tolerance. Genetic resistance in sunflower to O. cumana has been identified, but it is not durable due to the emergence of newly evolved races that can overcome the resistance bred into novel varieties. Therefore, an alternative resistance mechanim is urgently needed for sunflower production in the EU. In the here-proposed SunPro (Sunflower Protection against parasitic weeds) program, I will, together with KeyGene as the host institution, apply state-of-the-art molecular breeding technologies to provide such alternative resistance strategy to combat these parasitic weeds. I intend to identify such alternative solution in sunflower using a combination of high-throughput RNA sequencing, computational biology and mutation breeding to provide pre-breeding material that will be utilized by European sunflower breeding companies. If successful, this program will ensure sustainable production of high quality vegetable oil from sunflowers.

Mots clés : crop protection, sunflower, helianthus annuus, weed control, orobanche cumana, broomrape, rnaseq, computational biology, mutation breeding

Participants :
- KeyGene (Netherlands) (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 165598.8 €
Projet SpecSpiderVenom (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - Global Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Venoms of a wide range of animals are currently under scrutiny in the search for toxins that can be utilized as new bioactive compounds with potential medical and industrial applications. Venomous predators produce complex mixtures of bioactive components in their venoms, making them ideal candidates for a thorough investigation. Predatory toxins are usually very effective against certain prey as the result of evolutionary arms races. Many venomous animals are still understudied, including spiders, one of the most diversified groups of venomous predators. Prey-specialised spiders are particularly intriguing in this respect, as they preferentially feed on one prey type only, often represented by dangerous prey, such as ants, termites or other spiders. The current evidence suggests they immobilise prey with a potent venom. The aim of this project is to explore the venomic adaptations of those spiders from organismal to a molecular level, employing diverse methods that include behavioural experiments, venom potency bioassays, and proteo-transcriptomics. I will elucidate the venom composition of selected prey-specialised species and identify toxins with high selective efficiency. I want to analyse whether 1) prey-specialised spiders rely on their effective venoms to subdue their focal prey; 2) venoms of the specialised spiders are more efficient towards focal than to alternative prey; and 3) venom specificity is due to the presence of prey-specific highly potent venom compounds. Information on the venom properties will be put into ecological context to shed more light on the evolution of venomic adaptations in specialised predators. Furthermore, toxins of prey-specialised predators may be potentially useful as novel active ingredients of bio-pesticides due to their high specificity. My project will help to understand the mechanisms by which specialised venoms work, and could help in the development of environmentally safe bio-pesticides specifically targeting pests.

Mots clés : adaptation, evolution, predator, prey, specialization, spiders, venom

Participants :
- University of Queensland (Australie) — Partner, organization partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Masaryk University (Rép. Tchèque) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 261963.6 €
Projet MetaVCSEL (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : TERMINATED

Vertical cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) play a key role in the development of modern optoelectronic technologies, thanks to their unique characteristics such as low power consumption, high modulation speed, and large-scale two-dimensional array capability. To further expand the spectral range of VCSELs from the red/near-infrared region down to the blue/UV region is attracting significant interest. This will lead to versatile applications in for example retinal scanning displays, visible light communications, chemical sensing, and sterilization of viruses and bacteria. However, blue/UV VCSELs are suffering from poor beam quality and unstable polarization property due to the lack of effective beam shaping solutions. The recent advances in two-dimensional metamaterials, also known as metasurfaces, open new perspectives for the manipulation of light properties, including amplitude, phase, and polarization with exceptional subwavelength spatial resolution. In particular, the ultra-thin, flat, and compact characteristics of metasurfaces greatly facilitate their integration with semiconductor laser for the development of a miniaturized laser system with a controllable optical wavefront. Seizing on the timely opportunities provided by the latest metasurface technologies, this project aims to develop the very first solution for on-chip beam-shaping blue/UV VCSELs by exploiting metasurface optoelectronic integration, which will unlock the potential to tailor both the phase and polarization properties of blue/UV lasers at an ultra-compact wafer-level. This will give rise to high beam quality lasers with small divergence angle and vector lasers in the blue/UV regime, paying their way toward real-world applications.

Mots clés : metasurface, semiconductor lasers, vcsels, beam shaping, nanophotonics

Participants :
- Chalmers University of Technology (Suède) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 203852.16 €
Projet ViolenControl (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Violence is the result of complex interactions between cultural, social, economic, political and environmental factors and is subject to changes that reflect on-going transformations within society. Investigating its perception and understanding the boundaries between tolerated, sanctioned, and unacknowledged violence allows to examine inter-personal relationships within a community and the shared value systems within it. The management of violence is then a direct consequence of specific political factors, which are expressed on the judicial level. Studying violence during the early modern age is of fundamental importance to understand, for example, the role and weight of the state within society. This research project will study the rate of violence in the Venetian urban environment during the early modern age and the efforts made by the Republic to reduce it. The project will pay particular attention to political violence among members of families belonging to the Venetian ruling class, to verify whether the Venetian context was an exception in the European context. The project will examine the transformations that the Venetian judicial bodies underwent to demonstrate what impact they had on violence, either by increasing or effectively containing it. In addition to the judicial system, the project will also examine the policing measure and the expansion of the surveillance network as a form of control of the urban territory. The results achieved will be compared with the rates of political violence, caused by factionalism, in the Italian mainland under Venetian rule. Finally, the project will verify how the Republic tried to put a brake on another main source of violence, the one linked to border banditry. Venice repeatedly negotiated extradition treaties with its neighbouring states in order to deny any space of immunity to outlaws, but the execution of these agreements had little success.

Mots clés : history of violence, early modern republic of venice, political violence, history of criminal law, policing, gender and violence, peace and public order, history of judicial institutions

Participants :
- University of York (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 224933.76 €
Projet ASSESSnet (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Virtual mobility (VM), also termed as telecollaborative or virtual exchange (VE), entails a situation, in which students interact and cooperate, and thus engage in intercultural exchange, with peers from partner institutions by means of online communication tools. VM is reported to have a positive impact on students’ personal growth, foreign language (FL) competences as well as intercultural and transversal skills. Being easily accessible to students from different cultural, geographical, linguistic and economic backgrounds, as well as to students with disabilities, VM promotes inclusive education and social equity. VM is a relatively new trend in education, which is reflected in the scarcity of publications and teacher education opportunities in this area. This project addresses the topic of assessment in virtual mobility projects in FL courses at tertiary level. In particular, this mixed-methods research aims to explore, both longitudinally and cross-sectionally, assessment practices as well as the FL teachers beliefs’ about the shape and the content of assessment in virtual contexts. Assessment tools and course syllabi used in virtual exchanges will be analysed to gain insight into the level of constructive alignment between the tools, tasks and learning objectives in VM projects. The data will be collected by means of both qualitative and quantitative instruments: a questionnaire, a online reflective journal, semi-structured interviews and a document analysis framework. The research findings will be used to formulate practical recommendations for improving assessment in VM projects and set up a collection of real-life examples of promising practices illustrating effective efforts of planning and administering assessment in virtual projects in Europe and beyond. The practical implications will be of relevance to stakeholders ranging from teachers, teacher educators, curriculum designers, researchers, to policy-makers.

Mots clés : assessment, foreign language learning and teaching, virtual mobility, telecollaboration, higher education, intercultural competence, multimedia literacies

Participants :
- Autonomous University of Barcelona (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 160932.48 €