Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet HYDROSTEM (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : TERMINATED

Plant meristems integrate signals from water conditions to tune their proliferative activity and control growth. While extensive progress has been made elucidating water stress responses in plants, how cells in aerial meristems sense hydraulic fluctuations remains largely unknown. The vascular cambium (VC), the largest plant meristem, contributes to the radial growth of shoots and roots by producing xylem and phloem tissue. Theoretical models for cambial growth predict that water-dependent turgor pressure stimulates (locally) the proliferative activity in this meristem. These models are extensively supported by correlative studies in greenhouse and field conditions, yet how turgor pressure is sensed and transduced into a cell proliferation response is still unknown. This is what I would like to investigate during my postdoc at the Mähönen group. To do so, I will be trained in the design and implementation of the latest lineage tracing and genome editing tools from the hosting lab. I will contribute with my background in meristem hydraulics to reveal the dynamics of cambial cells under water deficit. Since the VC is directly connected with water-transporting cells, hydraulic fluctuations can have a direct physical effect in cambial cells, more specifically at the plasma membrane where key osmosensors are localized. Therefore, I will study the function of osmosensing channels in the context of cambial developmental plasticity. Finally, I will identify regulators of cambial activity dependent on water status. This project aims at 1) Generating a growth rate and cell fate map for the cambium under variations of water status, 2) Identifying osmosensing channels involved in the control of cambial activity, and 3) Uncovering cambial molecular factors transcriptionally sensitive to water status. Taken together, this project will provide me with a material and conceptual platform for developing a career studying the hydraulic control of plant growth.

Mots clés : plant meristem, vascular cambium, plant hydraulics, osmosensing, crispr, arabidopsis thaliana

Participants :
- Université d'Helsinki (Finlande) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 199694.4 €
Projet SymFish (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Phenotypic robustness, the capacity for organisms to buffer their development against internal and external perturbations, controls the strength of the links between phenotypes, genotypes, and environments. Despite its importance linking scales of biological organization, we have a poor understanding of how phenotypic robustness works—for example, the degree to which it is heritable, if the same mechanisms control both intrinsic and extrinsic robustness, or if it is correlated across organ systems. Working with Dr. Claudius Kratochwil in the Integrated Evolutionary Biology group at the University of Helsinki (UH), Finland, I will investigate the mechanisms of robustness using fluctuating asymmetry as an indicator of robustness. I will take advantage an ongoing hybrid cross of cichlid fishes in the lab, the offspring of which exhibit increasing rates of left-right color pattern asymmetry compared to their symmetrical parents. In research objective O1, I will identify the genomic basis of phenotypic robustness by selecting for increased and decreased color pattern asymmetry in this hybrid cross, and use whole genome sequencing to identify loci associated with decreased symmetry. In O2, I will test for gene-environment interactions in robustness by raising fish from asymmetrical and symmetrical populations at high and low temperatures and testing whether these populations exhibit different reaction norms. In O3, I will test whether robustness is correlated across organ systems by measuring asymmetry in other traits (paired fins, gills, jaws, eyes, and lateral line neuromasts) in the most and least asymmetrical fish from the cross. I will ask whether selecting for asymmetry in color patterns has also increased asymmetry in these traits.

Mots clés : phenotypic robustness, fish, association mapping

Participants :
- Université d'Helsinki (Finlande) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 226276.8 €
Projet KDR - UiB (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2021)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

This research investigates participation in digital musical performances as a way to enhance a sense of liveness - i.e., the feeling of being connected to other people. For the last 18 months, digital concerts have become the norm due to the restrictions on social interaction during the pandemic. Yet such digital events often challenge the relationship between performer and audience by compromising the experience of liveness. Using Participatory Action Research methods, I will work with women and girls to collaboratively create online piano performances where I am the main performer. Audience feedback and my own reflections as the performer, supported by literature review, will inform knowledge about the intensification of the relational and affective aspects of the music experience and its impact on the sense of liveness. My dual expertise as a musician (pianist) and qualitative researcher are essential here, as they allow me to undertake research both on and through the topic. By focusing research on audiences of women and girls I aim to address the specific lack of opportunities for these groups and challenge the traditional obstacles to participation in classical music. In this way the project will contribute to positive change towards more inclusive music practices for the post-pandemic and digitalised world. Research outputs will be a series of digital concerts which will be streamed via YouTube and music festivals, reflective short essays, two articles to be published in peer-reviewed journals, a technical handbook, and a book of personal reflections integrating researcher and audience perspectives. This research aims to innovate through applying ideas and methods from areas such as music performance, digital technologies, participatory arts, and gender studies. This project will enable me with skills and competencies to become an innovative and socially engaged performer and academic who is a leader in my field and an inspiration for future generations.

Mots clés : music performance, piano, piano recital, digital concerts, liveness, audience participation, modes of listening, embodied listening, social acoustics, girls empowerment

Participants :
- Université de Bergen (Norvège) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 226751.04 €
Projet AgriGate (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Soil bacteria are of critical importance to soil health. Soil pore-size distribution over multiple length scales, which facilitates nutrient transport, depends on the presence of soil aggregates, cohesive organo-mineral assemblies formed by bacterial activity. Aggregates support plant health and increase soil stability. Although restoring aggregate structure in degraded soil can yield great benefits for extreme-weather resilience and agricultural productivity, we lack any mechanistic understanding of how aggregates are formed by bacteria. This knowledge gap hampers the deployment of promising bio-augmentation strategies for soil restoration, such as inoculation of soil with aggregate-promoting bacteria. The objective of AgriGate is to narrow this gap by elucidating the biophysical mechanisms of bacterial aggregate-formation. I will focus on the reciprocal mechanical interactions between bacteria and soil grains, using interdisciplinary methods over multiple spatial scales. I will first develop a novel microfluidic chip granting real-time optical access to bacterial dynamics inside a three-dimensional bed of model soil grains. AgriGate’s hypotheses are that (1) there exists an optimal grain size and inoculant richness for bacteria-led aggregation, and (2) that bacterial extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) are necessary for aggregation. I will test these hypotheses by varying grain size, inoculant richness, and bacterial EPS-production in the chip. Microfluidic experiments will be combined with experiments in bacteria-loaded soil columns observed by X-ray tomography, to extend results to the macroscopic scale and link microscale structure to macroscale function. The search for optimal aggregation conditions will be formalized mechanistically and extended by a numerical model of bacterial colony growth in a cohesive granular medium. Together, AgriGate’s new tools and results will provide a strong basis for fundamental and applied studies on soil bio-augmentation.

Mots clés : soil microbiome, microfluidics, bacterial biophysics, granular mechanics

Participants :
- Université de Rennes (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 195914.88 €
Projet Meta-Heroes (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2021)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Aquatic ecosystems are currently facing an unprecedented biodiversity crisis linked to human activities and with even worse future scenarios. Among many potential drivers, habitat fragmentation still remains as one of the least understood due to its complexity. Furthermore, its interaction with other local stressors such as salinity remains as a major knowledge gap that hinders long-term conservation. Ponds host high local and regional biodiversity and contribute to important ecosystem functions and services. At the same time, the networks of these priority habitats are disappearing worldwide (50-90% of habitat already lost). However, the impacts of fragmentation and salinity increase on their biodiversity are yet to be unfolded. Meta-Heroes aims to shed light on the role of network connectivity in safeguarding biodiversity against environmental stressors by analysing pond communities in a multidisciplinary approach, combining experimental work (mesocosms), empirical data (long-term dataset) and a simulation framework to asses future scenarios (graph-based models). My supervisor, Dr. Zsófia Horváth, has an excellent background in metacommunity ecology and her and the host offer the most up-to-date EU level facilities for carrying out the proposed research with a unique large-scale mesocosm facility, a long-term biodiversity database, and access to cutting-edge techniques (eDNA-based methods). Meta-Heroes will also benefit from collaboration of top international experts. I will bring my taxonomical and modelling skills as part of the two-way transfer of knowledge. The combination of all these will result in robust novel results, informative for both basic ecology and conservation. Both will be disseminated and communicated to different audiences (scientists, practitioners, general public). Overall, meta-Heroes will represent a key milestone to expand my professional network and scientific toolsets enhancing the development of my career as an independent researcher.

Mots clés : salinization metacommunity ecology pond ecosystem global change network fragmentation habitat loss community ecology aquatic ecology

Participants :
- Centre de recherche en écologie (Hongrie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 141782.4 €
Projet MICOL-FUNTRANS (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Microbes in soil drive ecosystem services defining life on the Earth. Translocation of these microbes is key features in the spatial exploration of soil. This directly impacts major ecological processes such as niche colonization and the development of soil structure, but knowledge of how microbes migrate in soil is scarce. A potential universal mechanism is fungal hyphae mediated transport (FHMT) where bacteria use hyphae of fungi as a route to translocate in a directed manner. However, this has been solely observed in the laboratory, but not in soil where single-cell level studies are restricted by technical limits. MICOL-FUNTRANS overcomes these limitations by developing and exploiting a novel system combining microfluidics, microbiological and microscopical methods to i) observe microbial movement in soil-like systems and ii) identify single involved organisms. Micro-channels will provide treatments to compare soil colonization and structure formation with and without FHMT. Ultimately, findings will be upscaled to an ecological level in a dedicated field study using a glacier forefield in the Arctic, which constitutes a unique natural laboratory to study initial soil development as ongoing climate change melts glaciers and frees vast areas of barren soil at present. The results of this project will foster an integrated view on the soil biome and push research on bacterial-fungal interactions to the centre of attention in soil microbiology and related industries. Specifically, knowledge of migration rates of microbes in soil will impact models on nutrient distribution and efforts in bioremediation of contaminated soil. A better understanding of the initial stages of soil structure formation at the micro-scale will impact efforts in soil quality and health preservation related actions, a topic of highest societal and economic interest as the degradation of soil is one of the most pressing environmental threads we are currently facing.

Mots clés : soil microbiome, bacterial fungal interactions, soil colonization, soil structure, transparent soil, fungal highways, fungal hyphae mediated transport, interspecies interaction

Participants :
- GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 189687.36 €
- Université de Copenhague (Danemark) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (Allemagne) — Partner, associated partner, Recherche, subvention : 0.0 €
Projet ERMoCEU (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Ethno-regionalist movements (ERMs) are civil society organisations seeking greater regional self-government as well as protection and promotion of the regional territory and community. Although hundreds of ERMs operate in the Member States of the European Union (EU), ranging from student unions to paramilitary groups, with new ones emerging, defunct ones resurging, and many radicalising their demands, we lack knowledge about these actors’ objectives, strategies, and structure. This project, carried out at the School of International Studies of the UniTrento, investigates ERMs as neglected actors of regional emancipation in the contemporary EU. Drawing on Political science, Political geography, and Media communication for this interdisciplinary phenomenon and using innovative mixed-methods methodology, this project (i) identifies all relevant ERMs in the EU regions and generates novel, time-sensitive data on their territorial objectives, member base, internal organisation, and radicality of actions; (ii) explains these characteristics using region-specific factors; and (iii) evaluates the content and nature of ERMs’ social media communication as the most tangible and comparable expression of their behaviour. These findings are triangulated with (iv) interviews with these movements’ members, completing a comprehensive inquiry into ERMs’ role in times of increased ethno-territorial contestation. Project outputs comprise three original articles, a synthesising monograph, and an interoperable dataset containing ERMs’ characteristics. Intersectorality will be exploited through cooperation with Istituto Camillo Bellieni, a regional cultural organisation involved in public policy-making. Project results will be popularised through news articles, public events, and social media. This project incorporates substantial methodological training to enhance my career development while adhering to Open Science and research sustainability.

Mots clés : ethno regionalist movements, ethno regionalism, regional emancipation, civil society organisations, european union

Participants :
- Université de Trente (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 242054.1 €
- Istituto di studi e ricerche camillo bellieni (Italie) — Partner, associated partner, Autres, subvention : 0.0 €
Projet CATEGORHYTHM (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

When we listen to music, recognizing a well-known rhythmic pattern and moving our body along seems like a natural and effortless task. Yet, these widespread human abilities are far from trivial, due to the sheer diversity and variability of possible rhythmic inputs that may stimulate our sensory organs. How does the brain categorize a particular sensory input as an instance of a particular rhythmic pattern? One view, which dates back to Darwin, is that rhythm categorization is driven by fixed mechanisms anchored in the ancient subcortical parts of the brain. However, recent behavioral research argues that categorical perception of rhythm is a complex flexible function, possibly relying on evolutionarily newer plastic cortical networks. The current project scrutinizes these views by combining an innovative methodological approach with high-resolution neuroimaging techniques (electroencephalography and magnetoencephalography). This novel approach will be used to unravel how different brain regions contribute to the transformation from faithful encoding of stimulus’ physical properties towards internal rhythmic categories. Moreover, neural categorization processes will be probed in participants with developmental dyslexia to assess their contribution to generalized rhythmic abilities, which are impaired in this population. The results are expected to provide key insights into the neurobiological mechanisms underlying perceptual categorization of rhythm, and their role in driving the universality, yet remarkable diversity of musical rhythms observed across cultures. Likewise, the outcomes of this project are expected to improve our understanding of the role of rhythm categorization processes in language development and its disorders, such as developmental dyslexia, with implications for the improvement of diagnostic and therapeutic tools.

Mots clés : perceptual categorization, rhythm, music, meg, brainstem, cerebral cortex, frequency tagging, rsa

Participants :
- Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 165312.96 €
Projet FlexyRhythm (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

FlexyRhythm aims to move beyond traditional assessments of rhythmic abilities in the speech domain by proposing the strong hypothesis that synchronizing to isochronous speech is necessary but not sufficient for developing language abilities. In addition to this, the ability to flexibly reproduce and synchronize to slightly irregular rhythms typical of natural speech is crucial for enhancing the brain’s capacity to track continuous speech in naturalistic contexts. The project will develop a novel test to assess these abilities and investigate the relationship between flexible rhythm production abilities and key aspects of the human speaking brain, including: (i) statistical learning as a proxy for language acquisition, (ii) native language processing, (iii) second language learning, and (iv) speech-motor and language deficits following stroke. By employing magnetoencephalography (MEG) and state-of-the-art analytical tools such as temporal response function, coherence, and transfer entropy, the project will objectively assess the human brain's capacity to track and encode acoustic and linguistic information during speech listening (cortical tracking of speech), the neural auditory-motor connectivity dynamics underlying tracking, and the relation with flexible rhythm production abilities. FlexyRhythm offers a comprehensive exploration of the interplay between rhythm and speech, advancing our understanding in both healthy and damaged brains, across native and second language learning. The findings will provide scientific insights and societal benefits, including improved language teaching methodologies and personalized healthcare strategies for acquired speech and language disorders.

Mots clés : rhythm production, synchronization, meg, cortical tracking of speech, statistical learning, speech motor and language impairments, stroke

Participants :
- Université Radboud de Nimègue (Pays-Bas) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 194074.56 €
Projet ADRIAN (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The list of genes contributing to increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) grows every year. To date, large case-control Genome-Wide Association Studies have found 98 genetic loci associated with late-onset Alzheimer's Disease (LOAD). However, apart from a small number of genes related to familial cases, it remains largely unknown the direct relationships between genes amyloid-β and tau misfolding protein accumulation (hallmark of AD), and neurodegeneration of the human brain. Even more striking, current knowledge of mutations potentially conferring genetic resilience is sparse. A better characterization of each genetic risk loci and identification of protective genetic variants could lead to development of effective therapeutical targets, actually unavailable for AD. The goal of this project is to characterize associations between the 98 LOAD genetic risk loci, in vivo tau and amyloid-ß PET, and MRI neurodegeneration – including an examination of potential genetic variants conferring disease resilience. Hypotheses: genetic loci will show distinct spatial patterns of tau and amyloid-ß spreading and neurodegeneration, helping us to better understand AD biological heterogeneity. I expect to find different subtypes of AD with different molecular mechanism and different therapeutical targets for each subtype. I will use PET imaging of ~3,000 participants from the Harvard Aging Brain Study, and the A4 and ADNI databases. ~35,000 participants from the UK Biobank with genetic and functional and structural MRI will also be used to study the impact of genetic loci on neurodegeneration. Importantly, as a first analysis, we will search for the effects of each risk loci and protective variants conferring resilience; secondary analyses will also explore the contributions of sex and ethnic minority factors

Mots clés : alzheimer disease, phewas, pet, mri, gwas

Participants :
- Asociacion instituto de investigacion sanitaria biobizkaia (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 181152.96 €