Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet RaSiR (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The basis for this project consists in a mathematical framework previously developed by the applicant that allows to describe graph rewriting systems algebraically, the so-called rule algebraic framework. In order to advance and valorise the concept, this project proposes to develop a general concept for rule-algebraic simple rewriting (RaSiR), both for conventional graph rewriting and for a novel form of simplicial rewriting. Secondly, RaSiR will serve as the basis for developing rule-algebraic variants of trace compression and observable-update algorithms for the rewriting system Kappa. The final aim of the project consists in developing and implementing the so-called observable-centric bootstrapping algorithm (OCBA) as a module for the simulation suite KaSim for the Kappa language. Kappa is predominantly used for simulating biochemical reaction systems, which typically display an extremely high combinatorial complexity. The algorithms and software modules developed in this project will provide in particular an alternative to pure stochastic simulation via the SSA algorithm as currently implemented in KaSim, in the form of the OCBA module. This module will admit the generation of approximate observable distributions from individual pure states of the system by calculating algebraically truncations of the formal solution of the chemical master equation as well as the induced observable update functions. The project shall be hosted by Dr. Jean Krivine of the PPS team at IRIF at the University Paris-Diderot in France. Dr. Krivine is one of the two main developers of the KaSim simulation suite, and moreover one of the world experts in the theoretical and practical development of the programming language Kappa. IRIF will provide an ideal environment for the applicant to develop new skills, to be part the very interdisciplinary research team PPS, and to communicate and valorise the project results to the greater biochemical and systems biological simulation community.

Mots clés : rule based modelling, kappa language, algebra based algorithms

Participants :
- Université Paris Cité (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 173076.0 €
Projet STRIAVISE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - Global Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The brain is limited in information-processing capacity, and must selectively prioritise neural representations of the external stimuli that are most relevant for one’s current goals, i.e. apply attention to the stimulus (visual-selection). Predictions about likely future sensory inputs help determine which stimuli are prioritised. Although we know that frontal and sensory cortices comprise key parts of a system that represents prioritised visual information, we are only just beginning to understand how predictions influence the activity of this system, or which neural substrates encode such predictions. The striatum is an excellent candidate neural substrate to underpin the influence of predictions on visual representations, even though its role in visual-selection has barely been considered. The core aim of this proposal is to investigate the scope of striatal contributions to the function and dynamics of the brain networks that underpin visual-selection. Neuroimaging (MRI, DTI), neuromagnetic (MEG), and deep-brain-stimulation (DBS) approaches will be convergently applied to i) provide a high-resolution functional map of the striatum when predictive contexts are available to guide visual-selection performance, ii) provide a rich spatial and temporal characterisation of striatal influence on the brain networks underpinning visual-selection, and iii) go beyond the limitations of correlative measures by identifying the causal influence of the striatum when predictions influence visual-selection. The gained precise understanding of how the brain instantiates this influence will not only advance our theoretical understanding of the nature of sensory experience, but also carries the potential to shed insights into the cognitive difficulties faced by patients with striatal dysfunction such as in Parkinson’s disease, ADHD, and schizophrenia, thereby paving foundations for new interventions.

Mots clés : striatum, prediction, attention, magnetic resonance imaging, magnetoencephalography, deep brain stimulation

Participants :
- University of Queensland (Australie) — Partner, organization partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- University of Birmingham (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 276107.4 €
Projet PLaTONE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The capability of chemically and physically engineering the electrical and optical response of solids represents both the driving force and the consequence of the tremendous technological development of electronics, optoelectronics and plasmonics within the past century. As a most relevant example, the process—known as doping—of introducing foreign impurities in suitable hosts has led, among others, to the development of Transparent Conductive Oxides (TCOs), materials combining visible-light optical transparency with high electrical conductivity that are nowadays an irreplaceable component of solar cells and touch screens. Plasmonics and photonics, in parallel, have reached unprecedented levels of control of electromagnetic energy thanks to the possibility of fabricating and tailoring metallic nanostructures with physical dimensions down to the micro- and nano-scale for nano-antennas, perfect absorber and cloaking applications, to mention a few. One of the new challenges that researchers and engineers are facing is merging optical and electrical control in a single device for developing next-generation photovoltaic, opto-electronic devices and energy-efficient solid-state lighting. PLaTONE proposes the realization of a novel class of materials combining plasmonic resonators with TCO-based thin-film capacitors, a system envisaged in literature but not yet achieved. PLaTONE will address the fabrication and the electrical/optical characterization of these systems and exploit the mutual interaction between the plasmonic nanostructures and the voltage-controlled dielectric properties of the TCO for achieving an active optoelectronic device. PLaTONE musters up a team of highly experienced researchers from both academic and non-academic institutions to tackle the issue, and provides the candidate the ideal environment for boosting his skills and assemble a solid collaboration network for future national and international funding programs.

Mots clés : hot elctrons, field effect, alzno, nanoparticles, self assembly

Participants :
- University of Genoa (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 168277.2 €
Projet SAAFE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - Global Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The SAAFE project, Soil quality Assessment in Agriculture For life cycle assessment-based Eco-design, aims to tackle the lack of accounting for land use impacts on soil quality in environmental footprints. It will provide a turnkey method within Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) based on a set of models integrating the interdisciplinary research advances. To benefit from this up-to-date research and to learn from renowned researchers, I aim to go to James Cook University, where there are rich knowledge and unique modelling groups on tropical soil processes. I will then bring back operational knowledge to Europe, where the gap in methods is still hampering the development of environmental footprint regulations, which concern a growing number of imported tropical products. Such scientific and operational developments are critical to improve the diagnostic power of LCA and ensure that LCA-based eco-designed practices enable soil functions’ resilience, hence sustainability. I will coordinate the project together with two extraordinary supervisors, A/Prof. Nelson and Dr. Perret, who have remarkable experiences in tropical soil sciences and LCA of agricultural systems, respectively, and are undeniable references in terms of project coordination and student supervision. I will also develop a complete personal career development plan along the project in order to overcome my scientific and skill gaps and surpass me. Rich from these collaborations and the experience gained through this ambitious project, I aim to move to the next stage in my career and become an internationally recognised research director. I will then build an ambitious new research programme in ecosystem services modelling and environmental assessments, combining research projects and an excellence training network to train young researchers and enhance capacity building exchanges. I also hope to become an influential expert providing advices to policy makers and contributing to make an impact for the society.

Mots clés : environmental footprint policy

Participants :
- James Cook University (Australie) — Partner, organization partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Centre de coopération internationale en recherche agronomique pour le développement (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 281827.2 €
Projet SMART-UP (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The SMART-UP project will initiate innovative devices called piezoelectric-dampers (PiDs) to be embedded in modern tall buildings for simultaneous structural elements connection and energy harvesting (EH). PiDs are composite elements (piezoelectric+steel or rubber) located in the connections between buildings’ structural members and engaged by wind-induced oscillations to transform the kinetic energy of the oscillating structure into electricity. The concept of PiD is transformative as this will scale-up currently developed piezoelectric EH (pzEH) techniques at the micro and meso-scales to the truly macro scale. pzEH devices have never been implemented as structural connections in civil buildings for a number of reasons, such as the inadequacy of piezo materials in carrying loads and low frequencies of the vibrations occurring in buildings. These will be comprehensively addressed in SMART-UP by innovative in-parallel coupling schemes between piezo and the load-carrying members such as steel and/or rubber and by allowing the piezo-blocks working in nonlinear regimes arising from buckling or impact. These features will allow their implementation in buildings for powering wireless sensors provided for building automation, which leads to an increment of the building sustainability, and for structural-health monitoring, leading to an increase of the building resilience. Thanks to the introduction of these novel macroscale EH skills, the SMART-UP project makes a step-change in high-rise buildings design and management, by defining a new breed of tall SMART buildings with self-powering, adaptive-in-behavior capabilities. The envisioned buildings not only resist wind loads, but they exploit wind-induced vibrations to reduce their carbon footprint and improve their performances. They will push Europe moving forward to the smart cities era, which is of paramount importance in our modern technological and connected/inclusive society.

Mots clés : structural engineering, energy harvesting, vibration, piezoelectric

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

The SOC-ILL action introduces the first systematic comparative interdisciplinary investigation into women illustrators in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY, 1945–1991), paying attention to all former Yugoslav contexts and combining art and literary historical and theoretical approaches with cultural studies for novel critical insights into socialist aesthetic education and subjectivation of children, especially in relation to gender. Through the examination of multiple archives and interviews with older generations of professionals working within the feminized sector of publishing for minors, the action works against their disappearance before any academic documentation can take place. The action entails 3 main objectives: (i) To explore and contextually interpret distinctive childhood- and gender conceptions within Yugoslav publishing for minors; (ii) To map the practice of women illustrators for minors at the intersection between local, regional and international artistic and aesthetic education movements; (iii) To intervene into academic “archiving” by supporting a more complex understanding of socialist modernist aesthetic education and subjectivation. Thus the action contributes to redefinition of the relation between communicative and cultural memory of the European socialist past in the broader fields of Yugoslav, Slavonic, and socialist studies and the disciplines of art, literary and cultural history. These objectives can only be achieved in the proposed collaboration, with my cross-sectorally situated research – my expertise on (post)socialist women’s authorship, i.e. a pioneering thesis on gender, war, and memory and a variety of international scientific and art events – and the beneficiary’s distinctive expertise within the emerging (post)Yugoslav studies. This unique transfer will ensure a notable academic footprint, my full re-integration into science and foster impactful scientific cognizance within a broad range of stakeholders.

Mots clés : socialist yugoslav aesthetic education, childhood and gender in illustration, socialism and subjectivation

Participants :
- Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (Slovénie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 243060.48 €
Projet SOS-Nano (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The SOS-Nano project will address one of the most pressing cutting edge issues of econanotoxicology at present: to find a structural property of nanoparticles (NPs) to predict their potential toxicity in real aquatic environments, the final sink of released NPs. By using an in vivo natural water exposure system, SOS-Nano will test the suitability of two paradigms, recently demonstrated effective in vitro for ranking the hazard of metal oxide NPs: 1) NPs physical-electrochemical properties for predicting oxidative stress potential, and 2) oxidative stress generation for predicting biological impact. The experimental plan of SOS-Nano is totally innovative for design and methodology: the relationships between NPs structure and toxic activity will be studied under the influence of natural water properties, and the toxic potential will be ranked through a multi-tier system combining genomics and functional measurements. The science of SOS-Nano will have high impact: nanotechnology is one of the six EU Key Enabling Technologies selected by the EU Commission to address the industrial-economic competitiveness and the grand societal challenges in Europe by 2020 (US$ 2.5 trillion of world market, 2 million of employers by 2015). The lack of a sound human and environmental risk assessment of NPs is now the major limitation to the safe growth of this economic sector, and the EU research community is tasked with addressing the nanotechnologies development toward sustainability. The SOS-Nano project will represent the perfect opportunity for the applicant to join a cutting edge working environment in which she will realise her potential as a leading nanosafety expert in EU. The host Institution, the University of Exeter, is in the top 10 UK Universities which will provide exciting opportunities for gaining interdisciplinary experience of novel approaches in ecotoxicology and for networking with industry and international partners at the forefront of environmental nanoscience.

Mots clés : nanoparticle, metal oxide, zinc, cerium, nickel, nanotoxicity, oxidative stress, bandgap energy, dissolution, oyster, crassostrea, marine environment, in vivo, water chemistry, surface properties

Participants :
- University of Exeter (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 183454.8 €
Projet BEMUS (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The Venetian humanist Pietro Bembo (1470-1547) played a central role in the European Renaissance. His literary works are widely known and his rich epistolary attests both his contacts with all the most important figures of his time, and the variety of his interests, ranging from literature to arts. However, a missing piece precludes the possibility of grasping Pietro Bembo's multi-faceted figure in its complexity: the sound dimension in which he was immersed has never been adequately investigated so far. This project aims to complete Bembo's portrait by reconstructing the soundscape that surrounded him, and his musical interests and networks. His literary works and letters, together with a few dedications in printed musical volumes and letters written by his friends and acquaintances, offer precious material in order to understand his involvement with music. The research will also explore the reception of his poems by composers who set them to music, investigating the reasons of this choice and evaluating Bembo's role in the dissemination of his texts among musicians. All the collected data, read against previous musicological studies about the cities where Bembo lived and the musicians working there at the same time, will contribute to complete Bembo's image from a musical point of view. The main results of the research will converge in a multimedia database which, combining the images of the very places that Bembo frequented and the music he could have heard, will constitute a visual and aural reconstruction of Bembo’s experiences of five centuries ago.


Participants :
- University of Padua (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 171473.28 €
Projet minimal-phagocyte (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The ability of cells to engulf large objects, such as invading microorganisms or apoptotic cells, is crucial to innate immunity and tissue remodelling. The molecular basis of this process - phagocytosis - is complex, involving numerous receptors and signalling pathways. Nevertheless, the biophysical process is always the same: the cell membrane deforms and reshapes to wrap around the particle, and upon closure and abscission of the resultant cup, the particle is internalised. Although the key molecular players in individual phagocytic pathways have been identified, we still know very little about the basic biophysics common to all phagocytic pathways. I propose to fill this gap in our knowledge by creating a “minimal phagocyte”: I aim to reconstitute a minimal, dynamic actin cytoskeleton and artificial phagocytic receptors in giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs), thereby identifying the molecular components that are not only necessary but also sufficient for phagocytosis. Using synthetic biology to build a bottom-up model of phagocytosis should answer many open questions, including: are spatial cues resulting from particle binding required for membrane wrapping around the particle? Is directed initiation of actin polymerisation sufficient to render GUVs capable of phagocytosis? What is the role of the membrane-supporting actin cortex and how does the affinity of the receptors affect the engulfment process? Beyond phagocytosis, the minimal-model approach I propose will also be useful to study other cellular functions requiring actin-driven membrane reorganisation, such as cell mobility. In line with the objectives set by ERA-NET ERASynBio and the Horizon 2020 work programme (which identified synthetic biology as one of the “cutting-edge biotechnologies as future innovation drivers”), the creation of “protocells” will not only enhance our understanding of biology, but ultimately also result in novel biotechnological applications, such as improved drug delivery systems.

Mots clés : membrane biophysics, biomimetics, in vitro reconstitution, synthetic biology, phagocytosis

Participants :
- Max Planck Society (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 159460.8 €
Projet R3DINBOW (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The ability of electronic devices to act as switches makes digital information processing possible. The current silicon-based semiconductor processors are fabricated according to a top-down principle. However, the need to scale down in the size of such electronic devices has prompted the search for molecule-based information processing components (Molecular Electronics), such as switching memories, sensors and logic gates. Concretely, within the past two decades, developments in Nanotechnology have shown the capabilities of molecules to perform some of the computational logic functions - relating to the concept of logical zeros (0) and ones (1) binary code - achieved in mainstream semiconductor technology. Molecular logic gates differ from the currently used semiconductor elements by small size, multifunctional nature and variability of input and output signals. Nonetheless, the transition of logic elements from mostly optical means for reading output signals to electronic transduction tools would be beneficial for developing many novel logic elements for information processing, (bio)sensing and actuation. Accordingly, the design, construction and miniaturization of molecular electronic systems capable of performing complex logic functions is a current challenge. Herein, 3D printing technology is presented as a promising tool to open up new horizons in the field of electronic devices in general, and molecular logic gates in particular. For this goal, a sustainable bottom-up approach has been devised for the development of the next generation of “intelligent” 3D-printed electronic devices - 3D-printed responsive interfaces -, where bistable (supra)molecular switches will be electrically read out on carbon-based 3D-printed conductive substrates as the proof. Accordingly, R3DINBOW is in strong agreement with the EU’s digital strategy, while helping to achieve its target of a climate-neutral Europe by 2050 and responding to the current needs of our Society.

Mots clés : 3d printing technology, responsive interfaces, molecular switches, electrodes, logic gates

Participants :
- Brno University of Technology (Rép. Tchèque) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 144980.64 €