Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet SUHIST (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The fast growing of cities population in the last decades, which is projected to be continued in the following, requires a better understanding of urban climatology and atmospheric conditions, looking for the benefit of citizens’ life. In a fast warming world due to climate change, the UHI, defined as the temperature difference between the urban area and its surroundings, is a major concern in the cities. UHI has been traditionally studied with localised in-situ air temperature measurements, i.e., taking the difference between a representative value of the city and of the suburban area, thereby limited by its spatial representability. However, a deep comprehension of UHI spatial variability is essential for supplying policy-makers with high-quality information to plan, prevent and mitigate the UHI effect, especially relevant under extreme heat conditions. While satellite thermal infrared (TIR) data provided new valuable insights in surface UHI (SUHI), these are still limited by the compromise between the spatial and temporal resolution of TIR satellite sensors. In this action, we will develop a novel methodology to estimate high-accuracy (<2 K) land surface temperatures (LST) at unprecedent high spatio-temporal resolution, i.e. ≤100 m at four different times. The ADTC model will be applied to ECOSTRESS LST data, which will be refined in synergy MODIS LST data. The SUHI diurnal cycle will be evaluated over 24 European cities to analyse the SUHI variability at European cities with different climate characteristics. The project outcomes are expected to have a relevant impact on economy and society, since the high-resolution data produced in the project will be provided to policy-makers and to urban and health planning related sectors. In addition, findings from the project will be communicated to general public and students in collaboration with local institutions and universities.

Mots clés : urban heat island, uhi, heatwaves, land surface temperature

Participants :
- Mediterranean Center for Environmental Studies (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 165312.96 €
Projet EvoChromoAdapt (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

MAIN HYPOTHESIS: Changes in chromatin drive evolution and adaptation in eukaryotes.  MAIN OBJECTIVE: This project aims to understand the impact of epigenetic regulation on the evolution of eukaryotes adapted to extreme environments. To achieve this objective, I will use two approaches involving extremophilic eukaryotes: 1) Identify chromatin signatures to evaluate the potential roles of chromatin in adapting to extreme environments. 2) Use experimental evolution to examine how chromatin affects their capacity for adaptation.  BACKGROUND: My previous research identified genome size reduction as a broad signature of adaptation strategies in extremophilic eukaryotes. In particular, an unanticipated loss of several canonical epigenetic pathways took place during the evolution of extremophilic red algae. I hypothesize that global changes in chromatin features have influenced the adaptation to extreme environments in eukaryotes.  STRATEGIES: I will apply orthogonal strategies to investigate the function of chromatin in environmental adaptability. I will use multi-omics to reveal adaptation signatures based on the comparison of the composition and maps of chromatin features between extremophilic and mesophilic groups. Genetic engineering in model red algae will identify the chromatin machinery that impacts adaptation to extreme environments. Finally, experimental evolution will be used to characterize how the specific chromatin composition of extremophilic red algae impacts adaptation capacity.  IMPACT: This work will establish how chromatin influences the evolution of eukaryotes with direct experimental evidence. It will demonstrate how specific chromatin components impact eukaryotic adaptations and eventually identify some macro-evolutionary trends that participate in the emergence of new eukaryotic lineages.

Mots clés : evolutionary biology, epigenomics, adaptability, chromatin, extremophiles

Participants :
- Gregor Mendel Institute of Molecular Plant Biology (Autriche) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 183600.96 €
Projet DeNovo-HGT (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The emergence and acquisition of new genes play a crucial role in the evolution of eukaryotes, providing new functions that contribute to adapting to changing environments and conquering unexplored niches through cellular innovations. Horizontal gene transfer (HGT), defined as the acquisition of genetic material from different species, has been shown to play a key role in eukaryotic genome evolution. HGT, particularly from bacteria and viruses, provides unprecedented adaptive potential by introducing novel functions into eukaryotic cells. However, new genes are often quickly lost because important constraints and evolutionary barriers need to be overcome for successful integration into the host genome. Despite the importance of HGT for eukaryotic biology, how this process works is still unclear and the mechanisms that contribute to the domestication of foreign genes, especially at the early stages, are unexplored. This project aims to develop a new experimental model for investigating HGT in eukaryotes using the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. For this, a bacterial antibiotic resistance gene (aphVIII) will be randomly integrated into the C. reinhardtii genome and its real-time functionalisation and evolutionary trajectories will be tracked. Using experimental evolution, I will identify genomic features that have a major impact on the control and stability of new genes. Additionally, I will analyze how HGT contributes to adaptation and impacts evolutionary flexibility in different scenarios. Finally, I will survey green algal diversity to understand how HGT contributed to the evolution of chlorophytes. Hence, this interdisciplinary project, combining molecular biology, experimental evolution, and computational methods, will offer unprecedented insights into the mechanisms of HGT in eukaryotes and answer fundamental questions in evolutionary biology, many of which have important implications for genome engineering and biotechnology.

Mots clés : horizontal gene transfer chlamydomonas experimental evolution

Participants :
- Gregor Mendel Institute of Molecular Plant Biology (Autriche) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 230184.72 €
Projet MicroChrom (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The extremely long DNA molecules encoding complex genomes of higher eukaryotes must be organised inside the tiny volume of cells so that the genetic information can be read, maintained, and propagated across cell generations. Genomic DNA is folded into loops such that contacts between distant DNA elements can mediate transcriptional regulation or assembly of mechanically stiff mitotic chromosomes. Following DNA replication, each chromosome contains two DNA molecules, which interact with each other to support homology-directed repair during interphase and DNA compaction during mitosis. Advances in sequencing technology and super-resolution microscopy have revealed the 3D structure of chromosomes with unprecedented resolution, but conventional methods cannot distinguish between the identical sequence present in replicated sister-chromatids. The Gerlich lab has recently developed a new sequencing-based technique termed sister-chromatid-sensitive (scs)Hi-C, which allows the discrimination of intra- from inter-molecular contacts in replicated chromosomes. However, scsHi-C can only inform on interaction probabilities and does not reveal the actual 3D structure in single cells. Therefore, the aim of my proposed project is to establish a sister-chromatid-sensitive fluorescence in situ hybridisation (scsFISH) method for the highly multiplexed and automated detection of the 3D architecture of replicated genomes within individual cells. The ring-shaped cohesin complex is a key regulator of chromosome structure by forming loops within DNA molecules and by linking sister-chromatids. By depleting cohesin core subunits/regulators, I will use scsFISH to understand how cohesin structures replicated chromosomes. I will further investigate how sister-chromatid conformation influences the efficiency of homology-directed repair at double-strand breaks. My project will hence provide insights into the organisation of replicated genomes, with important implications for genomic integrity.

Mots clés : sister chromatids chromatin fiber tracing fluorescence microscopy chromosome conformation dna repair

Participants :
- Institut für Molekulare Biotechnologie (Autriche) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 199440.96 €
Projet AtaxAtlas (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Inherited Cerebellar ataxia (CAs) is a large and multifaceted group of rare genetic neurodegenerative diseases affecting mainly the cerebellum and its connection, leading to the loss of coordination and ataxia phenotype. Purkinje neurons (PN) are crucial cells for cerebellar functionality, but also very sensitive neurons. Indeed, they were found as the most vulnerable cerebellar neurons in many CAs, both in mouse and human samples. Although CAs show high genetic heterogeneity and have different disease-genes, they converge into similar phenotypic features and recent papers highlighted common deregulated key pathways. The current research landscape, indeed, points out towards the identification of calcium, glutamate and inositol phosphate signaling as frequently dysregulated. However, there is yet no comprehensive analysis of degenerative mechanisms, in particular in PNs, that could prioritize molecular targets for therapeutic development. Our metanalysis readouts suggest converging pathophysiological points across different CAs, which so far remain poorly understood and need to be characterized. To this aim in this application, we propose to investigate in depth cerebellum CA signature taking advantage of cutting-edge single-cell profiling approaches in two flagship CA mouse models (SCA7, ARCA2) at two different disease stages. The combination of transcriptomics (single-nucleus RNA sequencing, probe-based spatial transcriptomics) and protein validation will help us to build a cerebellum atlas in the context of CA. The goal will be reached through the effort and synergism of a multi-disciplinary task force comprising biological, -omics approaches and computational expertise. The results will be presented and communicated during international conferences, via social media and, finally, published in peer-reviewed journals in order to reach a broad scientific community. Also, the data will be used to inform lay audience through the collaboration with patient association

Mots clés : cerebellar ataxia, cerebellum, purkinje neuron, transcriptomics, gene modulation, disease mechanisms, disease treatment

Participants :
- Institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 195914.88 €
- Université de Lausanne (Suisse) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
Projet REVEAL (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Primordial neutrinos are key messengers from the Early Universe, offering a probe of the cosmic times as small as 0.01 seconds after the Big Bang. This represents a key test of both the standard models of particle physics and cosmology. Upcoming Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) observations will achieve unprecedented precision in measuring neutrino properties, potentially revealing or constraining new physics. Establishing this linkage requires a unified, efficient, model-independent approach to solving the neutrino Boltzmann equation in the presence of new physics. Current studies lack all these features, resulting in a fragmented, limited, and opaque state-of-the-art.  This project will systematically study the effects of various new physics scenarios on primordial neutrinos and their impact on CMB, Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN), and baryon acoustic oscillations. It will develop a novel approach to solving the neutrino Boltzmann equation using an improved Direct Simulation Monte Carlo method, addressing limitations in current methods. Several new physics models will be considered within the approach, including decaying particles (like Heavy Neutral Leptons and late reheating particles) and non-standard neutrino interactions. The analysis will culminate in CosmoCalc, a framework to map new physics models to neutrino properties and primordial abundances, calculating cosmological constraints and/or sensitivities. It will also integrate cosmological observations with laboratory searches to refine the parameter space for new physics, guiding future accelerator experiments like SHiP.  By providing results and tools open-access, this project will connect theoretical predictions with observational data, enhance interdisciplinary collaboration, and improve the interpretation of high-precision measurements from upcoming cosmological missions, paving the way for future exploration of the universe's fundamental properties.

Mots clés : primordial neutrinos, new physics, boltzmann equation, cosmological observations, cosmic microwave background, big bang nucleosynthesis

Participants :
- Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire (Suisse) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 307958.88 €
Projet BBJAmps (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The data taken at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN and its future High-Luminosity upgrade enables the study of the fundamental interactions of matter at unprecedented precision and energy. After the discovery of the Higgs boson one of the major goals of the LHC is the precise measurement of its properties. In order to achieve the needed theoretical precision, two-loop corrections to many scattering amplitudes have to be computed. A crucial process to precisely determine the coupling of the Higgs boson to the bottom quark is the production of a Higgs, a Z-boson, and a jet. This process receives large contributions and accompanying uncertainties from the sub-process of gluon fusion, which only starts contributing at the one-loop level but is enhanced by the large gluon luminosity at hadron colliders. To improve the theoretical description of this sub-process and enable the most precise determination of the Higgs-bottom coupling, the two-loop five-point amplitudes of this sub-process will be computed in this project. The results of this project can also be applied to double Higgs production, which the crucial experimental signature to determine the Higgs self-interaction at hadron colliders in the future. The computation of five-point amplitudes with massive internal and external particles is a tremendously difficult task, due to the algebraic complexity of the amplitudes and the appearance of new classes of special functions. To tackle and circumvent some of the difficulties I will explore the systematic approximation of these complicated amplitudes in various kinematic limits, like small Mandelstam variables or the high-energy limit. This methodology has already proven successful for two-loop four-point amplitudes previously. The results of this project will, therefore, significantly enhance our ability to obtain precise theory predictions for high-multiplicity processes and simplify their calculation and numerical evaluation.

Mots clés : scattering amplitudes, qcd, perturbative qcd, lhc, collider physics, high energy phenomenology

Participants :
- Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire (Suisse) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 292118.88 €
Projet Rewiring PRC2 (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Polycomb repressive complex 2 (PRC2), which incorporates repressive methyl-lysine marks on histone H3 to facilitate global transcriptional repression, is an integral epigenetic modifier in normal development. Components of this complex, especially EZH2, are hyperactive or overexpressed in a broad range of cancers, resulting in excessive silencing of tumor suppressor genes (TSGs). Moreover, cancers with defects in the SWI/SNF complex, the most frequently mutated chromatin regulatory complex in cancer, are dependent on PRC2 function for survival. While inhibition or degradation of PRC2 components have become extremely attractive approaches to cancer therapy, they still suffer from suboptimal kinetics and perturbation because they must rely on opposing epigenetic modifiers and transcriptional regulators to derepress expression of silenced TSGs. Thus, I aim to overcome this issue by leveraging the cancer driver itself to derepress silenced TSGs. In this regard, I will utilize a high-throughput protein recruitment screen, coupled to next-generation sequencing, to identify proteins (effectors) that, when recruited to PRC2, can rewire its function to directly derepress a PRC2-silenced locus. This screen will be used a base to develop novel proximity inducing compounds, which can rewire the function of PRC2. The compound that produces the strongest transcriptional derepression and anti-proliferative effects in cancer cells will then be characterized via transcriptomics, and chromatin profiling to determine its effects on endogenous gene expression. Ultimately, this study will establish a new class of PRC2 targeting compounds that will pave the way for improved cancer therapies, which both inhibit PRC2 methyltransferase activity and directly derepress PRC2-silenced TSGs.

Mots clés : polycomb repressive complex, proximity inducing pharmacology, transcriptional regulation, chemical biology

Participants :
- CeMM Research Center for Molecular Medicine (Autriche) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 199440.96 €
Projet EFFORTS (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Primordial features (PFs) are scale-dependent deviations from the leading-order, scale-invariant spectra of primordial density perturbations, often manifesting as oscillations. These PFs arise from disturbances in the potential or internal space of primordial Universe models, which alter the background evolution from the leading trajectory. While the amplitudes of these features are uncertain, their presence is likely, and detecting them would offer insights into the physics of the primordial Universe, such as new energy scales and heavier degrees of freedom coupled to the inflaton field. This proposal aims to maximize the efficiency of the search for PFs in current and future cosmological data. I will test PF models against the most recent Cosmic Microwave Background and Large Scale Structure data for the first time using both the power spectrum and bispectrum of primordial fluctuations. At smaller scales, PF signals must be much larger to be detected through the Stochastic Gravitational Wave Background (SGWB) sourced by large scalar fluctuations. Focusing on the future LISA experiment, I will build an efficient code and pipeline to detect these signals in future data. On the theoretical side, I will also explore the contribution of loop corrections in these models, which may dominate over tree-level results, and design novel non-perturbative techniques to compute the spectra in these cases. This project will set the state of the art for analyzing PFs of any amplitude and at any cosmological scales.


Participants :
- Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire (Suisse) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 292118.88 €
Projet ROSEBuD (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - Global Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Early-life stress and its regulation define adult resilience on stress, well-being, and mental health. Previous research shows that the presence of a caregiver during early life is important for stress regulation, enabling safety feelings, exploratory behaviour, and regulation-related brain development. However, real-time stress experiences have not been examined in those studies and only selective parameters of the stress regulation mechanism have been considered, rather than multiple modalities and their complex interaction. ROSEBuD aims to describe the mechanisms of early-life stress and stress regulation, with and without the presence of a caregiver, in terms of physiological and endocrine synchrony (O1), brain structure and functional connectivity (O2), as well as on effects on memory formation (O3). The project tackles the limitations of existing research with the innovative combination of (a) a naturalistic experimental setting, i.e. real-time exposure to mild, school-like stressors and similar to real-life presence of a caregiver,(b) multi-modal data acquisition, incl. cutting-edge neuroimaging techniques (Diffusion Tensor Imaging, DTI-MRI, and magnetoencephalography, MEG) for optimal spatial and temporal resolution in the study of structural and functional connectivity, (c) state-of-the-art measures of neuroendocrine and physiological synchrony and memory, and (d) advanced analytical methods. Bridging interdisciplinary expertise in stress and memory research (outgoing phase, CISA, Geneva; supervised by Prof. Rimmele) and multilevel and MEG analyses (return phase, FORTH, Heraklion; supervised by Prof. Simos), ROSEBuD project aspires to make an important, timely and impactful contribution to basic and applied research, as well as to the society, informing about the crucial role of early-life stress regulation. Lastly, this work will enable me to synthesize and expand my research interests and skills, and promote my academic or non-academic career prospects.

Mots clés : stress regulation, stress, early life, childhood, development, brain, neural correlates, neuroendocrine, physiology, memory

Participants :
- Foundation for Research and Technology Hellas (Grèce) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 311292.48 €
- Université de Genève (Suisse) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €