Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet UFOX (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The purpose of this research project is to get a deeper understanding of the mechanisms and the fundamental interactions that control the formation of electronic ordered phases and the competition between different phenomena in 4d and 3d-4d hybrid transition metal oxides (TMO). Investigation of 4d materials, proposed here, provides new challenges and opportunities – they share some common features with 3d systems which stem from electron correlations, but have in addition subtle sensitivity of the electronic states to the lattice structure, effective dimensionality and, most importantly, to relativistic effects due to stronger spin-orbit coupling. The aim of the project is to exploit the class of 4d perovskite ruthenium oxides together with different 4d-3d families of doped materials as a platform for exploring in a controlled way the interplay between correlations, dimensionality and spin-orbit effects when moving from 4d to 3d oxides. Doping a 4d host with 3d impurities might be extremely effective in tuning valence, spin and orbital characteristics and, in turn, the macroscopic physical properties of bulk and layered systems. An ultimate goal is to exploit the variety of physical phenomena inherited in these classes of materials to design interfaces and heterostructures which can show properties at the nanometer scale that are qualitatively different from their single building blocks, thus allowing to engineer novel functionalities. Such a rich scenario can open the route to the fabrication and design of systems where novel and multiple functionalities are nano-integrated on the same “chip”. The key challenge of the present project is, then, both to unveil the complexities due to the interplay between the “dimensionality” and the “spin-orbital-charge-lattice” degrees of freedom and to disentangle them to get insight into the nature of the ordered states and the physical phenomena in 4d-3d systems, as well as in 4d-3d oxide interfaces and heterostructures.

Mots clés : transition metal oxides, magnetism, correlated electron systems, electronic structure, oxides heterostructures, interface physics

Participants :
- National Research Council (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 180277.2 €
Projet PHOTO-ITU (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The quest for successful lead candidates in drug discovery has challenged synthetic chemists to develop innovative strategies to rapidly generate screening collections of chiral molecules. In this context, cascade processes provide a powerful tool for rapidly increasing, in one step, structural and stereochemical complexity, while fulfilling the requirements for atom and step economy. The development of asymmetric variants has mainly relied so far on ionic reactivity. PHOTO-ITU seeks to expand the synthetic potential of asymmetric cascade reactions to include the radical reactivity domain. To achieve this goal, we will combine asymmetric organocatalysis and photochemistry, two powerful strategies of modern chemical research with an extraordinary potential for the sustainable preparation of novel molecules. Specifically, we will exploit the unexplored excited-state reactivity of isothiourea-based catalytic intermediates thus merging, for the first time, tertiary amine isothiourea catalysis with asymmetric photochemistry. The resulting photochemical asymmetric radical cascades will rapidly generate, in one single step, architecturally complex chiral natural-like compounds containing biologically relevant heterocyclic scaffolds. The planned research combines perfectly the fellow’s experience in isothiourea catalysis and the host’s experience in photo-triggered asymmetric processes to develop otherwise unachievable catalytic asymmetric radical cascade reactions. The resulting strategies will be used as an ideal platform for assembling libraries comprising enantiopure chiral small molecules that, along with biological screening carried out in collaboration with an international pharma-company (Bayer AG), will increase the probability of success in identifying drug-candidate structures. The multi-cultural and intersectorial nature of this project will contribute to broaden the fellow’s competencies and will place him in a competitive position for the next career move.

Mots clés : radical chemistry, asymmetric catalysis, organocatalysis, photochemistry, electron transfer, drug development

Participants :
- Institut Català d'Investigació Química (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 160932.48 €
Projet MBL-Fermions (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The question of how an isolated quantum mechanical system thermalizes is not only significant in condensed matter physics, but it also invokes the intriguing problem of the apparent loss of information in a complex system as it thermalizes. A curious case is when a complex system fails to thermalize altogether -- a phenomenon known as many-body localization (MBL). Here, we propose to use interacting ultracold fermions in a lattice to experimentally study the distinctive properties of MBL using a novel set of observables. Among the questions in MBL debated intensely today are those concerning the existence of a many-body mobility edge, many-body intermediate phase and localization in higher dimensional lattice systems. Moreover, the striking relation between non-ergodicity and Hilbert space fragmentation is also not fully understood. In this view, our research objectives include: [1.] Stark many-body localization and Hilbert space fragmentation. We plan to study MBL in a tilted lattice, i.e., a Stark Hamiltonian and study non-ergodicity resulting from Hilbert space fragmentation. [2.] Bipartite fluctuations in an MBL system of >100 lattice sites: We propose to characterize the localization properties using bipartite fluctuations which is a proxy for the Entanglement entropy of a 1D lattice. [3.] Approximate theories for fermionic MBL systems: Due to the exponential Hilbert space dimension of an interacting many-body system, studying their properties numerically is also exponentially hard. We plan to use a quantum simulator with >100 lattice sites develop efficient approximate theories to describe these systems. The aforementioned projects are easily accessible to the current experimental capability and they will enhance our general understanding of MBL physics. Moreover, they also include a step towards developing ultracold atoms in a lattice into a quantum simulator, capable of solving hard problems.

Mots clés : fermionic pptical lattice, many body localization

Participants :
- Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 162806.4 €
Projet PEDIGREE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The question of which economic framework (or sets of frameworks) is (are) appropriate for providing policy prescriptions conducive to ecological sustainable has gained renewed interest within the community of ecological economists and political economists. To help answer this question I propose to investigate the suitability of four economic frameworks — neoclassical environmental economics, non-Walrasian neoclassical environmental economics, institutional ecological economics, and ecological Marxian political economy, for providing effective and coherent policy prescriptions for renewable and sustainable energy resources, specifically for electricity generation. The inquiry will be both philosophical/methodological and empirical. The four frameworks will be interrogated against case studies of the UK, Germany, Norway, France, Canada, and the US. The case studies will be comprised of analyses of the socio-economic, historical, political, and cultural backdrop of energy resources in each country. The results of this interrogation will then be used to assess the suitability of the four frameworks for providing policy prescriptions conducive to ecological sustainability with regards to their respective methodologies including ontology, epistemology, methodology (to include methods as well), and ideology. The case for methodological pluralism will be assessed and a notion of pluralism developed for economic frameworks concerned with ecological sustainability. The benefits that will be gained from undertaking this research program at the ERA level will accrue to economists and social scientists first by giving them better analytical and conceptual tools, and all those, including policy makers, politicians, and business leaders who depend on those tools afterwards through better results.

Mots clés : pluralism, ecology and political economy, european energy policy, north american energy policy

Participants :
- Anglia Ruskin University (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 183454.8 €
Projet ARNU (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The question of why matter is able to exist in abundance in our Universe is one of the most exciting open questions in physics today. One possible source of a matter-antimatter asymmetry is an as yet undiscovered difference between neutrino and antineutrino oscillations (CP-violation). DUNE is a next generation long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiment that aims to discover CP-violation in neutrino oscillations for the first time. An intense accelerator (anti)neutrino beam from Fermilab will be directed at far detectors 1300 km away. In order to observe this difference, the experiment must contend with the fact that our planet and detectors are made of matter and not antimatter. Any differences between the way neutrinos and antineutrinos interact with atomic matter must therefore be well understood in order to disentangle these differences from CP-violation in the neutrino oscillations themselves. In this action I will work to reduce the systematic errors on DUNE's CP-violation measurement caused by uncertainties in our understanding of neutrino-nucleus interactions. The work will be centered around DUNE's currently operating prototype detectors. This work is essential to conduct now since DUNE will use argon as its neutrino interaction target nucleus, resulting in more complex nuclear effects than experienced by the current generation of long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments, which use lighter nuclei. In particular I will simulate the effects of different nuclear models on the interaction probabilities for neutrinos and antineutrinos and apply new analysis techniques to better distinguish between different nuclear models, ultimately improving DUNE's sensitivity to CP-violation in neutrino oscillations.

Mots clés : cp violation, liquid argon tpcs, neutrino nucleus interactions, convolutional neural networks, simulating particle interactions in matter, deep learning, neutrino interaction generators

Participants :
- Imperial College London (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 212933.76 €
Projet POLARISO (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The rate of Antarctic ice loss is accelerating and reached 20% of the global sea level rise in 2012–2017. This acceleration is attributed to the coupling between atmosphere, ocean, and ice sheet dynamics. Intensive efforts are in place for modelling this complex coupled system, which is the only valid approach to improve sea level rise projections. However, the greatest uncertainty in simulating the future of the Antarctic ice sheet is due to the lack of direct observational constraints required to evaluate and improve global climate models. The isotopic signals contained in Antarctic ice cores have high potential to record the climate variability of recent centuries as water stable isotopes are tracers of the whole water cycle pathway. However, linking the isotopic signal to climate patterns requires to use isotope-enabled climate models, which are currently limited by their poor skills in simulating polar-specific processes. The POLARISO project aims to overcome this major limitation by implementing water stable isotopes in a polar-oriented regional climate model, which will be evaluated with new isotope observations in Antarctica. We will then use the validated simulations to identify large scale drivers of the isotope variability at the Antarctic surface. This project is based on a synergy between advances in Antarctic climate modelling (PI) and advances in continuous measurements of water isotopes in water vapor and precipitation in Antarctica (host). The POLARISO project will provide robust transfer functions between climate modes and water isotope variability, which will open doors for new climate reconstructions based on water isotope measurements in Antarctic deep and shallow ice cores. It will also enable the PI to reach an independent leading position by developing an internationally unique expertise on polar regional modelling equipped with water isotopes, dedicated to model-data studies.

Mots clés : antarctica, climate reconstruction, water stable isotopes, regional climate modelling, polar processes, water cycle, model evaluation, sea level

Participants :
- Centre national de la recherche scientifique (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 196707.84 €
Projet CliMoTran (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The recent geological past is characterized by the cyclic growth and decay of large continental ice-sheets in the northern hemisphere driven by changes in incoming solar radiation associated with Earth’s orbital configuration. These glacial-interglacial cycles initially responded to the 41,000 year pacing of Earth’s axial tilt, but about 1 million years ago this periodicity slowed down to ~100,000 year cycles without any discernible change in orbital parameters, thus indicating fundamental shifts in internal feedback mechanisms. Yet, converging evidence for the origin of this remarkable change in glacial-interglacial pacing, known as the Mid-Pleistocene Transition, remains elusive. The CliMoTran project aims towards a comprehensive understanding of this unique climate transition through the employment of the Bern3D Earth System model. In order to enable fully dynamical simulations of glacial-interglacial cycles a readily available vertical integrated ice-sheet model will be coupled to the exceptionally computational efficient Bern3D model. Newly compiled paleoclimatic reconstructions will form important constraints on the past climate that can be directly compared to the wide palette of tracers implemented in the Bern3D model. This, together with the individually explored forcing parameters will shed light on the complex processes that were responsible for the remarkable slow-down of ice age cycles. As such, the project will advance the understanding of the relevant, often interwoven, driving processes of climate change, a much-needed undertaking for improving predictions of future climate in the face of accelerated anthropogenic carbon emissions. Conducted in a leading multidisciplinary research environment CliMoTran will thus not only expand the researcher’s previous scientific background in environmental physics and Earth sciences but will also enhance the development of his career as an independent researcher in a unique way.

Mots clés : climate modeling, mid pleistocene transition, glacial interglacial cycles, ice sheet modeling

Participants :
- University of Bern (Suisse) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 191149.44 €
Projet BlackHoleMergers (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The recent pioneering observations of gravitational waves (GWs) from merging black holes (BHs) by LIGO/Virgo have already led to new remarkable insight: From the first few events we have learned that BHs do indeed exist, that Einstein's General Relativity (GR) seems to very well describe their merger and ring-down evolution, and that nature is able to pair BHs in compact binary systems. However, many astrophysical key questions still remain unsolved, including, how and where BHs form and what helps them to get close enough to merge on an observable timescale. The project I propose will provide new state-of-the-art insight into such fundamental questions by addressing how BBHs form and merge in dense stellar systems, as well as how well one can infer their origin from their emitted GW signal. In order to achieve this goal, I will develop a new numerical Monte-Carlo framework for evolving dense stellar systems, which for the first time will include: stellar tidal interactions and GR corrections during strong few-body scatterings, orbital diffusion from weak encounters, and secular effects near a possible central massive BH. From my recent analytical models, these effects are expected to lead to the formation of eccentric BBH mergers, as well as other exotic populations, all of which can be used to constrain the dynamical origins of BBHs. The goal is to provide the community with accurate BBH merger distributions that can be used to constrain the origin of BBH mergers using incoming data from LIGO/Virgo. I will carry out the project at the Niels Bohr Institute under the supervisions of Prof. Martin Pessah and Niels Bohr Prof. Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz. The interdisciplinary environment, vibrant atmosphere, and exceptional scientists make the Niels Bohr Institute not only the ideal host for this project, but further ensures that I will mature into a true intellectual leader in my field during the time of the Marie Curie Fellowship.

Mots clés : relativistic dynamics, evolution of dense stellar systems, black hole mergers, n body simulations, origin of gravitational wave sources

Participants :
- University of Copenhagen (Danemark) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 219312.0 €
Projet 2DQOptics (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The recently discovered two dimensional 2D materials have opened up new possibilities for exploration of fundamental physics as well as device applications. Such materials offer new opportunities for ultra compact optoelectronic devices. On the other hand, with the improvement in micro and nanofabrication techniques, it is now possible to fabricate ultra high Q microresonators (UHQ µresonators). A relevant example is the case of silica microtoroids, which due to the whispering gallery modes, display one of the highest Q factors ever reported. The basic aim of this proposal is to advance the fields of 2D materials and integrated UHQ µresonators alike by pursuing the integration of the two platforms. Specifically two aims are addressed. First coupling these atomically thin systems with silica and silicon nitride (SiN) UHQ µresonators platforms may help us uncover new quantum behaviour of emission from 2D materials in particular to validate unambiguous lasing via established recipes such as g^(2) measurements. Our work will elucidate if lasing is possible and strive to integrate such lasers with SiN integrated photonic circuits. Second integrate the 2D materials with the developed integrated photonic SiN circuits using the photonic damascene process as developed by the host group to realize an entirely novel concept: the use of 2D materials to stablize the carrier envelope frequency fceo of a frequency comb. This will be realized using a SiN broadening waveguide that is functionalized to contain a 2D atomically thin semi-conductor in conjunction with the recently demonstrated quantum interference effect. This effect enables to produce a photocurrent that oscillates at the fceo without the necessity to actually double the comb light. This integrated device would enable a solid state platform to measure fceo and eventually serve as a chipscale route to stabilize the frequency comb through feedback control. The project will be implemented at T. Kippenberg's lab at EPFL.


Participants :
- Board of the Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology (Suisse) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 175419.6 €
Projet BioFlot (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The recycling rates of critical metals like In, and Ga are very less and it is high time to improve their recovery from secondary sources in an environmentally friendly way. However, the low concentration of target metals and presence of other metals in the industrial wastewater makes the recovery challenging. BioFlot aims to explore the use of amphiphilic siderophores (marinobactins) from Marinobacter sp. as highly specific extractants for recovery of CRMs (In, and Ga) from secondary sources (industrial wastewater) by means of bio-flotation technique. Marinobactins are composed of amphiphilic and hydroxamate functional groups which makes them an ideal candidate for bioflotation. The marinobactin-CRM interactions will be studied at molecular levels which will shed the light on their unexplored capacities and form the basis for the development of recovery process. The project proposes to employ the marinobactins as green flotation extractants in bioflotation technique for metal recovery and subsequent extraction and optimization of process parameters for maximum selective binding of metals and marinobactins so as to increase the flotation yield. And further optimization for separation of marinobactin from metals in flotation product to regenerate marinobactin and recover target metal. The next phase of the project would involve semi-continuous and continuous experiments to scale-up the best possible configuration selected during the batch study. Finally, an economic evaluation will be carried out to support the commercialization of the developed technology. This project will develop a novel and ecofriendly recycling process which will increase the recycling rates, reduce the waste and proliferate the circular economy in EU and also contribute in reducing its CRM dependency on non-EU countries. It will also train the experienced researcher in developing green technology and soft skills and make the host eminent in innovative biotechnology.

Mots clés : critical metals, recovery, wastewater, siderophores, bioflotation

Participants :
- Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 174806.4 €