Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet MicroNICHE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - Global Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is a growing interest in adult stem cells, especially from bone marrow, for regenerative medicine. Hematopoietic stem cells, a type of bone marrow stem cells, alone cannot be expanded in vitro; in vivo, they reside in a microenvironment known as a niche that maintains them in a quiescent state until prompted to differentiate. The stem cell niche provides structural and trophic support and the appropriate homeostasis to regulate stem cell function. Additionally to regulatory factors in these stem cell niches, a number of environmental and mechanical signals arising from the extracellular matrix are crucial regulators of stem cell fate. In order to expedite for basic studies of bone marrow stem cells, and further translational implementation, any realistic approach to the native stem cell niche requires: to engineer a biomimetic 3D-microenvironment, and then to develop artificial microniches with the key functional features reconstructed. High-throughput microfluidic technology offers high promise, however, adaptation to accommodate adult stem cells in artificially fabricated niches remains still a challenge. Microfluidic-assisted culture systems should not only allow maintaining cell homeostasis through biochemical and mechanical stimulation, but also modulating adult stem cell renewal and differentiation through microscale patterning of cells and extracellular materials in biomimetic microniches. This project aims at the microfluidic reconstruction of an artificial stem cell niches. In this proof-of-concept, a bone marrow stem cell microniche with tunable size, material and topography will be developed by integrating novel fabrication microfluidics with material engineering.

Mots clés : droplet microfluidics, hydrogel, adult stem cells, bone marrow

Participants :
- Spanish National Research Council (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 199235.84 €
- Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Espagne) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 39955.36 €
- Columbia University (Etats-Unis) — Partner, organization partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
Projet Magnetic Universe (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is a pressing need to chart the origin, evolution, and impact of magnetic fields over the full 13.7 billion year history of the Universe, with implications for particle physics, cosmology, and astrophysics. Key to this endeavour is a detailed physical understanding of how galaxies have become magnetised and what role intergalactic magnetic fields play in shaping the Universe. To make progress, we need to observationally characterize properties such as the strengths and topologies of galactic and intergalactic magnetic fields. I propose a portfolio of ground-breaking research projects that will capitalise on the recently upgraded Jansky VLA radio telescope to provide new observational measurements of interstellar and intergalactic magnetic fields and elucidate their roles in shaping the Universe. A Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Research Fellowship will facilitate movement from my current position as an Assistant Scientist at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in the USA to Newcastle University in the UK. This will enable me to acquire new expertise in theoretical astrophysics with a particular focus on magnetic dynamo mechanisms. This expertise is needed to interpret the observational findings of my research, maximize its impact, and enable me to establish an international leadership position in the study of cosmic magnetism. The move to Newcastle will enable me to develop my capabilities as a professional academic through engagement in student research supervision, classroom teaching, and public communication of science, facilitated by a variety of specialized training programs offered to University staff. Such training and opportunities are not available at my current position within an Observatory. As a result, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Research Fellowship will equip me with essential skills needed to compete internationally for faculty positions leading to my goal of becoming a full research and teaching Professor at a major University.

Mots clés : cosmic magnetism, radio astronomy

Participants :
- Newcastle University (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 195454.8 €
Projet MAXBAR (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is an ever increasing amount of data that needs to be transmitted, processed, and stored by mobile communication technologies like today’s smartphones and tomorrow’s numerous connected devices. Presently, the raw measurement signals need to be amplified, pre-conditioned, and converted to digital signals before they can be processed. Thus, there is clear impetus to supplement next generation radio technologies with analog signal processing functionalities to perform computation directly on the measured signals. By conducting research at the interface between nanomagnetism, acoustics, microwave engineering and micro-electromechanical systems, MAXBAR aims to integrate low power spin-wave signal processing capabilities with state-of-the-art acoustic wave resonators widely used in RF communication systems to distinguish between signals at different frequencies. It is motivated by the premise that the coupling between spin-waves and acoustic waves in nanosystems can be leveraged (i) to overcome the intrinsic limitations plaguing acoustic wave technology, and (ii) to simultaneously deliver an energy efficient microwave interface for spin waves – the holy grail of magnonics. The primary objective is to establish a platform in which strongly hybridized magneto-elastic resonant modes enables new technological functionalities, such as the tunability of bulk acoustic wave filters and the development of non-reciprocity in acoustical wave based delay lines. The project builds upon the host institution’s expertise in microwave measurements of spin-wave propagation, interference processes and magnetization dynamics, while relying on next-generation acoustic wave resonators developed at the secondment institute to demonstrate its objectives. The applicant is an expert in the design, fabrication and characterization of nanomechanical microwave devices and will thus complement its skills by adding nanomagnetism and acoustics in his competences.

Mots clés : microwave filter tunability, microwave non reciprocity, tunable acoustic resonators

Participants :
- Université Paris-Saclay (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 196707.84 €
Projet Neuroimaging power (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - Global Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is an increasing concern about statistical power in neuroscience research. Critically, an underpowered study has poor predictive power. Findings from a low-power study are unlikely to be reproducible, and thus a power analysis is a critical component of any paper. This project aims to promote and facilitate the use of power analyses. A key component of a power analysis is the specification of an effect size. However, in neuroimaging, there is no standardised way to communicate effect sizes, which makes the choice of an appropriate effect size a formidable task. The best way today to perform a power analysis is by collecting a pilot data set, a very expensive practice. To eliminate the need for pilot data, we will develop a standardised measure of effect size taking into account the spatial variance and the uncertainty of the measurements. Communicating effect sizes in new publications will facilitate the use of power analyses. To further alleviate the need for pilot data, we will provide a library of effect sizes for different tasks and contrasts, using open data projects in neuroimaging. We will integrate our effect size estimator in open repositories NeuroVault and OpenfMRI. Consequently, these effect sizes can then serve as a proxy for a pilot study, and as such, a huge cost in the design of an experiment is eliminated. A new experiment will not be identical to the open data and as such the hypothesised parameters might not be fully accurate. To address this issue, we present a flexible framework to analyse data mid-way without harming the control of the type I error rate. Such a procedure will allow re-evaluating halfway an experiment whether it is useful to continue a study, and how many more subjects are needed for statistically sound inferences. To make our methods maximally available, we will write a software suite including all these methods in different programming platforms and we will provide a GUI to further increase the use of power analyses.

Mots clés : reproducibility, power, statistics, sensitivity, neuroimaging, fmri, sample size, effect size

Participants :
- Institut national de recherche en sciences et technologies du numérique (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 264668.4 €
- Stanford University (Etats-Unis) — Partner, organization partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
Projet INEXCA (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Staff Exchanges
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is an international imperative to improve healthcare through health service research, including nursing research and new innovations. This EU-RISE project “Excellent research and expertise of quality of cancer care by internationally trained staff (INEXCA)” aims to utilize expertise across the globe to improve research, researcher training and care of cancer patients, family caregivers and patient and public involvement through international and intersectoral collaboration and staff exchange. The ultimate objectives are to create innovative opportunities to improve research and researchers’ skills and increase knowledge transfer from research to practice and business. The participants in the project representing academic, non-academic and clinical settings as well as information technology industry and health-related business experts from Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Italy, Great Britain and United States of America have enormous and interdisciplinary competences of their specializing areas in research methodology, quality of care, cancer care, patient involvement, family care givers and information technology in academic, non-academic and clinical settings. The participating organizations will bring their best know-how through staff’s secondments, workshops, training courses, conferences, publications and other activities. An innovative ICT platform will be developed for sharing information and knowledge. In total, 34 academic and non-academic staff members will be involved in this INEXCA project for 263 months. The participants’ synergies and complementarities from different disciplines, experiences, methodological advancements as well as clinical practice will be fully in use. The planned secondments will offer the best opportunity to get the best outcomes for patients, families, EU citizens as well as researchers. Descriptors: HEALTH SERVICES, HEALTH CARE RESEARCH

Mots clés : quality of care, cancer, patients, methodology, training, staff exchange

Participants :
- Ceref srl (Italie) — Partner, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 207000.0 €
- Länsi-Pohjan Sairaanhoitopiirin Kuntayhtymä (Finlande) — Partner, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 54000.0 €
- University of Eastern Finland (Finlande) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 441000.0 €
- Sensoftia oy (Finlande) — Partner, beneficiary, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 72000.0 €
- University of Southern Denmark (Danemark) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 45000.0 €
- KU Leuven (Belgique) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 45000.0 €
- University of Pittsburgh (Etats-Unis) — Partner, organization partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- University of Surrey (Royaume-Uni) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 49500.0 €
Projet REUSE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is an urgent need for sustainable development in modern societies. The construction sector can play an important role in achieving a sustainable environment, since the production of new materials is an energy-intensive process, which is responsible for about 15% of the global CO2 emissions, and buildings are usually demolished at the end of their useful life producing waste. A more sustainable solution is to develop innovative structural solutions that allow for the reuse of building components directly to new projects. In this way, the construction will produce less CO2 emissions, much less waste will go to landfill, and the natural resources of the planet will be used more responsibly. This project proposes a novel way to connect precast concrete slabs with steel sections that offer the advantages of a) off-site fabrication of all components; b) easy and fast installation on the construction site; c) disassembly of the composite floor; and d) direct reuse of all components in new projects. The project will use experimental testing complemented by numerical analyses to develop the proposed novel structural system. The experiments will provide evidence on the physical behaviour and the ultimate failure modes of the proposed system, whereas numerical simulations using advanced mathematical models will be used to study numerous geometrical configurations and generalise the results of the tests. Based on the results of the tests and the simulations, recommendations for the practical design of the proposed system will be proposed.

Mots clés : steel concrete composite beams, demountable structures, reuse of materials, large scale experimental testing

Participants :
- Heriot-Watt University (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 195454.8 €
Projet SELFCEPTION (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There will be around 35 million private or non-industrial use robots in the world by 2018, a market of 19 billion euros. However, autonomous robot technology in Europe is not yet ready to lead this high expectancy due to the lack of robust functionality in uncertain environments. Particularly, safe interaction is an essential requirement. A basic skill, still unachieved, is to allow the robot to be aware of its own body and perceive other agents. Recent evidence suggests that self/other distinction will be a major breakthrough for improving interaction and might be the connection between low-level sensorimotor abilities and conceptual interpretation. Advanced sensorimotor learning combined with new multimodal sensing devices, such as artificial skin, makes now possible that the robot acquires its perceptual representation, and I hypothesize that learning the multisensory-motor spatiotemporal contingencies permits self/other distinction. Hence, the aim of the project is to provide a hierarchical probabilistic model for self/other distinction in robots, learning the sensorimotor contingencies during interaction. This model not only provides a holistic solution for building the perceptual schema and improves interaction under uncertainty but it might also give insights about how humans construct their own perceptual representation and the sense of agency. Finally, the model will be tested in a whole body sensing humanoid and validated in a service robot in collaboration with a robotics SME. I will use an interdisciplinary approach that combines probabilistic and information sciences modelling with cognitive psychology, creating a highly attractive career profile. SELFCEPTION will boost the materialization of the next generation of perceptive robots: multisensory machines able to build their perceptual body schema and distinguish their actions from other entities. We already have robots that navigate and now it is the time to develop robots that interact.

Mots clés : robotic self other distinction, self detection, probabilistic learning, interaction under uncertainty, self perception, sensorimotor contingencies, multisensory attention

Participants :
- Technical University of Munich (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 159460.8 €
Projet NRG-DEAL (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Thermal insulation of construction and building elements has become the most important measure to enhance energy savings in new and existing building stock. Stricter regulations (such as 2019/2021 EU Buildings Directive) have led to the use of huge thicknesses of standard insulation, almost always EPS and XPS. An efficient use of a porous cementitious system as a thermal insulation material depends mainly on its air content. Lightweight concretes have a better thermal insulation capacity than regular-weight ones; however, their use is not efficient enough due to their still too high density. The problem with these insulations is that they store heat/cold sensibly (variation of the body temperature). An innovative solution would be the employment of a latent heat based Thermal Energy Storage, using the phase transition occurring in part of the insulation. During the phase transition, the insulation material will absorb/release energy at constant temperature, increasing the system efficiency. A maximization of the synergetic interplay between thermal conductivity and the potential to store/release energy into components of the building envelope can be achieved by an effective use of Phase Change Materials. A disadvantage of using commercially available Microencapsulated PCMs in building applications is their very low thermal conductivity. To counteract it, graphene can be blended in both the cementitious matrix and the MPCMs in order to achieve a targeted increase in thermal conductivity. Graphene addition also allows voluntary resets of the MPCM by means of an external intentional potential difference, due to the enhanced composite’s electrical conductivity and magnetic permeability. The proposed project deals with the improvement of cementitious lamellae of concrete foams for buildings insulations. MPCMs addition and graphene doping of both cement paste and MPCMs will enhance thermo-electrical properties of this cutting-edge eNeRGy material.

Mots clés : nearly zero energy buildings, thermal insulation, thermal energy storage, phase change materials, microencapsulated pcms, graphene, induced melting, lattice boltzmann method, atomistic, simulation

Participants :
- Spanish National Research Council (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 172932.48 €
Projet SmartNets (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Doctoral Networks
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Think of the the murmuration of starlings, the schooling of fish, or even hypes on social media or the spreading of powerouts: the behaviour of a network is critically determined by its structure. This structure induces collective emergent behavior that can only be understood by analysing the whole network in relation to its constituent parts. Particularly in the brain, the architecture of the network is essential for its functioning: information transfer and processing within and between networks. The relation between network structure and information processing capacity is essential at every scale: from molecules and genes to large neural networks to populations of behaving agents, on every level nodes form complex networks underlying the most essential functions of the functioning of the brain, body and society. Only recently, with high-throughput techniques, have we begun to collect the vast amounts of data needed to study the structure and functioning of these networks. However, analysing these data is still a challenge and the nature of complex network processes are still poorly understood. In order to compare networks, simulated or physical ones, or healthy versus diseased, network analysis and visualization tools are needed across three analysis dimensions: structure, activity and information processing. Many quantitative tools exist for analysing networks, but they are mostly restricted to one application domain or network type and often only address one of these dimensions. The novelty of our contributions will lie in the combination of existing and new techniques, from different research domains, and across the three analysis dimensions. By transcending specific data sets or domains, we expect to open up new insights into the properties, behaviour and dynamic evolution of biological networks. We will train the data scientists of the future, that will be able to analyse biological networks across levels, domains and types.

Mots clés : computational science, computational neuroscience, systems neuroscience, machine, learning, artificial neural networks, molecular networks, collective animal behaviour, social, networks, neurophysics

Participants :
- Ghent University (Belgique) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 512640.0 €
- Max Planck Society (Allemagne) — Partner, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 617927.2 €
- Technical University of Munich (Allemagne) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 393226.4 €
- Sorbonne Université (France) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 549604.08 €
- Foundation for Research and Technology Hellas (Grèce) — Partner, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 486035.28 €
- Radboud University Nijmegen (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 796859.64 €