Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet CtenoGerm (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

In the embryonic development of most animals, cell differentiation begins with the formation of three primary germ layers - ectoderm, endoderm, and mesoderm. A key regulator of this process is β-catenin, which activates the specification of the endoderm and mesoderm. Although β-catenin plays a central role in germ layer specification in a wide range of animals, we lack a detailed understanding of when this regulation emerged in animal evolution. By studying the embryonic development of the comb jelly Mnemiopsis leidyi, a member of the earliest branching animal lineage - Ctenophora, this project aims to determine whether β-catenin regulated endomesoderm specification in the last common ancestor of all animals. To understand the role of β-catenin in ctenophore germ layer specification, I will first characterize Mnemiopsis germ layers at the gene expression level using a single-cell sequencing approach. By comparing the results with data from other model organisms, I will determine whether Mnemiopsis germ layers are homologous to the ectoderm, endoderm, and mesoderm of other animals. Next, I will elucidate the spatial dynamics of β-catenin during germ layer specification by performing detailed immunofluorescence analysis using Mnemiopsis-specific anti-β-catenin antibodies. Finally, to assess the function of β-catenin signaling in ctenophore germ layer specification, I will analyze embryos with experimentally up- and downregulated β-catenin activity using morphological methods, gene expression analysis, and innovative 4D (3D time-lapse) microscopy. Through this research, CtenoGerm will deepen our understanding of how evolutionary changes in developmental programs have shaped the remarkable diversity of body forms across living species. By applying cutting-edge techniques in bioinformatics, molecular and developmental biology, and advancing leadership and management skills, the MSCA will be a transformative experience that will enhance my career and scientific growth.

Mots clés : evolution of germ layer specification, evolution of endomesoderm, ctenophora, mnemiopsis leidyi,  catenin

Participants :
- Université Friedrich-Schiller d'Iéna (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 202125.12 €
Projet COLMEC (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Every day, our bodies endure myriad mechanical forces that influence proteins, especially collagen, at the molecular level. COLMEC aims to use collagen as a model to uncover the nuances of protein mechanochemistry. A central aspect of this research is deciphering how collagen's evolutionary adaptations influence its response to forces, especially in contexts of aging and disease. This pursuit is split into three distinct objectives: (1) investigating the coevolution of collagen's amino acid residues to decode its response to tensile forces; (2) delving into the role of metal ions in collagen crosslinking, drawing parallels with natural phenomena such as the resilience of mussel byssus; and (3) probing the mechanisms of force propagation within collagen's varied structures. Merging bioinformatics, computational biophysics, and materials science, COLMEC's interdisciplinary approach illuminates how evolution shapes protein defenses against mechanical strains. This knowledge is pivotal in establishing design rules for crafting synthetic collagen-like materials with tailored mechanical stability and response, bridging evolutionary insights with innovative material design.

Mots clés : mechanically active proteins, mechanochemistry, collagen, mechanoradicals, protein coevolution

Participants :
- Société Max-Planck pour le développement des sciences (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 189687.36 €
- Université Harvard (Etats-Unis) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Université de Heidelberg (Allemagne) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
Projet AGR-ADAPT (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Economic Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Because crop growth is directly dependent on climate, the agricultural sector is arguably the most climate-vulnerable sector. Extreme weather events (EWE), worsened by climate change, can severely impact yields. Climate adaptation is crucial to mitigate this damage. Although most research has been done on long-term adaptation (i.e., farm measures taken in response to long-run climate change) farmers can take short-term measures in response to forecasted EWEs to reduce weather-induced damage. The 2023-27 Common Agricultural Policy dedicates inadequate attention towards this type of adaptation. Rather, it encourages the uptake of insurance to cover weather-induces losses subsidising insurance premiums. This project aims to gain insight into the adoption of proactive adaptation based on forecasts, its economic benefit and its complementarity to weather insurance in order to advise policymakers on a subsidy allocation which is in line with the Farm to Fork Strategy, which pursues a more resilient agricultural system.  The research will involve a comprehensive assessment of how EWEs, as defined by insurers’ weather indices, impact farm economic performance. It will provide an in-depth analysis of how farmers use weather forecasts to proactively adapt. The project will also evaluate the economic value of these proactive measures in reducing the impact of EWEs. Finally, the project aims to disseminate these findings to policymakers. The project will employ a mix of qualitative and quantitative methods, including literature reviews, stakeholder interviews and econometric analysis, focusing on European horticulture and permanent crop farms.  The researcher, aspiring a senior research career with expertise in the economics of climate adaptation, will gain significant scientific expertise and transferable skills from this project. The host institution, recognised as a leading university in agricultural sciences, will position her well for a senior research role in the future.

Mots clés : climate adaptation, weather forecasting, agricultural insurance

Participants :
- Wageningen University & Research (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 232916.16 €
Projet SEATRADE (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2023)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Seafood is a critical component of human diets and the most widely traded food group. Marine fish and invertebrates are increasingly affected by climate change. Global seafood trade could buffer the impacts of climate change by allowing for increased imports. However, global seafood trade could also double the burden for vulnerable countries by decreasing import access. Especially countries that rely on seafood for food security are potentially at risk. This project aims to investigate which nations experience worse or alleviated nutrient shortages due to global seafood trade when the supply of these foods is impacted by climate change. Moreover, this action aims to investigate local mediating factors that, together with markets, may shape food security outcomes. Such local mediating factors include governance and available pathways for switching between markets and food sources. To achieve these aims, this action will use state-of-the-art statistical methods to analyse global panel data spanning two decades of trade data in marine species and more than 3000 detailed household surveys from more than 100 villages in Indonesia. A systematic review and meta-analysis will complement by providing an overview of the current evidence base regarding the impact of global seafood trade on nutrition. The different resolutions of these large data sets allow this action to tackle this important topic from various scales, ranging from local to global. This action will contribute towards enhanced social-ecological integration, the study of food security and sustainability in a globalised world, and facilitate the interdisciplinary career development of a researcher moving from a Natural Sciences Department (University of Iceland) to a Department of Environmental Social Sciences (ENR, WUR, Netherlands). This action will advance cross-sectoral (academic and non-academic) knowledge exchange on the important topic of nutrition from seafood in a rapidly changing world.

Mots clés : fisheries, global seafood trade, climate change, cross scale connections

Participants :
- Wageningen University & Research (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 187624.32 €
Projet JORIGINS (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Many social animals collaborate, but only humans supposedly engage in joint action – cooperative interactions that involve normative, mutually obligating joint commitments (JCs). This enabled the evolution of hyper-cooperation observed in human societies, including complex collaborations like governments, and has likely played a pivotal role in human evolution. Given the significance, there has been a long-standing interest in the ontogenetic and evolutionary origins of joint action capacities like JC. The classical approach employed experiments with human children and nonhuman great apes, showing that while humans engage in joint actions, apes’ interactions rely on egoistic motives. However, such tasks are highly anthropocentric, involving engagement with human confederates in human-centric tasks. Conversely, drawing on a more ecologically valid approach, my research demonstrates that when apes interact with conspecifics naturally, they appear to exhibit specific joint action capacities like JC. Yet firm conclusions cannot be drawn unless the following empirical issues are solved: i) behaviours do not permit insights into internal mechanisms, ii) comparative joint action research is still in its infancy, lacking a holistic picture of affective and behavioural processes supporting coordination, and iii) previous ape studies are deficient of critical experimental controls. Building on and expanding my unique expertise in this domain, this project overcomes these challenges by pioneering a comparative investigation of spontaneous joint action coordination in human children and bonobos. Using cutting-edge tracking and thermal imaging techniques, as well as timely controls, the project explores pivotal joint action signatures like communicative repair, bodily synchrony, and JC-related emotions. This offers a powerful assessment of the hypothesis that humans and apes share basic joint action capacities, highlighting the evolutionary building blocks of human sociality.

Mots clés : joint action, great apes, affective states, tracking techniques, thermal imaging, collaboration, communication, emotion, joint commitment

Participants :
- Université de Constance (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 173847.36 €
Projet Lipo4AP (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Artificial photosynthesis is aimed at developing photocatalytic systems that convert solar energy into chemical energy carriers such as renewable hydrogen. These artificial systems draw inspiration from natural photosynthesis which takes place at the core of lipid membranes. The artificial lipid membranes of liposomes hence hold strong potential for designing visible light-driven water splitting supramolecular systems. However, it remains a photochemical challenge to couple the two half redox processes that altogether form water splitting: water oxidation and water reduction. In this project, we use bioinspired, supramolecular photocatalytic assemblies supported on the membrane of liposomes, to realise such coupling. Liposomes provide nanocompartments to confine reaction spaces and enable vectorial charge transport. Amphiphilic transition metal-based photosensitizers and molecular catalysts will be anchored to the lipid bilayers, facilitating the concomitant evolution of O2 and H2 from the two half-reactions. To couple both half-reactions, will use an hydrophilic cobalt cage complex as reversible electron relay. The project has been structured to realise key operations: light harvesting, charge separation, directed proton and electron transport from the water oxidation side to the proton reduction side, ultimately achieving water splitting via a Z-scheme mechanism. The study will focus on assessing the coupling of two redox processes by optimising pH and minimising charge recombination on both sides of the photo reaction. The successful implementation of Lipo4AP could lead to innovative strategies for the next generation of biomimetic artificial photosynthetic systems. The complementary advanced skills obtained by the fellow will complete her prior expertise to successfully advance her research career dedicated to catalytic transformations of small molecules, which are relevant to the economic and environmental targets of the European Green Deal.

Mots clés : coordination chemistry, biomimetic chemistry, self assembly, lipid membrane, photosensitizer, redox mediator, photocatalytic water splitting, hydrogen evolution, artificial photosynthesis, solar fuel

Participants :
- Université de Leyde (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 232916.16 €
Projet PHILGRAB (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

This research project aims to address the question whether land grabbing engenders a distinct moral concern—one that has not been sufficiently explored. Recent studies in political philosophy that directly address land grabbing take its moral distinctiveness to involve in the way land grabbing undermines territorial rights. A territorial-rights-approach may partially account for paradigmatic instances of land grabbing involving massive dispossession of land from small-scale farmers and of indigenous populations from their ancestral commons. It, however, overlooks increasingly intricate, ‘pin-prick’, forms of land grabbing present in the EU that involve transfer of ownership and control rights over relatively small individual plots of land in such a way that that the aggregate area of land can be quite extensive. In addition, theories about why territories matter for a state do not tell us anything about why land matters for a farmer. I hypothesise that, my preferred conception of distributive justice in farmland—'farming as equals’— offers a more promising moral diagnosis: (1) it maps out an analytical framework within which justice in the distribution of farmland is underwritten by concerns about the equality of farmers; (2) clarifies what is morally distinctive about land grabbing in all its multiple permutations; (3) applies theoretical insights to agricultural and land policies (such as CAP), legal protection of the rights of farmers, and to policy instruments related to environmental justice; and (4) deploys valid normative principles for scrutinising the neoliberal economic model where the concept of ownership (in farmland) is depersonalised and land is transformed from a vital resource for food security to a tradable commodity and an object of speculation. Finally, I believe that the innovative approach this project employs is suitable for addressing concerns of justice between generations as it pertains to inequalities in the distribution of farmland.

Mots clés : land grabbing, distributive justice, eu common agricultural policy cap , land access

Participants :
- Université de Fribourg (Suisse) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Université de Leyde (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 232916.16 €
Projet NFComCED (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2024)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Extremely large-scale multiple-input multiple-output (XL-MIMO) has been recognized as a crucial enabling technology for the sixth generation (6G) networks to realize extremely high throughput and high-resolution localization. XL-MIMO will bring new features of near-field communication which requires new algorithms and transmission scheme design. Meanwhile, given the extra-large number of antennas on XL-MIMO, the cost (operation overhead, hardware cost, power consumption, algorithm complexity) could be unacceptable in practice. Thus, it is key to realise the promising gains of XL-MIMO at an affordable cost, which however has not been comprehensively studied. This proposal aims to propose a cost-effective framework for implementing XL-MIMO in near fields and gain an in-depth understanding of the working mechanisms behind it. The first objective is to implement cost-effective XL-MIMO in the current commercialized sub-6 GHz band (for macro-cell and uniform coverage), by exploiting statistical channel state information (CSI) for beamforming design and exploiting sparse array architectures to reduce the number of antennas while maintaining the array size. The second objective is to propose cost-effective design for XL-MIMO in the mmWave band with rich spectrum resources (for micro-cell hotspots and indoor communication) by using two-timescale design for hybrid precoding and employing energy-saving metamaterial antennas. The third objective is to solve the blockage issue for XL-MIMO and realise ubiquitous coverage in a cost-effective way, by leveraging the nearly passive reconfigurable intelligent surface. Besides, this proposal plans to conduct prototype measurements to validate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms and architectures. This project is expected to significantly enhance the fellow’s career prospects, enabling him to develop new research skills, establish professional networks, learn leadership skills, and grow into an influential expert in academia.

Mots clés : near field communications, extremely large scale multiple input multiple output xl mimo , reconfigurable intelligent surface ris , sub 6ghz mmwave communications, statistical csi, beamforming design

Participants :
- Université technique de Berlin (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 202125.12 €
Projet glyCoVdrugs (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2021)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Viral infections are still a major challenge in medical therapy. The recent outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 has again shown the immense threat these pathogens pose. In contrast to the direct-acting antivirals approach (targeting viral proteases, polymerases or other viral enzymes involved in replication), which is mostly followed by the pharmaceutical industry, this proposal targeting host cell enzymes involved in the biogenesis of infectious virions. In this context inverting α-glucosidases are of special interest. They play an important role in cell functions, such as the correct folding of proteins in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). However, up to now selective inverting α-glucosidase inhibitors are scarce, and chemical probes that report on these selectively in biological samples non-existent. The dedicated aim of this proposal is to overcome this absence of inhibitors and probes. To identify novel inhibitors, activity-based protein profiling (ABPP) will be applied. This powerful analytical method is a driving force in chemical biology and medicinal chemistry but depends heavily on the availability of mechanism-based enzyme inhibitors. Based on current knowledge on retaining α-glucosidase inhibitors, unprecedented inhibitors and probes for inverting α-glucosidases will be developed and applied to ABPP. Their synthesis follows a divergent synthesis method to efficiently produce a wide library of compounds, that will be screened on the target enzyme, human ER α-glucosidase I. As the work on retaining α-glycosidase has shown, inverting α-glucosidase inhibitors are likely to be important tools for advancing many areas of application that are outside the primary scope of the proposed research (antiviral agents). Overall, my proposal on inverting α-glycosidase inhibitors and probes will therefore make a significant contribution to the current state of the art in glycan research.

Mots clés : glycans, antivirals, inverting alpha glycosidases, activity based protein profiling, aziridines

Participants :
- Université de Leyde (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 203464.32 €
Projet pepRu4PACT (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2021)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

One of the most severe limitations of current anticancer chemotherapy are the serious side effects caused by toxic drugs affecting not only tumors but also healthy organs. Local activation of drugs by light irradiation of the tumor is a promising approach to control where the toxicity is delivered. Metal complexes are well suited for photoactivated chemotherapy, but their activation wavelength is often too low to afford high tissue penetration of light; also, their ability to enter cancer cells is often controlled by lipophilicity tuning, which is unselective; finally, their phototoxicity often relies on oxygen-dependent mechanisms, while many tumor tissues show low dioxygen concentrations. The aim of this proposal is to develop new metallodrugs that are activated by red or near-infrared light, enter cells by controlled mechanisms, and deliver strong phototoxicity to cancer cells also under low oxygen conditions. The design is based on connecting multiple Ru(II) metal complexes to a biologically active antitumoral peptide. The ruthenium complexes will have a tuned coordination environment to allow red/near-IR light activation; meanwhile, the peptides will rely on methionine residues to coordinate ruthenium, and allow controlled cellular uptake of the prodrug into cancer cells. Both components will cage each other in the dark, thus affording low toxicity; while light-induced cleavage of the ruthenium-thioether bonds will release two bioactive components, which will kill cancer cells. The novelty of this proposal is to combine metal-based photoactivated chemotherapy with therapeutic peptides to enhance phototoxicity by creating synergies between both photoproducts. By combining light activation, resulting in timely- and spatially-resolved toxicity release, and bioactive peptides, which will improve uptake in cancer cells, this project will deliver new fundamental knowledge on the interaction between peptides and metals, and between metallopeptides and cells.

Mots clés : chemotherapy, photoactivated chemotherapy, bioconjugate, phototherapy, ruthenium, metallodrug, cancer

Participants :
- Université de Leyde (Pays-Bas) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 203464.32 €