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

Many out-of-equilibrium systems undergo transitions from one quasi-stationary state to a radically different one. Turbulent flows, for instance, exhibit sudden switches between attractors. It is crucial to understand this phenomenon, both for theoretical reasons and for potential applications to industrial or geophysical flows. Indeed, abrupt transitions or tipping points are a critical component of climate dynamics, which is a topic of major importance for society as a whole, in addition to being a scientific subject of uttermost current interest. Over the past decades, outstanding progress has been achieved in non-equilibrium statistical physics thanks to the theory of large deviations, which provides a natural generalization of the core concepts of equilibrium statistical mechanics: like entropy or free energy, large deviation rate functions encode all the relevant statistical information about an observable, such as its most probable values but also the probability of small and large fluctuations and the transitions between steady-states. However, large deviation computations have been up to now mostly restricted to relatively simple systems. This project will further develop cutting-edge analytical and numerical tools to compute large deviations in complex systems such as turbulent flows and the climate. The new ingredients we will consider are on the one hand, time-dependent attractors, and on the other hand, a complex field structure, since both are key features of geophysical flows. The goal of the project is at the same time to be able to predict some universal features of rare but high-impact transitions in turbulent attractors or, ultimately, the climate, and to promote novel techniques in rare event simulations which are applicable in an increasingly large spectrum of problems. Due to the combination of skills from the parties involved, the project will build a fruitful bridge between the statistical mechanics and the climate communities.

Mots clés : large deviations, rare events, bistability, transitions, turbulence, zonal jets

Participants :
- Centre national de la recherche scientifique (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 123138.0 €
Projet IRC (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Many philosophers and cognitive scientists have a habit of using the word “belief” as though it refers to a single, simple sort of cognitive attitude. But if we take empirical evidence from cognitive science of religion seriously, we will see that this habit is a source of confusion. Just as it is a mistake in astronomy to assume that Venus and the North Star are the same kind of entity because they are both “stars,” so too it is a mistake in theorizing the nature of belief to treat what I call religious credence and what I call factual belief as the same type of attitude. I have already argued in my paper “Religious Credence is not Factual Belief” (forthcoming, Cognition) that our best psychological theory of cognitive attitudes, in conjunction with psychological and anthropological evidence, will treat these two attitudes differently. The research aim of the project proposed here is to elaborate on my theoretical apparatus to produce a book-length monograph that will serve philosophers and cognitive scientists interested in religious “belief," and the corresponding aim for public dissemination is to make this research popularly available through essays, blogs, radio, and public debate. I propose to write _Imagination and Religious Credence_ while in residence at the Centre for Philosophical Psychology at the University of Antwerp. This will be an important step in my career development. My career aim is to achieve a level of distinction in research that will justify (1) mentoring PhD and postdoctoral researchers and (2) directing a research group similar in structure to the Centre for Philosophical Psychology. Advancing my own research and being embedded in the Centre, which has a stellar history of developing research careers, will both be critical steps toward realizing these career goals.

Mots clés : belief, imagination, religious credence, cognition, action, ritual, sacrifice, pretense, play

Participants :
- University of Antwerp (Belgique) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 93800.0 €
Projet SIMSEA (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Marine modeling at JRC provides a tool to examine the present and future state of the marine ecosystem and can inform and support a variety of EU policies including the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. The Black Sea has suffered from severe ecological changes since the 1970s due to concurent effects of intense eutrophication, overfishing, outburst of gelatinous carnivores and natural climatic variations. The main purpose of the project is therefore to implement an advanced ecosystem model for the complex Black Sea ecosystem based on the validated JRC hydrodynamic model to generate future scenario simulations considering different policy options and climate change scenarios. The data generated from these scenario simulations will be thoroughly analysed using state of the art statistical methods like singular spectrum analysis and breakpoint detection methods. The results of this work will be broadly disseminated not only to the scientific community but it will be ensured that various groups, public bodies and agencies (e.g. the Commission on the Protection of the Black Sea Against Pollution, etc.), outside of academia can and will utilise the knowledge produced.

Mots clés : ecosystem modelling, future scenarios, anthropogenic drivers, policy options

Participants :
- European Union (Belgique) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 180277.2 €
Projet MathDevBML (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Mathematics is the fundamental basis of modern science and technology. However, individuals differ in mathematical ability, and 5%–7% of the population suffers from a math learning disability (MLD). To provide appropriate support for children with MLD, detecting MLD before entering the formal education system is essential. Previous studies have identified some of the neural correlates of MLD; however, computational approaches to predict MLD have been limited. Also, most studies recruited children who were enrolled in elementary school, which is problematic because negative math experience may worsen the difficulties. This research project aims to address these gaps. By combining brain data of preschoolers with state-of-the-art machine learning techniques, I will construct a computational model aiming at predicting MLD before children enter elementary school. The host laboratory of Dr. Jérôme Prado is currently conducting magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) experiments in 5-year-old preschoolers. Participants are presented with visual stimuli consisting of dot patterns, and their brain activity is measured using functional MRI. I will repeat the same MRI task two years later (when children are 7). The math skills of participants will be measured at the age of 7. Multiple algorithms (model-based and model-free approaches) will be applied to the brain data at the age of 5 to predict the occurrence of MLD at the age of 7. Computational models will be applied to other cognitive abilities (language, reasoning), and the influence on atypical math development will be examined. I will benefit from the strong administrative support and advanced neuroimaging resources at the Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, where I will receive training in technical and leadership skills. This research project is an excellent opportunity for me and the host to contribute to the growth of an innovative research field combining developmental neuroscience and machine learning techniques.

Mots clés : arithmetic, development, machine learning, fmri

Participants :
- Institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 184707.84 €
Projet FICTSTRUCT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Mathematics is ubiquitous throughout the sciences and in everyday language and thought. Its applications across all disciplines - science, economics, engineering, computing and more - are central to the future development of a robust, creative, and driven society. The abstract character of mathematics raises difficult philosophical questions about the nature of mathematical entities (such as numbers, functions, and sets), how we have knowledge of such entities, and how they can be applied in the real world. This research project tackles such questions by integrating two perspectives in the philosophy of mathematics, viz. "mathematical structuralism" and "mathematical fictionalism". Both structuralism and fictionalism capture important aspects of how many working mathematicians approach their practice. But in contemporary philosophy of mathematics, structuralism and fictionalism are widely thought of as presenting competing views of the nature of mathematics. In contrast, this project will develop a new theory of mathematical structure that unifies structuralism and fictionalism, thereby shifting the debate and promoting new and fruitful lines of research in the philosophy of mathematics and mathematical practice. Crucially, this research will be informed and supported by interdisciplinary discussions of mathematical practice with mathematicians, mathematical scientists, linguists who work on meaning and reference, and psychologists whose research focuses on mathematical cognition. Drawing on aspects of their research, this project will build a new and distinctive positive theory of the nature of mathematics. With this comprehensive theory established, the project will show how it can be deployed to make progress on long-standing problems in the philosophy of mathematics and the philosophy of science.

Mots clés : philosophy of mathematics, nominalism, fictionalism, structuralism, mathematical abstraction, mathematical practice

Participants :
- University of York (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 224933.76 €
Projet SMART-LANLIGHT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Measuring and controlling light-matter interactions at the nanoscale is critical for many applications affecting both science and society, ranging from disease detection and treatment to quantum-based information science. Performing studies of these interactions requires a nano source of light, high resolution detection and accurate three dimensional manipulation. However, most of the existing nano-optical techniques offer a subset, but not all, of these elements. We propose in this project to develop a system for measuring optical fields properties on nanostructures with nano-emitter levitating by a Paul also called radio-frequency trap. We will use -but not limited to- a lanthanide doped particle as the nano-emitter. Specifically, lanthanides are sensitive to both optical electric and magnetic field so that full understanding of the optical near-field properties is achievable, in an unprecedented way. We then plan to employ this new technique for investigating nanolight-matter interactions on technologically-important nanostructures such as optical antennas, nanophotonic circuits, metamaterials etc... This new and original probing technique will open the ways to a large variety of applications such as high resolution imaging of nanophotonics components (nano-optical circuiterie, spin domain, ...) or biological samples but also e.g cancer diagnostic and therapy since lanthanide can be used for tumor cell detection and photodynamic therapy.

Mots clés : lanthanide nanoparticle, near field optics, paul traps, nano manipulation

Participants :
- Aix-Marseille Université (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 173076.0 €
Projet NIOBMT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Mechanical force is a ubiquitous perturbation that operates at all levels of life, from single molecules to organs. At the tissue level, cells are constantly exposed to forces exerted by their surrounding environment—body fluids, neighboring cells, or the extracellular matrix. The process by which cells sense and convert physical stimuli into a biochemical signal is known as mechanotransduction. When mechanical forces reach the nucleus, they can activate several force-induced transcriptional pathways that control cell functionality. The failure of these pathways has been linked to several human pathologies, such as cancer. While most of our knowledge in mechanobiology is focused on mammalian cells, comparatively little is known on how prokaryotes detect, interpret, and generate a response to physical inputs. Understanding how bacteria sense mechanical forces and how these signals are integrated to promote colonization, biofilm formation, or virulence development is crucial to develop therapeutic strategies that target the pathogenesis onset. Here we propose a cross-scale approach that first employs single-molecule force spectroscopy techniques to study in vitro the dynamics under force of PilY1 —from the Gram-negative opportunistic pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa— and how antibody binding affects its mechanical stability. Our goal is to implement a molecular-based strategy that disrupts the PilY-triggered mechanotransduction pathway, which we will probe at the cellular level. Using a combination of optical microscopy and single-cell mechanical techniques, we will monitor in vivo the downstream events that lead to the expression of genes that promote virulence after PilY1 mechanical stimulation in the absence and presence of antibodies that disrupt the activity of this protein.

Mots clés : bacterial mechanotransduction, mechanopharmacology and mechanomedicine

Participants :
- University of London (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 212933.76 €
Projet HumanLand (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Medieval Islamic Archaeology in Southern Greater Syria is relevant to the sustainable agricultural intensification discourse due the implementation of state intensive land use for profit that affected the lives of peasants and the ecology of semi-arid regions. Medieval Islamic agricultural intensification practices included irrigation, fertilizers, overgrazing, deforestation and cash cropping, which increase agricultural yields. The project “Human Landscapes: agricultural intensification and peasant resilience in medieval Southern Greater Syria” (HumanLand), offers a deep-time perspective on these issues. According to surveys and historic resources, the later medieval Islamic eras were marked by the collapse of the Mamluk state, the decline of major agricultural centers, and a shift to a seasonal basis occupation partly due to climatic stressors of the end of the 14th and 15th centuries, as well as the lack of state resources and support. HumanLand will use new environmental and textual data for medieval land-use to investigate these three objectives: 1) To identify changes in agricultural intensification in relation to climatic, political and economic shifts that took place in the late 14th and much of the 15th centuries, 2) To investigate the use of sustainable strategies and impact of imperial regimes on medieval communities, and 3) To investigate the impact of political structures on the ecology in semi-arid regions. The project will use botanical micro remains (phytolith, starches and spherulites) and stable isotope data from crop remains to understand agricultural practices of six medieval communities of Jordan and Israel. This evidence will be evaluated with information on land-use in medieval texts. These methods combined, provide evidence for intensified agriculture making this research one of the few studies done, which combine the different approaches proposed to approach the big picture of medieval Islamic agricultural history.

Mots clés : environmental history, southern levant, micro botanical data, political ecology, sustainable agriculture

Participants :
- University of Bonn (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 174806.4 €
Projet Mel.Photo.Protect (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Melanin is the deeply coloured, insoluble and heterogenous biopolymer of animal skin, hair and eyes responsible for protection against harmful light action. It also has a pathogenic role as a generator of reactive oxygen species and possibly through chemiexcitation, and its polydopamine synthetic analogue has raised great interest in the materials community. In spite of these multiple points of interest, the details of melanin structure and its main photoprotecting function are still largely unknown, mostly due to the heterogeneous polymer structure. Closing this gap is an urgent challenge, and our proposal aims at doing that with the methods of computational chemistry. Based on the widely accepted hierarchical structure model for melanin, in WP1 we will generate a library of aggregates made of 5,6-dihydroxyindole (DHI) and 5,6-dihydroxyindole-2-carboxylic acid (DHICA) oligomers with different connectivity and redox state (diol, semiquinone and quinone forms). In WP2 we will simulate the absorption spectra of the aggregates and compare them with the experimental melanin spectrum, which starts at the near IR and increases monotonically into the UV. In WP3 we will simulate the excited-state decay mechanisms for the different aggregates in order to explain melanin's lack of fluorescence, which is indicative of fast decay responsible for its photoprotecting function. The results of our project will provide a new view on the photoprotecting function of melanin based on a systematic consideration of its heterogeneous structure, and they will allow us to assess what specific aggregates are responsible for the different functional characteristics. They will help us to assess the possible pathogenic role of melanin chemiexcitation, and provide new principles for design of PDA-based functional materials.


Participants :
- University of Girona (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 172932.48 €
Projet METMEL (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Melanoma is the cancer with the fastest rising incidence world-wide, and although recent therapies can achieve unprecedented response rates, a significant fraction of patients still succumb to metastatic lesions. Key pending questions in the field are the mechanisms underlying the inherent metastatic behaviour or melanoma, whereby seemingly thin primary lesions (≥2 mm in depth) bear high risk of dissemination to proximal lymph nodes and ultimately, to distal sites. A dynamic crosstalk has been proposed to be established between melanoma cells and the lymphatic vasculature at tumour-draining lymph nodes, favouring an immune-permissive “lymphovascular niche”. However, whether (and how) these lymphovascular interactions occur at distal sites is unclear. The Soengas group has generated unique “Lymphoreporter” melanoma mouse models for non-invasive and whole body imaging of tumour progression. These lymphoreporters demonstrated that primary melanomas induce neo-lymphangiogenesis at distal pre-metastatic sites, already from very early stages of the disease, before dissemination occurs. Proteomic analyses were then performed to identify factors in the melanoma secretome that could drive these long range-acting effects and subsequently filtered these proteins for novelty (i.e. no previous link to melanoma and lymphangiogenesis). Here I will focus on the top-ranking factors in this screening. In particular, I will define the impact of these newly-identified melanoma secreted factors on tumour progression and metastasis, focusing on key components of the lymphovascular niche (i.e. on the crosstalk of tumour- vasculature-immune system). Secondly, I will assess the impact of these genes as prognostic biomarkers and indicators of response to clinically-relevant treatments. These studies will be performed in collaboration with dermatologists, pathologists and oncologist to define the physiological relevance of our work.

Mots clés : melanoma, lymphangiogenesis, metastasis, secretion, premetastatic niche

Participants :
- Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 170121.6 €
Projet TRIBBLES (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Melanoma is the most aggressive form of skin cancer resistant to all standard therapies. Currently, the established treatment of metastatic melanoma includes dacarbazine (DTIC) administration associated with response rates of between 10-20% with severe side effects during treatment. Recently, the BRAF inhibitors (vemurafenib and dabrafenib) and the MEK inhibitor (trametinib) were approved for the treatment of melanoma patients with mutated BRAF (about 50% of patients) while there are several PI3K, AKT, mTOR and MEK inhibitors being tested in clinical trials. However, the effectiveness of all these treatment modalities is limited by intrinsic or acquired resistance. The host lab has discovered a novel mechanism of resistance to a broad spectrum of drugs in clinical trials/use for melanoma therapy mediated by the kinase-like protein TRIB2. This means that TRIB2 could be used as a biomarker to select melanoma patients for specific treatment options and to develop co-treatment strategies to overcome drug resistance. This project pretends to (1) understand the mechanisms underlying TRIB2-mediated resistance to MEK inhibitors and to (2) further develop TRIB2 as a prognostic and predictive biomarker for melanoma. Ultimately, the expected results will be highly relevant for the clinic as they might allow to select melanoma patients for specific treatment options and to develop co-treatment strategies to overcome TRIB2 mediate resistance.


Participants :
- University of Algarve (Portugal) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 160635.6 €