Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet EXPECTBRAIN (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A fundamental question in the study of human perception concerns how we combine new sensory information with prior knowledge. Different underlying neural mechanisms have been proposed for how perceptual priors are combined with sensory input depending on their respective certainty to generate a subjective experience. Predictive Coding models suggest that neuronal populations compare (bottom-up) input from the sensory organs against (top-down) predictions so that only the unexpected part of the input is processed. Alternative models (e.g., Sharpening) propose that perceptual representations of the expected sensory input are enhanced while unexpected sensory input is suppressed. The objective of this proposal is to close this controversial research gap by testing 1) how top-down and bottom-up influences on perception depend on their respective certainty, i.e., the confidence in prior predictions and the clarity of sensory evidence, and 2) whether and how this mechanism is related to inter-individual differences during perception. To achieve this I will test multiple neuroimaging techniques (fMRI and EEG) against computational simulations of the two models. I will use state-of-the-art brain-activity pattern analysis to decode brain responses to individual words during perception of degraded speech. The innovative approach of combined pattern-information analysis techniques will allow unprecedented access to decode how prior information changes the representation of sensory information. The results of this project will have important implications for several clinical areas, e.g., the treatment of hearing impairments and neuropsychiatric conditions that are accompanied by aberrant perceptual experiences such as autism or schizophrenia. By strengthening my portfolio of research skills, the proposed project represents the perfect lead-in phase to put me in the position to start my independent research group at the host organisation and ultimately obtain a permanent post.

Mots clés : brain imaging, computational modeling, representational similarity analysis, speech perception, predictive coding

Participants :
- Universität Hamburg (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 171460.8 €
Projet GLOMODAT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A growing economy and population in the world is causing landscape changes and an increasing pressure is put on water resources. Diffuse water pollution is considered to be one of the major problems for water quality in many countries. Modelling has been successfully used to simulate water quality in catchments to better understand the underlying landscape processes. The widely used Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) is a spatially distributed model that can be used to estimate flow and nutrient transport at a variety of scales. In current published studies typically only one or two parameters of precipitation, DEM, land use or soil properties are used in. The proposed project aims to investigate how spatial resolution of core input datasets of all types (precipitation, DEM, land use and soil) impacts SWAT modelling results and estimate the nutrient runoff on a local and global scale. Sensitivity analysis to all of precipitation, DEM, land use and soil will therefore be tested. The limitation to one or two parameters in current published studies is due to the computational demands. Due to the way the SWAT model is programmed using a tightly coupled Message Passing Interface (MPI) approaches the available computing power needs to accessible within specialised High Performance Computing (HPC) clusters of limited size. Thus, either scale or resolution is typically compromised. As for higher resolution or global scale data the computational effort becomes too large for automated calibration, we aim to develop a novel method to automate data processing and balancing computational load transparently between many computers. In order to surpass these limitations we test the MapReduce framework as a novel method for parallelization. This entails new ways of data management, model data partitioning and spreading the model partition computations transparently over multiple computing nodes fostering a loosely coupled distributed computation paradigm.

Mots clés : water quality modelling, nutrients, water management, scientific computing, ogc standards

Participants :
- University of Tartu (Estonie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 148582.8 €
Projet Farewell flashbacks (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A hallmark symptom of posttraumatic stress disorder involves ‘recurrent, involuntary and intrusive memories of the traumatic event’, in their most extreme form referred to as ‘flashbacks’. At present, effective interventions to prevent the development of intrusive memory after trauma are lacking. The research aim is to develop innovative, science-based therapies for treating trauma-related psychiatric disorders, by using a multidisciplinary approach, combining advanced neuroimaging (fMRI) analyses with an experimental analogue for trauma (film footage with aversive content). Key to the proposed research are findings from basic neuroscience showing that consolidated memories can - upon their retrieval – enter a labile state, making them susceptible to interference. Recent finds from the supervisors lab show that the reconsolidation of trauma memory can be disrupted, resulting in fewer subsequent intrusions, by engaging participants in a visuospatial task (i.e., Tetris) after retrieving the memory. To understand the mechanisms underlying this effect, I aim to directly measure the neural processes involved in the modulation of consolidated emotional memory. This has the potential to yield major conceptual, clinical and methodological insights, and will advance my research skills. The acquired transferrable knowledge will form the basis of a future grant application fully supported by the supervisor, prof. Emily Holmes, towards the end of the fellowship and fuel my career as a future leader in mental health science. My training will include courses on advanced MRI, media training and project management, and disseminating my results through scientific papers, conferences, and the media. A fellowship at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit (CBU) in Cambridge would help me establish an network with leading scientists from all over the world, while being based at a premier establishment for clinical psychology research and neuroscience.

Mots clés : memory plasticity, functional magnetic resonance imaging, trauma film paradigm, experimental psychopathology, behavioural intervention, intrusive memories, memory reconsolidation

Participants :
- University of Cambridge (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 114015.3 €
- UK Research and Innovation (Royaume-Uni) — Partner, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 81439.5 €
Projet FORGE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A key question in language studies is how children learn the meaning of new words and corresponding concepts. Developmental studies show that children’s actions promote learning about new objects and that acting on objects is closely related to early gestures’ production, which in turn accompanies vocabulary acquisition. Brain imaging studies have found activation of motor areas when people process action-related words. Together, these findings suggest a link between sensory-motor experiences, gestures and vocabulary acquisition. But how are these related? One hypothesis is that children’s manipulation of objects promotes their learning of concepts, these concepts then drive the use of iconic gestures rooted in actions with objects, as well as word learning. An alternative hypothesis is that iconic gestures scaffold vocabulary learning because gestures maintain important iconic similarity with the corresponding affordances and actions, while having communicative functions like words: thus emergence of gestures would be precursor to word learning. To-date, correlational data seems to support the first hypothesis, but existing data does not allow to clearly establish the direction of effects. The FORGE project aims to test between these hypotheses, to understand how learning new concepts (mental representations for new manipulatable objects), learning to gesture about these new tools and learning their labels are related to one another. The project uses a multi-disciplinary approach, bringing together traditional video-coding techniques from developmental psychology and psycholinguistics, and new bio-engineering sensor technology for movement analysis. As pre-school children learn new words on a daily basis, and because vocabulary is a strong predictor of academic achievement, establishing optimal conditions for learning to occur is critical to any educational setting. It is further critical to implement programmes assisting children with clinical impairments.

Mots clés : child development, vocabulary acquisition, sensory motor skills, language, gestures

Participants :
- University of London (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 183454.8 €
Projet COGNAC (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2014)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A large part of our knowledge on climate change is provided by the usage of coupled atmospheric-ocean Global Climate Models (GCMs), which produce numerical simulations of the Earth’s climate system for both the present and the future. However, state-of-the-art GCMs show considerable systematic errors: they are limited by low spatial resolutions and by the problematic representation of many physical processes. In particular, one of the largest sources of uncertainty is associated with the coupling between the atmospheric circulation and the water cycle. COGNAC is conceived as a fundamental theoretical project framed in this context. It aims at readdressing the representation of moist convection, clouds and precipitation and their interaction with the surface and the soil in GCMs. A recently developed theoretical framework capable of treating in a unified way the soil, the Planetary Boundary Layer (PBL), clouds, and both shallow and deep convection will be used. Such model - the Probabilistic Plume Model, PPM - is capable to represent the whole atmospheric column (from the PBL to the tropopause) with results comparable to Large Eddies Simulations and with a minor numerical cost. COGNAC aims at improving and refining the PPM and integrating it into two models, the LMDz GCM and the EC-Earth GCM, in the form a new unified parameterization. First evaluation will be carried out on Single Column Models, and hence extended to the full 3D case. Once operational, these new GCM configurations will provide a powerful tool to study complex interactions among surface, PBL and moist convection, as the ones occurring in the Sahel, the Amazon Rainforest or the Mediterranean region. These advancements will have notable potential for improving the representation, the forecast and the evaluation of the future changes of large-impact hydro-meteorological events.

Mots clés : global climate models, convection, climate change, planetary boundary layer, extreme events

Participants :
- Centre national de la recherche scientifique (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 173076.0 €
Projet CYgnaling (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A limited number of molecules have been characterized as plant growth regulators or hormones, usually identified due to the strong effect that they exert on plant architecture or development. Most of the metabolic pathways leading to their biosynthesis and catabolism are now well characterized, and all but one involve oxygenases belonging to the family of cytochrome P450 (P450) oxygenases. The increasing set of sequenced plant genomes reveals the evolutionary history and complex phylogeny of the P450 superfamily. It shows that some P450 genes are specific to taxa or evolutionary branches, which correlates with the versatility of plant metabolomes when different species are compared. But comparative analysis of plant genomes also point to ancient genes, highly conserved and under strong purifying selection. Those are most often involved in the metabolism of molecules essential for plant development and with signaling function. Taking advantage of the increasing power of comparative genomics, we propose to identify P450s that share similar evolutionary characteristics with their counterparts in known hormone metabolism. We propose to perform a comprehensive functional analysis of a set of candidates, using the easiest plant model Arabidopsis thaliana, and to assess their role in the biosynthesis or degradation of signaling compounds. This includes establishing a detail map of candidates’ expressions to evaluate their place and time of action, and a phenotypic analysis of inactivation mutants and overexpressors to assess the consequences of gene misexpression on plant development. Based on gene expression and potential mutant phenotypes, we will select tissues to be analyzed for metabolic changes associated with gene mutation using high-definition analytical tools. Enzyme activity will be assessed with recombinant proteins. We are confident that this innovative multidisciplinary approach will be a powerful tool to identify new and overlooked plant signaling pathways.

Mots clés : evolution, cytochrome p450, function

Participants :
- Centre national de la recherche scientifique (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 185076.0 €
Projet NeuroASPECT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A long-standing question in biology has been to determine how the mammalian central nervous system (CNS) achieves its dramatic cellular complexity and connectivity. Notably, mechanisms increasing transcript diversity, particularly alternative splicing (AS) and RNA-editing, have critical roles in the mammalian CNS development and function. However, it is still unclear whether the crosstalk between these two processes constitutes an additional RNA-mediated regulatory layer contributing to the complex mammalian CNS. Thus, the main goal of NeuroASPECT is to determine the extent, dynamics and functional relevance of the crosstalk between AS and RNA-editing in the mammalian CNS. To tackle this general goal, I propose the following specific aims: 1) Elucidate the extent of co-regulation between AS and RNA-editing events in the CNS by building a comprehensive catalog of neural co-regulated AS-editing events in mammals and explore their evolutionary conservation in other vertebrates. 2) Assess the crosstalk between AS and RNA-editing in neural differentiation by analyzing transcriptomes of cells with impaired RNA-editing. 3) Characterize the functional impact of AS and RNA-editing crosstalk on mouse neurogenesis. I expect this work will uncover RNA networks established between AS and RNA-editing that are involved in shaping and regulating the CNS transcriptome. Moreover, it will also contribute to a better understanding of the biological functions and regulation of AS and RNA-editing, in both an independent and synergistic manner. In addition, the functional characterization of the AS-editing crosstalk could ultimately reveal alterations in which the lack of coordination between AS and RNA-editing can lead to the development of neurological disorders, thus offering potential targets for their treatment.

Mots clés : alternative splicing, rna editing, central nervous system, mammals

Participants :
- Centre for Genomic Regulation (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 158121.6 €
Projet ETIC (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2015)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A major challenge in neuroscience is to understand how neurons code information. Optogenetics techniques provide the opportunity of controlling neuronal activity with high temporal and spatial resolution and thus testing causally the role of a specific encoding strategy. However, to enable us to crack the neural code, these optical approaches need to be complemented by theoretical developments that: 1) identify the response variables of a neural population that carry the most information about sensory stimuli and thus allows to build a hypothesis about the neural code it uses; 2) create stimulation protocols specifically designed to rigorously test the hypothesis; 3) apply appropriate statistical analyses that determine whether different information-carrying components of neural population activity are transmitted through downstream networks. Here I will develop a novel theoretical framework to address these issues and understand how the mammalian cortex encodes sensory information, using the mouse somatosensory cortex as an experimental model. I will develop a set of computational techniques aimed at characterizing the encoding and transmission of information in layer IV and then in one of its main targets: layer II/III. Specifically, I will develop Non-Negative Matrix Factorization methods to characterize how large-scale populations of layer IV encode whisker information. I will develop a Wavelet Transform based method to decompose the electrophysiological responses of layer II/III neurons into independently contributing temporal scales and establish which whisker-informative components of layer IV population activity are transmitted to the response of layer 2/3 neurons. This project constitutes a completely novel and comprehensive approach to crack the neural code that lies at the interface between computational neuroscience, optogenetic and neurophysiology and that will provide a crucial step towards the optimal applicability of causal optogenetic techniques.

Mots clés : neural code, population coding, information theory, wavelet transform, non negative matrix factorization, multiplexing, two photon microscopy, optogenetics, whole cell recordings

Participants :
- Italian Institute of Technology (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 168277.2 €
Projet MMDWET (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : SIGNED

A moving contact line (MCL) is a moving line of intersection between a fluid/fluid interface and a solid wall. MCLs are central to a wide range of flows in nature and industry, ranging from surface coating, spray cooling, displacement of oil by CO2, to the recent development of 3D printing, microreactors, and nanotechnology. However, the modelling of MCLs has been a classical challenge. In particular, when the solid phase can dissolve into the wetting fluids, e.g., in soldering, formation of alloys and manufacturing of composite materials, there are still a few fundamental challenges which have handicapped the development of predictive computational models. This fellowship project will address those challenges and it has three objectives: (1) to develop a new computational model for 3D direct numerical simulation (DNS) of MCLs on dissolvable solid surfaces, covering both inertial- and diffusion-dominant dissolutive wetting regimes, and resolving nanometer length scales; (2) to develop a novel experimental method using tapping mode atomic force microscopy to directly measure, for the first time of the world, the dynamic contact angle and interface profiles within tens to hundreds of nanometers near the dynamic dissolutive wetting line, and to formulate a theory relating the dynamic contact angle and interface profiles to system parameters; (3) to formulate a reduced-order macroscale computational model which can save computational effort by at least nine orders of magnitude compared with DNS models in numerical simulation of dissolutive wetting. The project will lead to a step change in our modelling and understanding of dissolutive wetting. It will enable accurate and affordable simulations which will greatly benefit design and optimization in a vast range of industrial applications.

Mots clés : dynamic wetting, dissolution, moving contact lines, multiscale experiments, modelling

Participants :
- University of London (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 224933.76 €
Projet MagDirac (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

A new field in condensed matter physics has emerged, dealing with new quantum states of matter originating from non-trivial topologies of the electronic band structure. Topological insulators were the first class of such materials. Dirac and Weyl semimetals are becoming the focus of the next major waive of research on topological matter. In these materials, the bulk valence band and conduction band touch at discrete points and disperse linearly (3D analogues of graphene). This project aims to answer a key fundamental question in this field: can time-reversal symmetry (TRS) breaking induce a Weyl state in a Dirac semimetal? The originality of our project resides on the idea of switching between Dirac and Weyl states using magnetism (TRS breaking), as the ON-OFF switch, instead of inferring the role of TRS by investigating Dirac and Weyl states in different compounds. We will synthesize epitaxial thin films of Cd3As2, the model 3D TDS, and induce a ferromagnetic state via magnetic doping. Subsequently we will perform a thorough investigation of the band structure (Dirac/Weyl cones, surface states and Fermi arcs), aiming to understand the coupling between magnetic and topological states, in particular, the switching between Dirac and Weyl states by breaking and restoring of TRS. In addition to its fundamental interest, this work has the potential to open a new research field dedicated to electrical switching between topological states, to be exploited in Dirac/Weyl-based electronic devices.

Mots clés : dirac, weyl, topological, doping, ferromagnetism, band structure, arpes, thin films, cd3as2

Participants :
- KU Leuven (Belgique) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 172800.0 €