Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-actions-marie-curie-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet SENSE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Phyto-rhyzo-remediation is a promising technology for pollutant clean-up provided by the plant holobiont, composed by the host plant and its microbiota. Plant root exudation is modulated by the pollution stress and has a key role in the activation of the microbial degrading metabolism. Despite the well documented role of the plant holobiont in ecosystem services, the complex interactions between host and microbiome are poorly understood, in particular in contaminated environments. SENSE is an innovative, interdisciplinary approach to sort out the time-spatial synergistic interplay within the plant holobiont components and the geochemistry of rhizosphere micro-niches supporting microbial degradation. The project will take place in a top-rated Italian research university and spans metabolomic techniques, biosensors, together with an original application of microsensor/sensor devices to profile the chemistry of the root microenvironments. The study will be applied to one of the largest sites in Europe contaminated by polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), located in Italy. The research will be approached from two complementary angles: i) set up and application of bacterial biosensors to examine topology and dynamics of activation of the PCB degradation pathways upon stimulation by identified plant root exudates; ii) sensing the plant-modulated chemical micro-habitats through microsensor/sensor devices during plant-microbe interaction under PCBs stress. This will provide a proof of concept for the role of root exudates as boost of soil microbiome degradative potential. SENSE outcomes will provide a comprehensive understanding of the plant holobiont applied to environmental biotechnology, representing an opportunity for Europe to keep its leadership in research and green biotechnology. Additionally, this project will significantly enhance my skills and capabilities as experienced researcher in microbial and plant-sciences, to become a leader in this field

Mots clés : bioremediation, plant microbiome, beneficial microbes, plant bacteria interaction, rhizosphere, arabidopsis, pcb degradation, biosensor

Participants :
- University of Milan (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 183473.28 €
Projet SAPPHIRE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Phytoplankton, the tiny algae that fix carbon dioxide via photosynthesis, represent the base of the oceanic food chain and support essentially all life in the oceans. In the tropical Pacific, where phytoplankton biomass is low, local nutrient enrichments near islands support ecosystems characterized by higher biomass and biodiversity. While this "island effect" has been known for 60 years, the vast majority of islands remain unstudied and impacts at the basin scale are unknown. Additionally, little is known regarding changes in phytoplankton community structure despite implications for higher trophic levels. The SAPPHIRE project will elucidate the impact of islands on phytoplankton by conducting the first systematic study of the island effect in the tropical Pacific from a suite of physical and biological satellite data. This project leverages the OUTPACE in situ 20°S transect that sampled phytoplankton community composition nearby several islands in 2015 and the breakthrough satellite-based PHYSAT method that detects phytoplankton functional groups from space. Novel methods identifying and characterizing the island effect will be first developed in the OUTPACE region from in situ and satellite data, then applied to the entire tropical Pacific using satellite data. The ultimate goals are to 1) quantify the impact of islands on phytoplankton and physics in the tropical Pacific and 2) classify the islands as a function of enrichment processes and phytoplankton responses using cutting-edge machine learning techniques. SAPPHIRE provides a highly original perspective on marine ecological research by systematically conducting thousands of small-scale process studies over a large area, effectively providing a large-scale assessment of a mesoscale process. This project will be an important step in my career development by establishing me as a leading scientist in the emerging field of multidisciplinary data-intensive oceanography in Europe.

Mots clés : phytoplankton, biodiversity, island effect, satellite data, physical biological interactions, tropical pacific

Participants :
- Aix-Marseille Université (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 108172.5 €
Projet CASUABIOTA (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Pioneer plant species native to tropical ultramafic areas can be useful tools for the restoration of ultramafic soils degraded by nickel mining activities. Casuarinaceae trees are well known for its capacity to grow on nutrient-poor areas. This is possible thanks to multiple adaptations, including the formation of actinorhizal symbioses with nitrogen-fixing Frankia actinobacteria. Members of the genera Gymnostoma and Ceuthostoma (both from Casuarinaceae) colonise degraded ultramafic soils and promote the recovery of soil fertility. However, they produce high amounts of slow-degrading litter which (among other effects) reduce the colonisation by other plant species. The project CASUABIOTA is intended to improve our knowledge of soil biota associated to Casuarinaceae from ultramafic areas of SE Asia. The project has two main objectives: 1) to advance our knowledge about Casuarinaceae-associated frankiae and its tolerance to nickel, and 2) to obtain insights about the composition of Casuarinaceae litter and the organisms involved in its degradation, with a special interest in earthworms and saprophytic fungi. To accomplish these objectives, a sampling campaign aimed at plants, litter, root nodules and earthworms will be performed in ultramafic areas from Sabah State (N of Borneo, Malaysia). Collected material will be subjected to different analyses (litter composition, earthworm barcoding, soil fungal metabarcoding) and two manipulative experiments on litter degradation will be performed on vermireactors and on mesocosms. Expected results include the identification of Ni tolerant Frankia strains, the assessment of litter effects on the composition of soil fungal and earthworm communities and the optimisation of a biological method to accelerate the degradation of Casuarinaceae litter. This knowledge will ease the use of Casuarinaceae for the restoration of tropical Ni-mine spoils.

Mots clés : borneo, ceuthostoma, earthworm barcoding, frankia, gymnostoma, litter degradation, nickel mining, soil fungal metabarcoding, ultramafic soils

Participants :
- Universidade de Vigo (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 259398.72 €
Projet MORTI (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Placing coins as grave offerings was one of the most common, and is among the most widely studied, funerary pagan practices in the Roman world. Charon’s obol was the toll that souls had to pay to be ferried to the netherworld. The deposition of coins in tombs did not cease with the Christianisation of the Roman world, and the extension, prevalence (in terms of geographical areas, types of burial, etc.) and meaning of this practice during the Middle Ages are unclear. The main aim of MORTI is to interpret the use and meaning of coinage in post-classical funerary practices through its full archaeological contextualisation and the study of its relationship with the personal traits of the individuals they were buried with (sex, age, social and religious affiliation, etc.). Northern Italy is an ideal region where to carry out this project; it is no only a key region to understand the transformations undergone by the Mediterranean world after the fall of the Roman Empire (militarisation of society and settlements, Gothic and Lombard kingdoms, the struggle between Arrians and Catholics, commercial exchange, etc.); it has also been subject to specific studies about post-classical funerary practices (CAMIS, CARE) leading to over 15,000 data entries that are of interest for the project. MORTI will use this record and statistical multivariate correspondence methods to analyse circa 800 coins from over 120 necropolis dated to between the 3rd and 11th centuries. This analysis will specifically examine the phenomenon of Charon’s obol, and more broadly the characteristics of funerary ritual and the evolution of post-classical mentalities over time. MORTI will create new links between numismatics and funerary archaeology, as well as opening a wide array of research and professional avenues to the applicant.

Mots clés : coin in context, ritual use of coinage, funerary archaeology, evolution of mentalities, statiscal correspondence analysis, late antiquity, early middle ages

Participants :
- University of Padua (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 171473.28 €
Projet NLR_NLR-ID power (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Plant and animal innate immune systems detect pathogen infection by both cell-surface PRR (pattern recognition receptor) and intracellular NLR (nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat) immune receptors, and activate effective defences. Transfer of cell surface receptors between plant families can enhance disease resistance, but intracellular receptors are often non-functional when transferred to different families. This "restricted taxonomic functionality" may arise from a requirement for an appropriate helper or partner NLR. Some NLRs carry Integrated Domains (IDs) that serve as “baits” that detect the action of pathogen effector proteins, thus enabling pathogen recognition. NLR-ID proteins require for function a helper NLR, usually closely linked as a head-to-head gene pair. Some NLR/NLR-ID pairs confer resistance to diverse pathogens when transferred as a unit between plant families. For example, Arabidopsis RPS4/RRS1, when transferred as a unit, confers recognition of bacterial and fungal pathogens in Solanaceae and cucurbit plants. This project is based on the hypothesis that NLR/NLR-ID pairs from one species can detect effectors that target that class of ID from a pathogen of any species. Rice is completely resistant to fungal rusts of wheat and barley. Many NLR-IDs are present in rice but not in other Poaceae. My goals are to: (i) use DNA sequence capture and bioinformatics to discover the full NLR/NLR-ID pair repertoires of diverse rice genotypes; (ii) investigate rice IDs interactions with effectors from wheat and barley pathogens; and (iii) transfer gene pairs to barley, maximizing the diversity of IDs in these pairs, and assess transgenic lines for novel resistance to barley diseases. The outcomes of this interdisciplinary Fellowship will provide profound insights into NLR/NLR-ID diversity in plants, into the diversity of domains that are effector targets, and into the molecular basis of "non-host" disease resistance.

Mots clés : plant innate immunity, immune receptors, immunity of rice nlr receptor, non host resistance

Participants :
- Sainsbury Laboratory (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 195454.8 €
Projet SPLINTER (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Plant diseases are an economic, environmental and social threat affecting crop production worldwide. Effective plant disease resistance is a critical requirement to maintain world food security. Deployment of resistance (R) genes in crops is currently the most effective strategy for genetic control of disease. However, this type of resistance can be short-lived and is often affected by environmental stresses such as elevated temperature, which is highly concerning in the context of global warming. The proposed research aims to decipher the signaling function of intracellular plant immune receptors of the NOD-like receptor (NLR) family encoded by canonical and non-canonical (truncated) R genes. The opportunity at the heart of this project arises from the finding that N-terminal domains of NLRs act as potent signaling domains that are self-sufficient to activate immune responses independently of pathogen recognition and preliminary data indicate that this signaling activity is not compromised at elevated temperature (unlike full length NLRs). Hence, manipulating signaling downstream of pathogen recognition may lower the risk of resistance breakdown and provide a source of disease resistance adapted to global warming. Naturally occurring truncated NLRs lacking some of the canonical domains but containing N-terminal signaling domains are promising candidates to investigate this hypothesis. “SPLINTER” will focus on the signaling function of canonical and non-canonical NLRs in the major vegetable crop tomato, and the model plant Arabidopsis, mainly in response to the devastating phytopathogenic bacteria Ralstonia solanacearum and under temperature stress. This project will also establish a long-term research path for an early-mid career researcher returning to her home country.

Mots clés : nod like receptors, plant immunity, signaling, tomato, arabidopsis

Participants :
- Institut national de recherche pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 185076.0 €
Projet Clock-SAM (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Plant growth and organogenesis are coordinated by stem cells located in specialized tissues known as meristems. Virtually all the aerial parts of the plant derive from stem cells located in niches at the shoot apical meristem (SAM), where they process internal and external cues to sustain their function. As cells are continuously produced at SAM, it is essential for plants to precisely regulate the timing of proliferation as development and plant organogenesis occurs over time throughout the life cycle. The circadian clock is the primary timing device that enables an organism to measure the pass of the time to precisely coordinate biological activities with the internal cues and its surrounding environment. Despite the importance of stem cell function, the mechanisms controlling the timing of SAM activity in synchronization with the environment remain essentially unknown. we propose to investigate the role of the circadian clock as a flexible biological metronome orchestrating the SAM activity in plants. The Clock-SAM proposal aims to generate a road-map of clock function, defining circadian similarities and divergences among the different functional states at the SAM and establishing the correlation between the circadian pace of the clock and cell fate and specification. We will follow an ambitious integrative approach combining epigenetic and transcriptional regulatory mechanisms to understand stem cell function. Our studies will thus answer a fundamental question in plant cell biology by determining how the plant is temporally constructed in our rotating world. The results from this proposal will provide a framework that can be tested for regulating plant productivity and survival in different environmental conditions. Hence, in the long term our findings could be applied to crops of agronomical interest.

Mots clés : circadian clock, shoot apical meristem, plant organogenesis, epigenetics, environmental change, plant performance

Participants :
- CERCA Institution (Espagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 172932.48 €
Projet Xerobranching (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2019)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Plant roots forage for key resources like water and nutrients which are often distributed heterogeneously in soil. Plants optimize foraging by employing adaptive responses to modify their root shape. The host laboratory recently discovered (using non-invasive X-ray microCT imaging) that root branching is tightly regulated by the availability of soil moisture. For example, roots growing through an air-filled space transiently repress root branching until re-entering moist soil. This new root adaptive response is termed Xerobranching. Initial studies reveal that Xerobranching is dependent on ABA and auxin responses. However, how these hormone pathways cross-talk to regulate Xerobranching is unclear. Xerobranching is induced by transient accumulation of ABA in root tip tissues following reduced water uptake. Transient water stress also increases levels of protein SUMOylation in plant roots. The host lab recently reported in the journal Science that the transcription factor ARF7 is a target for SUMOylation during transient water stress. I will examine whether Xerobranching requires the ABA-dependent post-translational modification of key lateral root regulator, AUXIN RESPONSE FACTOR 7 (ARF7). I will also investigate whether Xerobranching depends on specific components of the SUMOylation machinery in an ABA-dependent manner. Furthermore, I will explore the wider impact of Xerobranching on soil exploration and crop performance. The highly interdisciplinary project will allow me to master advanced molecular and imaging techniques. This experience will uniquely position me to study adaptive responses at the root-soil interface and exploit allelic variation in key loci to create new varieties of cereal crops with greater foraging abilities.

Mots clés : plant environment interactions, root adaptive response, root branching, water sensing, hormone crosstalk, sumoylation, auxin response, x ray microct imaging

Participants :
- University of Nottingham (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 212933.76 €
Projet TESS (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Staff Exchanges
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Plant viruses cause an estimated 50 billion € loss worldwide per year. Viral diseases represent one of the most limiting factors in European crop production having negative effects on the quantity and quality of foodstuffs. The recent identification of plant factors required for virus infection, together with the development of functional genomic tools in several economically important crops, offer novel opportunities to protect crop plants against viral diseases. The scope of TESS is to capitalize on the latest biotechnological tools in order to manipulate the plant/virus interactions towards non-host resistance and to match the research outputs with fruit industry and breeding applications. TESS benefits from multidisciplinary research teams involving genomics, tissue culture, molecular biology, virology and plant breeding. It focuses on Prunus species for stone fruit trees. The originality of TESS is to test the generic mode of interference of plant viruses with their host during the infection and use this information to implement complex and durable resistance in perennial fruit tree species.

Mots clés : genome editing, stone fruit trees, rapid cycling breeding, resistance to virus

Participants :
- Institut national de recherche pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 108000.0 €
- Instituto de Investigaciones Agropecuarias (Chili) — Partner, organization partner, Recherche, subvention : 0.0 €
- Agricultural Research Council (Italie) — Partner, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 85500.0 €
Projet IMMUNE (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Plant-parasitic nematodes are major root pathogens that affect drastically plant development and growth. Predominant species, such as the root-knot nematodes (RKNs) Meloidogyne spp., represent a global threat for annual and perennial crops causing huge crop losses worldwide. In Europe, RKNs were mainly controlled by toxic pesticides that are getting banned. One of the most promising alternative to pesticides is to rely on biological control and on the plant innate immunity for disease resistance in crops. The plant immune system is a multi-layered network that enables the detection of pathogens using different classes of receptors. The presence/absence of such receptor can determine whether or not the plant will be resistant/susceptible to a particular disease. At INRA Sophia Agrobiotech Institute (ISA), an immune receptor gene Ma, from the toll/interleukin-1 receptor, nucleotide-binding and leucine-rich repeat (TIR-NB-LRR or TNL) family, has been cloned from the plum tree Prunus cerasifera where it provides a broad resistance against numerous RKN species. A unique feature of Ma resides in five repeated exons encoding a large C-terminal extention. Interestingly, each of those exons carries a recently characterized post-LRR (PL) domain which is found in a single copy in many other TNLs from different plant species. The PL domain’s function remains unknown but its conservation suggests an important role in TNLs. The peculiar architecture of Ma provides a great opportunity to decipher the involvement of the PL domain in TNL–mediated immunity. Combining complementary approaches, the proposed IMMUNE project aims to describe how Ma triggers immunity in response to RKNs in plant roots and how the PL domain participates in the recognition and signalling. This project, undertaken by Dr Simon Saucet at ISA, will provide new insights into the molecular mechanisms of plant immunity and contribute to the development of methods to control RKNs infection in crops.

Mots clés : plant immunity, root knot nematodes, tnl resistance receptor, defence signalling

Participants :
- Institut national de recherche pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 184707.84 €