Projet Natural Traces (Horizon Europe, appel à projets 2022)
Action : Doctoral Networks
Panel : Environment and Geosciences
Statut du projet : SIGNED

Literally any crime scene contains animal, plant, soil, microbial or environmental traces. Examples include pet hairs or saliva, pollen and algae, soil and soil organisms like bacteria or nematodes, fungal spores, insects, and environmental traces in the form of environmental DNA of any origin. Such biological traces can be found mainly on living people (suspects, victims), on objects like cars or weapons, and on bodies not just on the surface but also in their surroundings like single or mass graves, or an aquatic environment. In the EU, there is a lack of training opportunities in applied topics of forensic science at postgraduate level, such as the qualitative and quantitative analysis of specifically such non-human biological traces. While many EU countries have forensic laboratories that also such traces, a much broader, integrated knowledge base is needed, built on close cooperation between basic research in academia and analysis and application in casework by forensic specialists. Natural Traces aims to optimise the procedures for taking and analysing non-human traces in order to meet the ever-increasing demands for identifying suspects and victims and to link traces to different places, times or courses of action. The results based on this need a statistical robustness that will also hold up in the courtroom under cross-examination. The proposal aims for 10 PhD students with a background in life sciences. They will build their knowledge and experience in practical forensics in training schools provided by academic, non-academic partners, and police academies or laboratories. The training embeds biological evidence in a Bayesian framework, making it universally comparable with all other forms of evidence, by applying novel probabilistic approaches to extract forensic useful information from metadata. It is truly cross-sectoral, with secondments at end-users of the training (e.g. police forces) and joint supervision by PIs from different countries.

Mots clés : forensic science, taphonomy, graves, soil analysis, mycology, fungi, botany, diatoms, pollen, zoology, insects, mites, edna, microbiome, machine learning, bayesian, 

Participants :
- Université d'Amsterdam (Pays-Bas) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 0.0 €
- Université Charles de Prague (Rép. Tchèque) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 237038.4 €
- Government of the United Kingdom (Royaume-Uni) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes publics (hors enseignement & recherche), subvention : 0.0 €
- Université de Modène et de Reggio Emilie (Italie) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 259437.6 €
- National University of San Juan (Argentine) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 216720.0 €
- Valsts tiesu ekspertizu birojs (Lettonie) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes publics (hors enseignement & recherche), subvention : 0.0 €
- Forensic DNA Service Czechia (Rép. Tchèque) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 0.0 €
- Université de Potsdam (Allemagne) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 260539.2 €
- National University of Jujuy (Argentine) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Université de Reading (Royaume-Uni) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €
- Université de Gênes (Italie) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 259437.6 €
- Université Johann Wolfgang Goethe de Francfort-sur-le-Main (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 260539.2 €
- Université de technologie de Tallinn (Estonie) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 238507.2 €
- Université Loránd Eötvös (Hongrie) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 228348.0 €
- Scottish Government (Royaume-Uni) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes publics (hors enseignement & recherche), subvention : 0.0 €
- Anath genomic consultants ab (Suède) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 0.0 €
- Government of Portugal (Portugal) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes publics (hors enseignement & recherche), subvention : 0.0 €
- Université autonome de Madrid (Espagne) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 251971.2 €
- Institut de Recherche et d’Innovation en Santé de l’Université de Porto (Portugal) — Partner, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 243403.2 €
- University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (Royaume-Uni) — Partner, associated partner, Recherche, subvention : 0.0 €
- Institut de Recherche et d’Innovation en Santé de l’Université de Porto (Portugal) — Partner, associated partner, Recherche, subvention : 0.0 €
- Synlab (Germany) (Hongrie) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes privés (hors enseignement), subvention : 0.0 €
- Multiprofile hospital for active treatment "dr tota venkova" - gabrovo (Bulgarie) — Partner, associated partner, Organismes publics (hors enseignement & recherche), subvention : 0.0 €
- Université Nicolas-Copernic (Pologne) — Partner, associated partner, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 0.0 €