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

The widening of gene pool of bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) by employing its wild relatives as donors of new alleles and genes will ensure the ability of wheat to sustain yield quality and quantity under adverse environmental conditions. Species from genus Aegilops represent a rich source of agronomically important traits, such as leaf rust resistance, grain nutritional quality and abiotic stress tolerance. To date, the utilization of wild genetic diversity has been hampered by low throughput of methods used to select introgression lines and the lack of knowledge on the genomes of wild relatives. The multidisciplinary AEGILWHEAT project integrates the applicant’s expertise in interspecific hybridization and cytomolecular genome analysis of Aegilops species with the state of art expertise in flow-cytometric sorting and genomic analysis of plant mitotic chromosomes in the Centre of Plant structural and Functional genomics (IEB, Olomouc, CZ). The aims of this project are to (1) isolate individual U and M chromosomes from Aegilops biuncialis and (2) identify their gene content and produce polymorphic markers (SNPs, INDELs) by next-generation sequencing and bioinformatic analyses. The genes and new markers will be integrated into (3) a new high resolution genetic linkage map of Ae. biuncialis. The marker-assisted selection system based on the ordered markers will be used for the (4) high throughput selection of wheat-Ae. biuncialis introgression lines. The training through the research will extend the expertise of the applicant by new skills in molecular genetics, genomics and bioinformatics so that he can apply innovative genomics approaches to speed up his wheat pre-breeding programmes in Hungary. The project will deliver valuable information to geneticists and breeders on chromosome structure and genome evolution within the tribe Triticeae and provide molecular tools to support cost-effective transfer of wild alleles into wheat.

Mots clés : alien intogression breeding, chromosome flow sorting, genetic linkage maps, interspecific hybridisation, marker assisted selection, next generation sequencing

Participants :
- Czech Academy of Sciences (Rép. Tchèque) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 154720.8 €
Projet ExoDia (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The worldwide explosion of obesity has resulted in an ever-increasing prevalence of type 2 diabetes (T2D), a non-communicable disease that affects more than 370 million people worldwide. T2D is characterized by insulin resistance with a relative deficiency in insulin secretion. It is now recognized that there is decreased beta-cell function and mass in T2D but the precise underlying mechanism remains to be determined. Skeletal muscle accounts for >50% of the total glucose uptake in the post-prandial state, it is also the largest organ in non-obese individuals. Recent studies demonstrated that there is conversation between skeletal muscle and beta-cells, and that certain peptides (i.e. myokines) secreted by insulin-resistant skeletal muscle cells may impact negatively on beta-cell function, proliferation and survival in T2D. Nevertheless, other factors than myokines could also be involved in this inter-organ communication. A novel concept suggests microvesicles, such as exosomes, as a new cell-to-cell communication mode. The major goal of the project will be to characterize the different exosomes populations and their impact on islets cells. The findings may have important implications for understanding decreased functional beta-cell mass in diabetes, especially in T2D etiology, and therefore bring new insights into the development of innovative therapies. To achieve the aims of the innovative translational project, the candidate will be part of one of the European leader research centres on diabetes, trained to promising new research area in inter-organ communication, micro-RNA biology, as well as cutting-edge 'omic' technologies which will perfectly complement her strong knowledge in energy metabolism and physiology and create a rare expertise in candidate's profile. It will provide a unique stepping-stone for her independent research career in Europe and successful collaborations in the future.

Mots clés : type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, skeletal muscle, beta cells, inter organ communication, exosomes, myokines, metabolism, exercise

Participants :
- Ctre europeen d'etude du diabete (France) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Autres, subvention : 185076.0 €
Projet GET READY (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

The ‘Get Ready’ project aims to integrate service-learning methodology into Physical Therapy and Sport Sciences University degrees by offering students individual service opportunities (placements) with Residential Care Homes, in order to co-create the best suited physical activity (PA)/ sedentary behaviour (SB) intervention with researchers, older adults (end-users) in care homes, health professionals and policy makers. The project will use a Participatory Action Research (PAR) methodology and will follow the objectives of workforce development to support users to demand more responsive and integrated care programmes for chronic diseases, and to involve end-users in their health management and decision-making relevant to their own health (Action Area 6). We will use mixed methods to assess the intervention feasibility and acceptability (including process evaluation) and we will conduct a pilot study of a two armed pragmatic randomized controlled trial to assess the effectiveness of a 12-week complex intervention on reducing SB and increasing PA, infused with behaviour change technologies, in an institutionalized older population. This complex intervention co-designed with care home residents and conducted by university students will be compared to existing PA interventions (usual care), conducted by health professionals working in the Residential Care Homes. The experienced researcher will significantly expand her scientific knowledge by combining it with the new themes of SB as a risk factor for health and its assessment in institutionalized older adults, shorten the gap between students and real life conditions, and the process of PAR methodology to co-create a robust intervention through workforce development with end-users, providing a logical progression and extension of her knowledge, enhancing the experienced researcher’s academic skills and offering a distinct progression on wider academic (as opposed to purely research) skills.

Mots clés : sedentary behavior, physical activity, aging, intervention, workforce development

Participants :
- Glasgow Caledonian University (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 195454.8 €
Projet AdIrCAT (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Statut du projet : SIGNED

The “green hydrogen” produced by water electrolysis using renewable energy as power input will play a vital role in the decarbonization of various sectors, particularly the heavy industry and freight road transport where electrification is impossible or too costly. Proton exchange membrane water electrolysis (PEMWE) is a very promising low-temperature technology, and has a number of advantages over the conventional alkaline water electrolysis. However, the usage of precious and scarce noble metal iridium (Ir) to catalyze the thermodynamically and kinetically demanding oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is indispensable to achieve decent electrolysis performance. To enable widespread deployment of PEM electrolyzers and make electrolyzed hydrogen fuel economically competitive, the utilization of Ir in electrolyzers must be reduced without comprising the catalytic performance for the OER. The AdIrCAT project aims at developing the emerging atomically dispersed Ir catalysts, which will maximize the utilization of Ir and meanwhile improve the mass activity of Ir catalysts by a factor of at least 5. Moreover, a method will be developed that potentially allows for upscale production of atomically dispersed Ir catalysts. The catalysts will be accessed not only in the half-cell configuration but also in membrane electrode assemblies under industry-relevant conditions in collaboration with a company where the applicant will have her secondment. The applicant and host group have complementary expertise that can be transferred to each other. The host institution will offer the applicant a range of training to enhance her competences and skills in terms of proposal preparation, project management, leadership, and science communications. Successful implementation of this project will help the applicant reach her professional maturity and remarkably enhance her future career prospects as a female scientist, leading her to find a tenure-track position after the Fellowship.

Mots clés : single atom catalyst, pem electrolysis, oxygen evolution reaction, iridium, large scale synthesis, electrocatalytic test

Participants :
- International Iberian Nanotechnology Laboratory (Portugal) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 159815.04 €
Projet MENTALIZINGORIGINS (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2016)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Social Sciences and Humanities
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Theory of mind (ToM) is the ability to impute unobservable mental states, such as desires and beliefs, to others. Our inferences about what others are thinking allow us to deceive and to empathize, to cooperate and to teach. For four decades, researchers have been attempting to elucidate the evolutionary and ontogenetic origins of this critical cognitive ability. In conflict with a long-held consensus, some have begun to argue that human infants (and to some extent great apes) share with human adults even the most cognitively sophisticated representational ToM abilities. To help resolve the intense resulting debate, this proposal presents a series of targeted experiments to test for several understudied but key ToM skills in great apes and human infants. The skills in question—attribution of (a) unfamiliar desires, (b) ignorance, and (c) false perceptions—form the basis of an organism’s ability to distinguish others’ minds from its own and build sequentially in terms of their cognitive and representational underpinnings. The present proposal marshals innovative new anticipatory looking eye-tracking methods and the most auspicious conditions available worldwide, through support of esteemed comparative and developmental psychologists Profs Josep Call and Malinda Carpenter and the School of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of St Andrews, to address these major gaps in the social cognitive literature. The proposal’s novel anticipatory looking methods, which assess participants’ predictions based on their looks in anticipation of agents’ acting on specific locations or objects, combine low task demands (like VoE paradigms) with clearer interpretability (much like action-based tasks). The proposal thus offers powerful tests of the hypotheses that great apes and human infants share with human adults a representational theory of mind. These studies will contribute key data to our understanding of the ontogenetic and evolutionary precursors of the human mind.

Mots clés : theory of mind, social cognition, mentalizing, perspective taking, great apes, chimpanzees, human infants, evolution, development, ontogeny

Participants :
- University of St Andrews (Royaume-Uni) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 183454.8 €
Projet Nano_Brain (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2018)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Chemistry
Statut du projet : CLOSED

Therapeutic drug delivery to the brain remains an unsolved challenge that limits the treatment of neurological and brain diseases, such as Glioblastoma, Parkinson and stroke. The main limitation is in the ability of the therapeutic drugs to cross the Blood Brain Barrier (BBB). To overcome this limitation, scientists present hyperthermia as an approach to overcome this limitation. Although this approach show promising results, the studies were not focused on understanding and combining the temperature raise during the BBB opening. Thus, the possibility of using this temperature rise to both improve the BBB opening performance and to exploit it to treat brain diseases is not used. For the aforementioned to be actualized, this project will bring the latest advances in intracellular temperature and nano-thermometry to a deeper understanding of the role of temperature in the BBB opening and its possible utilization in the treatment of brain diseases, such as glioblastoma. Thus, with the effort of the host organization (world leader in develop of nanomedicine platforms) and the experienced researcher (expert in nano-thermometry), two important objectives will be achieved under this Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowship: (1) detailed studies and understanding of both the intracellular temperature and extracellular temperature needed for the BBB opening and (2) design and synthesis of the nano-complex for simultaneously BBB opening and the release “in real time and on demand” of therapeutic drugs for glioblastoma treatment in vivo. The outcome of this proposal will represent an important step forward in the field of brain drug delivery, that will not only improve the applications of nanotechnology in glioblastoma treatment, but will also facilitate the overcoming of the actual limitations in the treatment of different brain diseases.

Mots clés : blood brain barrier, temperature, nanothermometry, glioblastoma

Participants :
- University of Coimbra (Portugal) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 147815.04 €
Projet MENESIS (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2020)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Information Science and Engineering
Statut du projet : SIGNED

There are currently 2666 active satellites orbiting the Earth to support the world’s telecommunication, navigation, exploration, and security systems. These satellites downstream a deluge of data to the Earth where most of the processing/analysis is performed, due to the lack of reliable on-board computing capabilities at the satellites. The introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) at earth stations has allowed us to process such big-data in more efficient ways, overall, boosting our capabilities. Nonetheless, the key bottleneck remains – better progress cannot be realized without addressing the bandwidth constraint. Henceforth, all of these data are then relayed to the cloud servers to be processed by artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms and, hereafter, feed the end-user meaningful information. Henceforth, nowadays data transmission and governance are inefficient. Moreover, if we do not revolutionize the way we process our data, we have to continuously dependent on cloud technology, which will be a major problem in the future. Besides its technical disadvantages (risk of data confidentiality, prone to network congestion, etc.), a cloud system is power-hungry, high operational and maintenance cost, and expanding a new server will consume a large area of land. These aspects significantly contribute to the increase of carbon and silicon footprint that damage the environment. The project proposes a disruptive concept by bringing the AI itself available on the sky, where the satellites have the autonomous computation power to differentiate signal to noise before transmitting the data to Earth, directly to the end-user. This work exploits an emerging memristor technology for making AI hardware accelerator as the “computing element” on board the satellite. The architectonic of memristor not only delivers lightweight, low power, fast, and dense AI chip, but also rad-hard; these are the crucial factors that will keep the cost of deployment to space minimum.

Mots clés : memristor, artificial synapse, neuromorphic computing, radiation detector, rad hard electronics, adaptive system

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

There are no therapies for the core symptoms of most psychiatric and neurodevelopmental disorders. Compelling evidence indicates that most of these disorders feature aberrant neuronal connectivity. Importantly, the neuronal growth regulator 1 (Negr1) is associated with neuronal connectivity and diverse brain disorders. Thus, a better understanding of how Negr1 exerts its functions may reveal general principles underlying these pathological conditions. Previous results show that Negr1 does not operate as single entity. Negr1 functions by physically interacting with other proteins. In this context, PSYNegrT will investigate the hypothesis that the brain’s Negr1 interacting-protein network is remodeled in psychiatric and neurodevelopmental disorders. The fellow will investigate the role of specific Negr1 complexes in diverse brain disorders and their possible exploitation as drug targets. To this aim, he will identify and characterize the brain’s Negr1 interacting-protein networks by proteomic, biochemistry, and molecular biology studies. Computational and mutagenesis studies will reveal structural features for molecular interactions at the interface between Negr1 and selected partner proteins. This project will thus: i) produce the first exhaustive list of cerebral Negr1-interacting proteins in physiological conditions ii) identify the protein-protein interactions involved in Negr1-mediated pathological effects. With PSYNegrT, the fellow will increase his research skills and expertise in molecular biology and modeling, thus flourishing into an independent group leader. The project will be a breakthrough in our understanding of the causes of diverse brain disorders, and it will reveal certain general principles underlying their pathophysiology. This will facilitate structure-based efforts to design small molecules, peptides, or nanobodies to target Negr1-mediated protein-protein interactions involved in these disorders.

Mots clés : negr1, schizophrenia, autism, depression, interactomic, molecular modeling

Participants :
- Italian Institute of Technology (Italie) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 183473.28 €
Projet RydSpin (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Physics
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is a currently growing interest in utilizing dipolar interacting Rydberg spin systems to simulate behavior of electron spins in magnetic materials. The tunable strong, long-range interactions as well as the long lifetimes of highly excited Rydberg atoms enable the study of coherent spin dynamics with beyond-nearest-neighbor interactions. An understanding of dynamical quantum magnetism enables researchers to explain the behavior of magnetic materials in microscopic and macroscopic scales, which leads to a development of technology related to condensed matter physics. In this action, I propose to investigate short time spin dynamics during magnetic-phase transition and long time dynamics of non-equilibrium spin systems towards thermal equilibrium. Rubidium-87 Rydberg spins will be prepared in a well-define magnetic-spin state utilizing lasers and microwave fields. The short-time spin dynamics will be measured after a quench generated from a microwave field at chosen field strength and frequency. A global magnetization of the systems and a spatial correlation between spins will be extracted using a state-selective field ionization of Rydberg states and an interaction-enhanced imaging method, respectively. By varying the quench parameters and the spin-spin interactions, we expect to obtain the quench conditions that lead to thermal equilibrium of the system. During the action, I will obtain scientific training about Rydberg-spin systems and microwave engineering under the supervision of experienced researchers. At the same time, I will transfer my expertise about high-resolution imaging technique as well as state-selective field ionization to the host institute. Aside from scientific activities, I will also involve in project administration and organization as well as take part in dissemination and outreach activities. The scientific and the career trainings throughout the action will benefit me for my future career as a professional researcher.

Mots clés : rydberg atoms, heisenberg model, microwave engineering, vacuum system

Participants :
- Heidelberg University (Allemagne) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire, subvention : 79730.4 €
Projet MAPGenome (Horizon 2020, appel à projets 2017)
Action : Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
Panel : Life Sciences
Statut du projet : CLOSED

There is increasing evidence that gene flow between populations adapted to different environments is widespread in nature. Understanding this interplay of adaptation and migration at the genomic level is a fundamental goal of evolutionary biology, with wide applications in situations where these two forces operate, e.g. pesticide resistance or species invasion. Yet, this goal remains largely elusive, mainly because genetic signatures of local adaptation are confounded by other evolutionary processes, such as past demography, the removal of deleterious mutations and recombination. I will address this by integrating new computational methods with new data from experimental evolution and field populations. First, I will develop a method to map gene flow along the genome to find regions under divergent selection, taking the challenging step of modelling recombination and background selection. I will then apply it to characterize the spread of pesticide resistance in field populations of a major crop pest, Tetranychus urticae (spider mite). Due to their small genome (90Mb) and haplodidploidy, we have the unique opportunity to get phased genomes from haploid males. Third, by training-through-research, I will follow mites (and their genomes) evolving under controlled selection regimes in the laboratory (with vs without pesticide), varying migration rates. Combining my background on population genomics with the PI’s knowledge in spider-mite evolutionary ecology and the excellent conditions for experimental evolution at the host institute, we will move the field towards a comprehensive characterization of the genomics of adaptation in face of gene flow. The new method will be of general application to address fundamental questions on speciation and ecology, while providing a transferable framework to tackle societal challenges, from agriculture to human health and global change (e.g. find genes responsible for human disease and crop response to increasing temperatures).

Mots clés : pesticide resistance, tetranychus urticae, molecular ecology, inference of demographic history, adaptation, gene flow

Participants :
- Fciencias.id - associacao para a investigacao e desenvolvimento de ciencias (Portugal) — Coordinator, beneficiary, Recherche, subvention : 148635.6 €