Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : eLightning (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Earth system science
Entité participante : Spanish National Research Council — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CSIC
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1960825.51 €

More than 250 years after establishing the electrical nature of the lightning flash, we still do not understand how a lightning channel advances. Most of these channels progress not continuously but in a series of sudden jumps and, as they jump, they emit bursts of energetic radiation. Despite increasingly accurate observations, there is no accepted explanation for this stepped progression. This proposal addresses this open question. First, we propose a methodological breakthrough that will allow us to tackle the main bottleneck in the theoretical understanding of lightning: the wide disparity between length-scales within a lightning flash. We plan to apply techniques that have succeeded in other fields, such as multi-model coupled simulations and moving-mesh finite elements methods. Acting as a computational microscope, these techniques will reveal the small-scale electrodynamics around a lightning channel. We will then apply these techniques to elucidate the intertwined problems of lightning channel stepping and thunderstorm-related high-energy emissions. The main hypothesis that we will test is that stepping is due to the formation of low-conductivity spots within the filamentary-discharge region that surrounds a lightning channel. This idea is motivated by observations from high-altitude atmospheric discharges. By resolving the small-scale dynamics, with our numerical method, we will also test hypothesis for high-energy emissions from the lighting channel, which crucially depend on the microscopic distribution of electric fields. This interdisciplinary proposal, straddling between geophysics and gas discharge physics, seeks a double breakthrough: the methodological one of building multi-scale lightning simulations and the hypothesis-driven one of finding out the reason for stepping. If it succeeds, it will achieve a leap forward in our knowledge of lightning, undoubtedly one of the greatest spectacles in our planet's repertoire.

Mots-clés : lightning,gas discharge physics
Projet ERC : FungalTolerance (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Tel Aviv University — Pays : Israël — Rôle : CO-PI
Acronyme de l'entité : TAU
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 4281250.0 €

Mortality from invasive fungal infections approaches 50%, despite the use of available antifungal drugs. While bacterial studies have focused on drug resistance, the rare appearance of antifungal drug resistance does not explain these treatment failures. Antifungal tolerance is a poorly understood property that is expressed to different degrees in different non-resistant isolates, yet has not been measured routinely in the clinic or in most research studies. We do not know how tolerance differs between isolates, what biological mechanisms drive it, how it affects only some cells in a single isolate, or whether it can be inhibited to improve treatment outcomes. Recently, the Berman lab found that tolerance is an intrinsic property, in which some cells of a non-resistant isolate continue growing in the presence of the drug that has the potential to explain antifungal treatment failures. In parallel, the Ralser lab found that inhibitors of metabolic pathways affect the stress survival of some cells and the Berman lab found that these inhibitors can clear tolerance and convert an antifungal drug from fungistatic to fungicidal, thereby killing the cells and halting their adaptation. Together, we combine expertise in pathogenic fungi (Berman) and metabolic systems (Ralser) to reach fundamental understandings of tolerance across the range of its biological scales by: 1) capturing the diversity of tolerance in a genomic and proteomic data resource of >1000 isolates; 2) identifying metabolic pathways and molecular mechanisms that drive tolerance within isolates; and 3) probing processes and compounds that affect phenotypic heterogeneity between cells and suppress tolerance. By elucidating the mechanisms that drive tolerance and fungal single-cell diversity, we propose to render tolerance targetable, providing a paradigm shift in anti-fungal treatment strategies.

Mots-clés : phenotypic heterogeneity,metabolic communities,stress tolerance,integrated biomolecular responses
Projet ERC : FungalTolerance (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Centre national de la recherche scientifique — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CNRS
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 420000.0 €

Mortality from invasive fungal infections approaches 50%, despite the use of available antifungal drugs. While bacterial studies have focused on drug resistance, the rare appearance of antifungal drug resistance does not explain these treatment failures. Antifungal tolerance is a poorly understood property that is expressed to different degrees in different non-resistant isolates, yet has not been measured routinely in the clinic or in most research studies. We do not know how tolerance differs between isolates, what biological mechanisms drive it, how it affects only some cells in a single isolate, or whether it can be inhibited to improve treatment outcomes. Recently, the Berman lab found that tolerance is an intrinsic property, in which some cells of a non-resistant isolate continue growing in the presence of the drug that has the potential to explain antifungal treatment failures. In parallel, the Ralser lab found that inhibitors of metabolic pathways affect the stress survival of some cells and the Berman lab found that these inhibitors can clear tolerance and convert an antifungal drug from fungistatic to fungicidal, thereby killing the cells and halting their adaptation. Together, we combine expertise in pathogenic fungi (Berman) and metabolic systems (Ralser) to reach fundamental understandings of tolerance across the range of its biological scales by: 1) capturing the diversity of tolerance in a genomic and proteomic data resource of >1000 isolates; 2) identifying metabolic pathways and molecular mechanisms that drive tolerance within isolates; and 3) probing processes and compounds that affect phenotypic heterogeneity between cells and suppress tolerance. By elucidating the mechanisms that drive tolerance and fungal single-cell diversity, we propose to render tolerance targetable, providing a paradigm shift in anti-fungal treatment strategies.

Mots-clés : phenotypic heterogeneity,metabolic communities,stress tolerance,integrated biomolecular responses
Projet ERC : LPIGMANN (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Individuals, Markets and Organisations
Entité participante : University of London — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : U. London
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2175289.0 €

Most advanced economies have struggled to deliver inclusive growth in recent decades. Many people are fearful about the impact on their lives of technological change, large-scale immigration, and a shifting balance of power in the labour market that seems to have benefitted employers at the expense of workers. There is a widening gap in economic fortunes between ex-industrial areas and dynamic cities with service-based economies. The stakes are high: we should not be surprised if some voters no longer support growth-enhancing policies if they do not anticipate benefitting from that growth. While it is easy to identify the problems, diagnosing the causes and finding effective solutions has been more difficult. This proposal aims to improve our analytical tools for thinking about these problems and to develop appropriate policies to respond. On the impact of technology, it will extend our understanding of the link between job polarization and inequality and analyse the appropriate skills policy. On immigration it will develop models of the impact of migration in which employers play a pro-active role as they do in many labour markets. This will be done by integrating models of migration with models of imperfectly competitive labour markets. The empirical content of these models and the implications for migration policies will be explored. On labour market competition the project will provide better estimates of how responsive recruitment is to wages offered by firms, and better measures of the gap between wages and productivity and how this varies across different types of labour markets. The intention is that the proposal will help to develop practical policies to improve people’s lives. But it also aims to provide improved models and empirical methodologies to make a more lasting intellectual contribution, to equip us with the tools to analyse and develop policy not just for the problems we face today but the new ones we will undoubtedly face in the future.

Mots-clés : immigration,inequality,inclusive growth,technology,polarisation,labour market competition
Projet ERC : REFORMED (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Institutions, Governance and Legal Systems
Entité participante : Autonomous University of Barcelona — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UAB
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1002307.0 €

Most countries in the world are facing reform pressures to make their education systems more effective and responsive to the new challenges generated by the global economy. In this scenario, managerial policy ideas such as school autonomy and accountability, which aim to modernize public education and strengthen its performance, are spreading broadly. To date, a wide range of countries with different administrative traditions and levels of development have adopted school autonomy with accountability (SAWA) policies, whilst the most active international organizations in the education sector, like the OECD, are strongly promoting them globally. Constituting SAWA as a global model of education reform generates two main questions. First, why and how are SAWA policies disseminating globally, and to what extent does this reform model generate international policy convergence in education? Secondly, how and under what particular contextual and institutional circumstances do SAWA policies work and for whom? The fact that existing scholarly research has achieved inconclusive and mixed findings concerning the SAWA effects on learning outcomes and equity makes this second question especially relevant. To address these gaps in existing literature, REFORMED develops a comprehensive research approach that scrutinizes the different, but mutually constitutive stages of global education policy, from the inception in global agendas stage to their operationalization and effects in multiple contexts. Specifically, the project analyzes how and why SAWA policies are being adopted and re-formulated by policy actors operating at different scales (from international bureaucrats to teachers), and inquires into the institutional frameworks and policy enactment processes that explain the different effects of SAWA at the school level. A robust and multi-scalar methodological strategy that combines quantitative and qualitative methods will contribute to advancing such an innovative approach.
Projet ERC : DeLiCAT (Horizon 2020, appel 2016, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Physical and analytical chemical sciences
Entité participante : Delft University of Technology — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : TU Delft
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1973438.04 €

Most of the developments in catalyst are still based on serendipitous and trial-and-error approaches, in which potential systems can be overlooked simply because of the sub-optimal conditions of the initial activity assessment. Mechanistic and kinetic studies could provide a framework for a more adequate assessment of new catalysts, but such rigorous experiments are not practical for general catalyst discovery. Modern chemical theory and computations hold a promise to be employed in new efficient theory-guided approaches for rational catalyst and process development. The main aim of DeLiCat is to formulate a hierarchical computational strategy for the design and synthesis of new non-critical metal-based catalysts for sustainable chemical transformations. New, durable and cheap, yet, highly active and selective tailor-made catalyst for hydrogenation of carboxylic acids and their esters as well as for acceptorless dehydrogenation of alcohols will be developed. The research will follow an innovative strategy combining advanced chemical theory, computational screening and experimental approaches from the fields of homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis in an efficient knowledge exchange loop. Computer simulations will reveal complex reaction networks that determine the “death” and the “life” of catalyst systems. These insights will be used in targeted design of novel multifunctional catalyst systems to direct the selectivity of the reaction network and to prevent deactivation paths. Complementary experimental studies will guide and validate the theoretical predictions. DeLiCAT represents a leap forward in unified first principles-guided catalyst design for liquid phase chemical transformations. The new theoretical concepts, methodological advances as well as the novel superior catalyst systems developed here will be applicable in various areas including biomass valorization, homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis as well as hydrogen technology.

Mots-clés : catalyst design,cooperative catalysis,sustainable chemistry
Projet ERC : SCIROCCO (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Products and processes engineering
Entité participante : Centre national de la recherche scientifique — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CNRS
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1976835.0 €

Most renewable energies can only be delivered intermittently. Without massive long-term storage capacities they will never provide 65 % of our energy mix by 2050, as required to limit global warming to 2°. Throughout this period and beyond, energy generation from combustion will remain a key component of this mix. SCIROCCO has two goals: (1) provide effective storage for renewable energies and (2) significantly improve existing combustion systems. Objective (1) is addressed by extending ‘Power to Gas (PtG)’ strategies, where excess electricity from renewable sources is converted into fuel, usually hydrogen (H2), which is easy to store over long periods and burn when power is needed. Objective (2) is addressed by burning the ‘renewable’ H2 in smart combustors with higher efficiencies and reduced emissions. Today, H2 is diluted in methane lines ('drop-in' strategy) to burn in existing devices. This strategy ignores the exceptional properties of H2, which burns and ignites faster than all other fuels. We will exploit these properties in new chambers that (1) burn H2 within a wide range of fossil fuel mixes and (2) use H2 as a powerful actuator to increase performance. Rather than diluting H2 in other fuels, we will inject H2 into the chamber separately. Research is needed to analyse the structure of these new dual-fuel flames that burn a fossil fuel and H2 simultaneously. This is a challenge for combustion science, requiring a re-think of chamber design and control. These fundamental issues will be addressed for two applications with fundamental societal impact: (1) laminar gas-burning flames (stoves, heaters) and (2) swirled liquid fuel turbulent flames (aerospace and power gas turbines). All cases will be studied experimentally (at IMFT) and numerically (with CERFACS simulation codes). SCIROCCO will develop fundamental knowledge on multi-fuel flames and have a direct societal impact as SCIROCCO burners will pave the way for smart combustors burning renewable H2

Mots-clés : renewable energy storage combustion hydrogen power to gas
Projet ERC : SCIROCCO (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Products and processes engineering
Entité participante : Centre européen de recherche et de formation avancée en calcul scientifique — Pays : France — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : CERFACS
Type d'entité : Organismes privés (hors enseignement)
Financement ERC de l'entité : 518500.0 €

Most renewable energies can only be delivered intermittently. Without massive long-term storage capacities they will never provide 65 % of our energy mix by 2050, as required to limit global warming to 2°. Throughout this period and beyond, energy generation from combustion will remain a key component of this mix. SCIROCCO has two goals: (1) provide effective storage for renewable energies and (2) significantly improve existing combustion systems. Objective (1) is addressed by extending ‘Power to Gas (PtG)’ strategies, where excess electricity from renewable sources is converted into fuel, usually hydrogen (H2), which is easy to store over long periods and burn when power is needed. Objective (2) is addressed by burning the ‘renewable’ H2 in smart combustors with higher efficiencies and reduced emissions. Today, H2 is diluted in methane lines ('drop-in' strategy) to burn in existing devices. This strategy ignores the exceptional properties of H2, which burns and ignites faster than all other fuels. We will exploit these properties in new chambers that (1) burn H2 within a wide range of fossil fuel mixes and (2) use H2 as a powerful actuator to increase performance. Rather than diluting H2 in other fuels, we will inject H2 into the chamber separately. Research is needed to analyse the structure of these new dual-fuel flames that burn a fossil fuel and H2 simultaneously. This is a challenge for combustion science, requiring a re-think of chamber design and control. These fundamental issues will be addressed for two applications with fundamental societal impact: (1) laminar gas-burning flames (stoves, heaters) and (2) swirled liquid fuel turbulent flames (aerospace and power gas turbines). All cases will be studied experimentally (at IMFT) and numerically (with CERFACS simulation codes). SCIROCCO will develop fundamental knowledge on multi-fuel flames and have a direct societal impact as SCIROCCO burners will pave the way for smart combustors burning renewable H2

Mots-clés : renewable energy storage combustion hydrogen power to gas
Projet ERC : SKILLNET (Horizon 2020, appel 2016, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The study of the human past
Entité participante : Utrecht University — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1998750.0 €

Most scholars today are in favour of sharing their knowledge freely, even if there is no guarantee that they will get something in return. Apparently they assume that there is some greater good involved in sharing knowledge. Where does this ideal of knowledge come from? SKILLNET demonstrates that the ideal of sharing knowledge is a legacy of a bottom-up social network of scholars and scientists who transcended religious, political and linguistic boundaries through their correspondence with one another. From about 1500 to around 1800, the ‘citizens’ of this knowledge-based civil society referred to their community as the ‘Republic of Letters’ (RL). SKILLNET will show that the ideal of sharing knowledge proved so powerful that even after 1800, the RL has continued to be a model of tolerance and exchange for the global intellectual and academic community. The central thesis of this project is that the RL was held together by the ideal of sharing knowledge. To support this thesis, SKILLNET applies two theoretical frameworks which are entirely new to the study of the RL. First, it conceptualises the RL as a ‘knowledge commons’ devoted to the production and management of knowledge. Second, it conceptualises the RL as an ‘imagined community’ whose culture of memory and identity was defined by the ideal of sharing knowledge. To operationalise these theoretical frameworks, the project uses two methodologies which are also new to the study of the RL. The first is large-scale social network analysis: SKILLNET digitally unravels the social structure of this huge network and its development over time. The second is digital text-mining: analyses of a large corpus of texts to trace changes in the semantics of key ethical concepts across time and space. SKILLNET presents an innovative history of knowledge, made possible through an unprecedented pool of ‘big data’ which allow a long-term diachronic perspective and a representative spatial and social geography.

Mots-clés : history of knowledge,history of science,history of scholarship
Projet ERC : GRAPH-EAST (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The study of the human past
Entité participante : Centre national de la recherche scientifique — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CNRS
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1498768.0 €

Most traffic signs in the Middle East today bear city names transcribed in Latin characters, making them familiar to all. It was the opposite in the 7th c. with the Arab conquest and the Hellenisation of the empire. The Latin script disappeared from the monumental graphic landscape of the Eastern Mediterranean. Progressively until the Ottoman expansion, pilgrims, merchants, crusaders from the West re-established hospices, churches, castles, and placed on monuments and artefacts inscriptions and graffiti using the Latin alphabet, i.e. signs now exogenous. They attempted through stone, painting, mosaic and metal to appropriate graphically, spatially and symbolically, parts of the East, including the Christian holy places. The study of these inscriptions faces 3 problems: the lack of a comprehensive corpus, the concept of Latin East suggesting a uniform Latinisation, conflating writing, language, culture and religious rite, and limited to the crusades, and a perspective that views Latin epigraphy as something static and unchanging, not taking into account the plurigraphic environment of the East. GRAPH-EAST aims to change this paradigm by exploring Latin epigraphic writing in the Eastern Mediterranean (7th-16th c.), from Greece and Turkey to Egypt via the coast of Palestine-Syria and Cyprus, in contact, interaction, and competition with Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Armenian, Syriac etc. inscriptions, reflecting the political, religious, social and cultural issues of the area. The project proposes an innovative study of an outstanding body of texts, an estimated 2,500 inscriptions and graffiti, many unpublished, that opens a new field of research. It aims at understanding the representation and practice of the Latin script, alien in the Byzantine and Islamic empires, providing a connected history of epigraphy in this area, and analysing this migrant Latin writing through the prism of cultural transfers between West and East, with an international and pluridisciplinary team.

Mots-clés : medieval epigraphy,inscriptions,graffiti,writing systems,eastern mediterranean,scripts in contact,cultural studies,latin east,crusades,connected history,literacy,palaeography,latin script,written culture