Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : SHY-FEC (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Proof of concept grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Systems and communication engineering
Entité participante : Eindhoven University of Technology — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : TU/e
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Next-generation optical and wireless communications require high-performance, high-speed, and low-power consumption error decoding structures. These requirements cannot be satisfied by VLSI-implemented soft-decision or hard-decision forward error correction (FEC), as both bear crucial limitations. The entire telecommunication network value chain is in distress. Designers, device manufacturers and system level integrators are trying to find solutions via costly and time-consuming approaches that only result in incremental improvements. Error correction algorithms need to be replaced with completely new methods to cater for the ever-increasing data rates in future high-speed communication systems. Recently, we made a breakthrough innovation in tackling the challenges above and developed Shaped Hybrid Forward Error Correction (SHY-FEC) that combines hybrid channel coding and low-complexity constellation shaping. With such an algorithm-based approach, we have been able to achieve low complexity, high-throughput and low energy consumption making it a very attractive solution to high-speed communication systems, both for wireless systems and for short/medium-haul fibre optics. The environmental footprint of the ICT sector is estimated to be 5–9% of the world’s total electricity use, of which a large proportion is due to data centres cloud services and connectivity. For connectivity, 15% of the overall receiver energy consumption is attributed to FEC. Therefore, our approach can create also a significant positive environmental impact. Our ultimate goal is to use SHY-FEC to obtain performance levels similar to those of state-of-the-art soft-decision FEC, but with at least one order of magnitude lower energy consumption. In addition to establishing the technology feasibility in this PoC, we will also carry out pre-commercialisation activities.

Mots-clés : forward error correction,product codes,staircase codes,signal shaping,constellation shaping,probabilistic shaping
Projet ERC : NSETHIO (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment of Human Diseases
Entité participante : California State University System — Pays : Etats-Unis — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : CSU
Type d'entité : Autres
Financement ERC de l'entité : 72500.01 €

Nodding syndrome (NS) is a neurological, incurable syndrome, currently affecting mainly children between 5 and 15 years of age in South Sudan, Uganda and Tanzania. Since 1950, when NS was first described, its cause has remained a mystery. NS is characterized by head-nodding (an atonic form of epilepsy), often followed by clonic - tonic seizures, developmental retardation and faltering growth. In the affected regions, NS is a major public health problem associated with severe socio-economic consequences. After exploratory missions to South Sudan, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), we gathered epidemiological evidence that supports the hypothesis that NS is a disease caused by a pathogen transmitted by blackflies, the vectors that transmit the parasitic worm that causes onchocerciasis. This pathogen could be an unknown neurotropic virus or another pathogen that is transmitted either independently or as a symbiont of the worm. We postulate that this pathogen is able to cause typical NS, but also other forms of epidemic epilepsy. We hypothesise that the same disease is also endemic in other onchocerciasis hyper-endemic regions e.g. in the Mbam valley, Cameroon and the Orientale Province, DRC (where it is referred to as “river epilepsy”). In this project we aim to investigate our hypotheses in South Sudan, Uganda, Tanzania, Cameroon and the DRC with a trans-disciplinary approach including clinical-epidemiological, post-mortem, eco-entomological, and metagenomic studies. We will study the effect of vector control methods and ivermectin distribution on the incidence of river epilepsy. So far a multi-country study on NS was never done and nearly all previous studies were cross-sectional, carried out during short country visits. With this long term research plan we hope to finally discover the cause of NS and detect effective control strategies to decrease the incidence of epilepsy in onchocerciasis endemic areas.

Mots-clés : vector born diseases,onchocerciasis
Projet ERC : NSETHIO (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment of Human Diseases
Entité participante : Erasmus MC — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : Partner
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 58568.5 €

Nodding syndrome (NS) is a neurological, incurable syndrome, currently affecting mainly children between 5 and 15 years of age in South Sudan, Uganda and Tanzania. Since 1950, when NS was first described, its cause has remained a mystery. NS is characterized by head-nodding (an atonic form of epilepsy), often followed by clonic - tonic seizures, developmental retardation and faltering growth. In the affected regions, NS is a major public health problem associated with severe socio-economic consequences. After exploratory missions to South Sudan, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), we gathered epidemiological evidence that supports the hypothesis that NS is a disease caused by a pathogen transmitted by blackflies, the vectors that transmit the parasitic worm that causes onchocerciasis. This pathogen could be an unknown neurotropic virus or another pathogen that is transmitted either independently or as a symbiont of the worm. We postulate that this pathogen is able to cause typical NS, but also other forms of epidemic epilepsy. We hypothesise that the same disease is also endemic in other onchocerciasis hyper-endemic regions e.g. in the Mbam valley, Cameroon and the Orientale Province, DRC (where it is referred to as “river epilepsy”). In this project we aim to investigate our hypotheses in South Sudan, Uganda, Tanzania, Cameroon and the DRC with a trans-disciplinary approach including clinical-epidemiological, post-mortem, eco-entomological, and metagenomic studies. We will study the effect of vector control methods and ivermectin distribution on the incidence of river epilepsy. So far a multi-country study on NS was never done and nearly all previous studies were cross-sectional, carried out during short country visits. With this long term research plan we hope to finally discover the cause of NS and detect effective control strategies to decrease the incidence of epilepsy in onchocerciasis endemic areas.

Mots-clés : vector born diseases,onchocerciasis
Projet ERC : SINGWAVES (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Mathematics
Entité participante : Université Côte d'Azur — Pays : France — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : UCA
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1118731.25 €

Non linear wave equations are central in the description of many canonical models in physics from nonlinear optics to fluid mechanics. A phenomenon of particular interest is singularity formation which corresponds to the concentration of the energy of the wave packet. The existence and description of such dynamics is still mostly mysterious, but fundamental progress have been made in the past ten years on canonical models like nonlinear wave and Schr\"odinger equations, with in particular the discovery of the fundamental role played by a specific class of nonlinear wave packets: the solitary waves. These very recent works open up a huge field of investigation on problems which were considered out of reach ten years ago. The aim of the SINGWAVES project is to strenghten our research group in the setting of an intense international activity with two main directions of investigation: the construction and classification of singular bubbles for some canonical models like non linear Schr\"odinger equations, the exploration of new deeply nonlinear dynamics in connection with classical models at the frontier of current research.

Mots-clés : singularity formation
Projet ERC : OPTOACOUSTOGENETICS (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment of Human Diseases
Entité participante : Helmholtz Zentrum München — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : HMGU
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 308652.67 €

Non-invasive observation of fast spatiotemporal activity patterns of large neural populations distributed over entire brains is a longstanding goal of neuroscience. Not only would such abilities significantly promote our knowledge on brain function and its pathophysiology but they are also expected to accelerate development of novel therapies targeting neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. The progress is hampered by the limited capacity of state-of-the-art functional neuroimaging tools, which do not permit simultaneous monitoring of whole-brain activity with an adequate spatiotemporal resolution. Our recently developed five-dimensional optoacoustic tomography technique is ideally poised to overcome these limitations – it has shown excellent capacity for imaging intrinsic contrast in entire brains of vertebrates and rodents non-invasively; delivers unmatched temporal resolution in the milliseconds range for true volumetric imaging in real time; capable of label-free observations of hemodynamic changes and sensitive to genetic markers of neural activity. Yet, several fundamental challenges ought to be addressed before true potential of optoacoustic functional neuroimaging is unveiled. First, optoacoustic monitoring of fast neural activation under physiologically relevant stimuli and in real disease models has not been achieved. Furthermore, a variety of acoustic effects introduced by the skull compromise performance of optoacoustics in transcranial imaging of murine models, further hindering its clinical translation potential. Finally, technology needs to be developed that can deliver information from single neurons while maintaining high volumetric imaging speed. By resolving those challenges, the current project will yield a unique and groundbreaking functional neuroimaging method that can truly transform the existing paradigms in neuroscience by delivering real time information from hundreds of thousands or even millions of neurons simultaneously.

Mots-clés : optoacoustic tomography,brain,functional imaging,real time,ultrasound
Projet ERC : PERSIST (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Computer science and informatics
Entité participante : Max Planck Society — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : MPG
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1999300.0 €

Non-volatile memory (NVM) is an emerging technology that provides orders of magnitude faster access to persistent storage (which preserves its contents after a crash or a power failure) than hard disks. While NVM is expected to radically change how we manage storage in applications, its programming model is standing on very shaky foundations. The persistency semantics of the mainstream architectures is very unclear and full of counterintuitive behaviours. As a result, writing correct NVM programs is extremely difficult: there is no support for persistent programming in programming languages nor any techniques for testing and verifying their correct recovery from crashes. PERSIST will develop a solid mathematical basis for determining the possible outcomes of persistent programs and reasoning about their correctness. More specifically, it will produce: (1) formal empirically-validated persistency models for mainstream hardware architectures, (2) formal efficient persistency models for mainstream programming languages, (3) firmly-grounded higher-level abstractions to ease persistent programming, and (4) the first effective testing and verification techniques for persistent programs.

Mots-clés : semantics of programming languages,verification,non volatile memory,weak memory consistency,persistent memory,concurrency,program logic,model checking
Projet ERC : ProbDynDispEq (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Mathematics
Entité participante : University of Edinburgh — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1007811.0 €

Nonlinear dispersive partial differential equations (PDEs) appear ubiquitously as models describing wave phenomena in various branches of physics and engineering. Over the last few decades, multilinear harmonic analysis has played a crucial role in the development of the theoretical understanding of the subject. Furthermore, in recent years, a non-deterministic point of view has been incorporated into the study of nonlinear dispersive PDEs, enabling us to study typical behaviour of solutions in a probabilistic manner and go beyond the limit of deterministic analysis. The main objective of this proposal is to develop novel mathematical ideas and techniques, and make significant progress on some of the central problems related to the nonlinear Schrödinger equations (NLS) and the Korteweg-de Vries equation (KdV) from both the deterministic and probabilistic points of view. In particular, we consider the following long term projects: 1. We will study properties of invariant Gibbs measures for nonlinear Hamiltonian PDEs. One project involves establishing a new connection between the limiting behaviour of the Gibbs measures and the concentration phenomena of finite time blowup solutions. The other project aims to understand the space-time covariance of the Gibbs measures in the weakly nonlinear regime. 2. We will first construct the invariant white noise for the cubic NLS on the circle. Then, we will provide a statistical description of the global-in-time dynamics for the stochastic KdV and stochastic cubic NLS on the circle with additive space-time white noise. 3. We will develop novel analytical techniques and construct the local-in-time dynamics for the cubic NLS on the circle in a low regularity. 4. We will advance the understanding of traveling waves and prove scattering for some energy-critical NLS with non-vanishing boundary conditions.
Projet ERC : NI2D (Horizon 2020, appel 2016, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : University of Liège — Pays : Belgique — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 147000.0 €

Nonlinear vibrations are a frequent occurrence in engineering structures and can originate from friction, contact, material laws and large displacements. Nonlinear phenomena are most often ignored or avoided in industry, because practitioners lack both a methodology and a software for properly addressing them. The objective of this ERC PoC is to provide companies active in aerospace, automotive and mechanical engineering with a solution for the analysis of nonlinear vibrations. Specifically, we aim to bring the Nonlinear Identification to Design (NI2D) software to the market. NI2D, developed based on the outcomes of the NOVIB ERC Starting Grant, is the first software that can accurately quantify the impact of nonlinear vibrations on engineering structures. NI2D’s unique feature is that it can embrace both measured time series and finite element models, allowing to progress from experimental data to design. The NI2D software and related services will help (i) shorten test campaigns through proper handling of nonlinear phenomena, (ii) decrease time-to-market by providing an improved correlation between measurements and numerical predictions and (iii) enlarge the design space thanks to the richness of nonlinear behaviors.

Mots-clés : vibrations,nonlinear,aerospace,software
Projet ERC : OPTIMALZ (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment of Human Diseases
Entité participante : Medical University of Vienna — Pays : Autriche — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1497000.0 €

Novel diagnostic techniques and disease models have the powerful potential to provide new insights into pathological and pathophysiological processes. Ocular manifestations of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) emerge as novel and attractive alternative to investigate disease progression in parallel to the brain. Using the eye as a window to the brain, we propose to develop multi-functional optical coherence tomography (OCT) as a noninvasive in-vivo technique for preclinical imaging of AD pathology. OCT is analogous to ultrasound B-mode imaging, using light rather than acoustical waves, and performs high-resolution real time 3D imaging of microstructure in biological tissues in situ. Based on the optical polarization properties or movement of particles, functional OCT methods provide additional contrast channels. In the proposed project, we will unite/join standard and functional OCT for imaging ocular and cerebral pathology in AD mouse models with threefold contrast. Structural changes caused by neuronal cell loss in the retina will be assessed longitudinally and with micron-scale resolution. Beta-amyloid plaques are birefringent and are deposited in both brain and retina in AD. We propose to exploit these intrinsic polarization properties for noninvasive detection and longitudinal characterization/assessment of retinal plaque load. Simultaneously, we will assess AD-related changes in retinal microvasculature. Retinal blood flow will be measured in quantitative units and monitored during disease progression. In addition to the retina, we will perform longitudinal imaging of AD-related lesions in the ocular lens with OCT. By correlating ocular AD pathology as imaged with OCT to cerebral lesions, the proposed research provides a new set of in vivo parameters that potentially shed new light on the pathogenesis and impact early diagnosis of AD in aging populations worldwide.

Mots-clés : optical coherence tomography,optical imaging,alzheimer s disease,mouse,retina,lens
Projet ERC : LockChip (Horizon 2020, appel 2016, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Karlsruhe Institute of Technology — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : KIT
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Nuclear magnetic resonance is an important chemical analysis method, because of its inherent chemical specificity, its versatility to extract molecular information, and its absolute accuracy. The market has been dominated by large superconducting NMR magnets with price tags of many 100k €. The emergence of less expensive low field compact (tabletop and portable) NMR spectrometers, based on the use of permanent magnets, with price tags around a factor of 10 lower than superconducting magnets, brings a drastically lower cost-of-ownership, and the significantly lower need for external support, maintenance, and lack of liquid Helium, which is opening up new applications and huge new markets for NMR. Compact NMR spectrometers, mainly used for teaching but targeting professional applications (e.g. real time process monitoring in chemical factories), have very cramped magnet bores (15 mm cube) mainly needed for the generation and detection of analyte signal. The magnetic field strength of their permanent magnets is strongly temperature dependent, so that the proportional NMR frequency drifts during measurements that are taken over extended time periods, which can lead to erroneous resonance results and is a major challenge, especially for forensic applications, or applications in factories. The remedy is to detect the temperature-dependent frequency shifts of a special lock substance, which is typically mixed into the sample, but cannot be done in the case of factory automation applications. This represents a big barrier for the introduction of compact NMR into many professional applications. Our miniaturized NMR detector, entitled LockChip, provides an ideal solution for all aspects. Its extremely compact size, easily fits side-by-side with the vendor NMR detector, with only two leads of wire needed to connect it to the lock channel circuitry. Our chip can therefore solve this issue, and help to open up a vast market.

Mots-clés : low field portable nmr,independent lock channel
Projet ERC : NuWaSim (Horizon 2020, appel 2016, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : CERCA Institution — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CERCA;I-CERCA
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 149250.0 €

Nuclear waste is generated during the operation and maintenance of nuclear power plants. The waste is first transferred to an interim storage, where it remains for tens of years, till radioactivity and heat generation of the spent fuel is reduced to a level that allows its final disposal. It is generally accepted that the final waste will be disposed of in a deep geological repository. However, not a single country worldwide has an operational underground repository. In the design process of these repositories, simulation tools capable to model their long term behavior (hundreds of years) are required. However, such simulations are extremely challenging, due to the complicated nature of the physical phenomena of multiscale and multiphysics nature. Current numerical tools being used by some of the most advanced deep repository projects use CODE_BRIGHT (developed at UPC-CIMNE), a very rich code in terms of modelling capabilities, which benefits from 20 years of intensive validation against in-situ experiments. However, CODE_BRIGHT is a serial structured FORTRAN 90 code with very limited capabilities in terms of parallel performance. As a result, actual analyses of prototypical deep repositories require strong and not validated simplification assumptions, in order to reduce by some orders of magnitude the computational cost of the target simulations. In this project, we want to change the situation by developing extremely scalable simulation software for nuclear waste management in repositories. The strategy is to port CODE_BRIGHT modelling capabilities to FEMPAR, the extremely scalable scientific computing code that resulted from the Starting Grant COMFUS. The result of this work will be a new software that (1) produces the same results as CODE_BRIGHT for a wide set of benchmark tests (to validate the code), and (2) with proven excellent scalability on hundreds of thousands of processors.

Mots-clés : simulation,modelling,computational engineering,scientific software,nuclear waste management,finite element method,parallel computing