Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : QuantCom (Horizon 2020, appel 2017, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Systems and communication engineering
Entité participante : University of Southampton — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2496372.0 €

''It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future'' - Mark Twain. Yet, Gordon Moore's predictions - known as Moore's Law - made in 1965 remained valid for half a century! As a result, semi-conductor technology is approaching nano-scale integration and on this journey to quantum futures the traveller enters the world of quantum physics, where many of the phenomena are rather different from those of classical physics. This proposal contributes to the 'quantum jig-saw puzzle', with special emphasis on the enabling techniques of ubiquitous quantum communications, potentially leading to job- and wealth-creation on a similar scale to the economic benefits of flawless classic wireless communications. My ultimate goal as a telecommunications researcher is to build bridges across the exciting fields of quantum physics, mathematics, computer science and hardware aspects of quantum communications. Specifically, the three Key Challenges of Work-Packages 1-3 on the new concept of Pareto-optimum error control, secret key-distribution, network coding and entanglement distribution will lead to creating stepping-stones for the Grand Challenge of Work-Package 4, dedicated to the support of quantum-communications for aircraft 'above the clouds'. Methodology: theoretical performance bounds will be established based on the hitherto unexplored Pareto-optimum quantum design philosophy using multi-component optimization. Explicitly, the Pareto-front of optimal solutions will be found off-line, where none of the conflicting parameters, such as the bit-error ratio, transmit power, delay and implementation complexity can be improved without degrading some of the others. A suite of new soft-decision aided components will be conceived by invoking code-specific quantum syndrome decoders to be designed for iterative soft-information exchange without perturbing the fragile quantum states. Finally, quantum-communications solutions will be created for drones and planes.

Mots-clés : quantum communications,quantum signal processing,quantum codes,quantum network codes,quantum routing,entanglement distribution,quantum key distribution,aircraft communications,drones
Projet ERC : CANDICE (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : University of Oxford — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2497907.0 €

150 years after Broca's seminal statement "Nous parlons avec l'hémisphère gauche" we still do not know how or why we have this bias. I propose that by studying cases of impaired language development and combining genetic and neuropsychological approaches we will be able to make a leap forward in our understanding of the quintessentially human characteristic of functional cerebral asymmetry. I argue that contradictory findings in the literature may be reconciled if we adopt a novel approach to cerebral asymmetry. In particular, I propose a network efficiency hypothesis which maintains that optimal development depends on organisation of key language functions within the same cerebral hemisphere. In project A, I will combine behavioural measures with functional transcranial Doppler ultrasound (fTCD) measures of blood flow and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to identify individual differences in patterns of dissociation between language functions in lateralisation. In project B I will test the prediction that risk for language and literacy impairment is increased if different language functions are represented in opposite hemispheres. For project C, simulations of predictions from genetic models will be tested using data on twin-cotwin similarity in language lateralisation. Project D will test a 'double hit' genetic model that predicts that neurodevelopmental abnormalities, including language deficits and inconsistent asymmetry, arise when there is more than one hit on a functional brain circuit. For this study we will use an existing sample of individuals already known to have one 'hit' on the neuroligin-neurexin circuit, viz people with an additional dose of neuroligin caused by an extra sex chromosome. Project E will focus on individuals with inconsistent patterns of language laterality and will look for rare genetic mutations and structural rearrangements associated with a departure from consistent left hemisphere language.

Mots-clés : language,cerebral lateralisation,neuroimaging,sex chromosomes
Projet ERC : 4-OCEANS (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Trinity College Dublin — Pays : Irlande — Rôle : CO-PI
Acronyme de l'entité : TCD
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 4907047.5 €

4-OCEANS aims to assess the importance of marine life for human societies during the last two millennia. We contend that the harvest of marine resources played a critical, but as yet underappreciated and poorly understood, role in global history. To bridge this gap in our understanding, the four PIs will form an interdisciplinary team combining expertise in marine environmental history, climate history, natural history, geography, historical ecology and zooarchaeology. We will examine when and where marine exploitation was of significance to human society; how selected major socio-economic, cultural, and environmental forces variously constrained and enabled marine exploitation; and identify the consequences of marine resource exploitation for societal development. Through these objectives we will discover how marine resources as novel wealth altered societies throughout history. How might marine wealth have enabled some societies to escape food shortages? How did it trigger long-term socio-economic impacts and ecological consequences? How were marine resources valued, consumed, and energetically transformed? Revealing this history will open a new window on human-nature dynamics of profound importance for understanding developmental trajectories of human societies. 4-OCEANS will transcend the binary distinctions of East and West, global-north and global-south, indigenous and colonial, resource exploitation and wildlife conservation, nature and culture. In doing so, 4-OCEANS will uncover and chart historical trajectories towards sustainable and unsustainable food security and resource extraction, identifying their complex underlying drivers.

Mots-clés : marine environmental history,environmental archaeology,climate history
Projet ERC : 4-OCEANS (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : University of California System — Pays : Etats-Unis — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : UC
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 57393.75 €

4-OCEANS aims to assess the importance of marine life for human societies during the last two millennia. We contend that the harvest of marine resources played a critical, but as yet underappreciated and poorly understood, role in global history. To bridge this gap in our understanding, the four PIs will form an interdisciplinary team combining expertise in marine environmental history, climate history, natural history, geography, historical ecology and zooarchaeology. We will examine when and where marine exploitation was of significance to human society; how selected major socio-economic, cultural, and environmental forces variously constrained and enabled marine exploitation; and identify the consequences of marine resource exploitation for societal development. Through these objectives we will discover how marine resources as novel wealth altered societies throughout history. How might marine wealth have enabled some societies to escape food shortages? How did it trigger long-term socio-economic impacts and ecological consequences? How were marine resources valued, consumed, and energetically transformed? Revealing this history will open a new window on human-nature dynamics of profound importance for understanding developmental trajectories of human societies. 4-OCEANS will transcend the binary distinctions of East and West, global-north and global-south, indigenous and colonial, resource exploitation and wildlife conservation, nature and culture. In doing so, 4-OCEANS will uncover and chart historical trajectories towards sustainable and unsustainable food security and resource extraction, identifying their complex underlying drivers.

Mots-clés : marine environmental history,environmental archaeology,climate history
Projet ERC : 4DRepLy (Horizon 2020, appel 2017, 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 : 1977000.0 €

4D reconstruction, the camera-based dense dynamic scene reconstruction, is a grand challenge in computer graphics and computer vision. Despite great progress, 4D capturing the complex, diverse real world outside a studio is still far from feasible. 4DRepLy builds a new generation of high-fidelity 4D reconstruction (4DRecon) methods. They will be the first to efficiently capture all types of deformable objects (humans and other types) in crowded real world scenes with a single color or depth camera. They capture space-time coherent deforming geometry, motion, high-frequency reflectance and illumination at unprecedented detail, and will be the first to handle difficult occlusions, topology changes and large groups of interacting objects. They automatically adapt to new scene types, yet deliver models with meaningful, interpretable parameters. This requires far reaching contributions: First, we develop groundbreaking new plasticity-enhanced model-based 4D reconstruction methods that automatically adapt to new scenes. Second, we develop radically new machine learning-based dense 4D reconstruction methods. Third, these model- and learning-based methods are combined in two revolutionary new classes of 4DRecon methods: 1) advanced fusion-based methods and 2) methods with deep architectural integration. Both, 1) and 2), are automatically designed in the 4D Real World Reconstruction Loop, a revolutionary new design paradigm in which 4DRecon methods refine and adapt themselves while continuously processing unlabeled real world input. This overcomes the previously unbreakable scalability barrier to real world scene diversity, complexity and generality. This paradigm shift opens up a new research direction in graphics and vision and has far reaching relevance across many scientific fields. It enables new applications of profound social pervasion and significant economic impact, e.g., for visual media and virtual/augmented reality, and for future autonomous and robotic systems.

Mots-clés : 4d reconstruction,dynamic scene reconstruction,computer graphics,computer vision
Projet ERC : np-Gold (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Proof of concept grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Synthetic Chemistry and Materials
Entité participante : Technion – Israel Institute of Technology — Pays : Israël — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

70% of the toxic gasses emitted from automotive exhaust systems originates from the first 60 seconds of the cold start. Severe health effects are associated with air pollution from motor vehicles. In fact, it causes 6% of total mortality per annum, half of which is attributed to vehicle emissions. Current catalytic converter technology relies on expensive platinum group metals (Pt, Pd, Rh) which are very effective in oxidizing these toxic gases at elevated engine working temperatures, however, they completely fail to catalytically convert the gases at temperatures of cold starts. Nanoparticles of gold are well known for their superior catalytic capabilities at low temperatures. Nevertheless, they have never been integrated into the catalytic converter technologies because of their tendency to coarsen at elevated temperatures and lose their catalytic activity. We have developed nanoporous gold (np-Gold) that has the same catalytic activity as that of gold nanoparticles but is thermally stable at elevated temperatures. This is due to the fact, that we form our np-Gold from a eutectic Au-Ge alloy and in the form of single crystals. The elimination of grain boundaries as well as more energetically stable facets of np-Gold removes the rapid diffusion routes leading to the coarsening of the nanoporosity and renders np-Gold thermal stability. This makes our np-Gold a promising candidate to solve the current problem of cold start catalysis. We trust that our np-Gold solution will make a great positive impact on the environment and society by lowering the levels of air pollution and occurrence of diseases attributed to toxic cold start vehicle emissions. We propose herein to study how we can incorporate our np-Gold into current catalytic converter products by replacing some of the current catalysts or incorporating as an add-on component to the existing technology.

Mots-clés : nanoporous gold,catalysis,bio inspired
Projet ERC : ExtComb (Horizon 2020, appel 2017, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Mathematics
Entité participante : University of Birmingham — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1797111.0 €

A central theme of extremal combinatorics is the interplay and relationship between the parameters of combinatorial objects. The first and most immediate question which arises in this context is that of the (i) existence of objects with a given set of parameters. Once this has been answered, the next step is to seek for (ii) the number of such objects - i.e. to ask for a counting result. This is of central importance in the context of many combinatorial questions arising in statistical physics. A very effective approach here is to seek asymptotic results - rather than exact formulas. This asymptotic approach sometimes makes it possible to go even further and ultimately uncover the (iii) typical structure of the objects in such a given class. In this project, we will consider the above perspective with a focus on inter-related topics involving combinatorial designs, decompositions, Latin squares as well as matchings in graphs and hypergraphs. The project themes have close connections e.g. to statistical physics, probability, algebra and theoretical computer science. A common feature of the structures considered in this proposal is that the constraints describing them are of a "global nature". This makes their study extremely challenging. However, recently initiated methods have opened up completely new avenues, bringing questions within reach that were considered inaccessible until now. (In fact, one of the objectives involves the study of algebraic structures which had been conjectured not even to exist.) The aim of the project is the development of general tools and approaches which make the asymptotic study of such structures far more accessible. These tools will be mostly of a probabilistic nature. Indeed, the probabilistic perspective has already been the driving force behind recent advances which underpin the proposal. But it seems that overall, this development is still in its early stages - a situation we aim to address in the current project.

Mots-clés : extremal and probabilistic combinatorics
Projet ERC : TrackingMinds (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : Universität Hamburg — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UHH
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499129.03 €

A core research question in cognitive neuroscience and many other disciplines is to understand how humans interpret the behavior of others. Despite the plethora of empirical work on human Theory of Mind, we still lack a computationally and neurobiologically plausible model. The goal of the current project is to fill this gap by leveraging our extensive knowledge of decision making, which has been formalized as a process of evidence accumulation. Thus, my central hypothesis is that humans utilize their own evidence-accumulation machinery to track others’ minds and to infer their hidden beliefs and preferences. Importantly, my theory goes far beyond previous accounts (e.g., the mirror neuron system), as it specifies not only how we observe others, but also how we predict and learn from their decisions. I will subject this hypothesis to a series of studies that test its behavioral, physiological and neurobiological implications. Thereto, I will employ cutting-edge cognitive neuroscience tools, including cognitive modeling, eye tracking, functional magnetic resonance imaging, and electroencephalography (EEG). Moreover, I will use EEG hyperscanning to probe the synchronization of brain signals related to evidence accumulation in interacting people. Finally, I will develop a multi-agent artificial intelligence (AI) system that can infer the hidden beliefs of other agents on the basis of their decision processes. I will then show that this AI system provides superior performance in coordinating its actions with human partners. The multi-modal and mathematically rigorous approach of TrackingMinds will advance our understanding of human mentalizing abilities profoundly. Thereby, it will stimulate further research and applications. First, it can help to devise better interactive AI systems. Second, it has strong implications for equilibrium predictions in economic theory. Third, it can foster new interventions of social mental disorders such as autism and social anxiety.

Mots-clés : decision making,evidence accumulation,theory of mind,computational modeling,eye tracking,fmri,artifical intelligence,game theory,behavioral economics
Projet ERC : SCFTAlg (Horizon 2020, appel 2019, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Fundamental constituents of matter
Entité participante : University of Oxford — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1963921.0 €

A critical challenge of the current era in theoretical and mathematical physics is to understand and solve strongly coupled quantum field theories. Meeting this challenge will necessitate a significant reformulation of the edifice of quantum field theory and will surely require dramatic mathematical breakthroughs. To this end, a productive and promising strategy is to focus on the intricate algebraic structure of observables in quantum field theories, and in particular in those theories that are fixed points of the renormalization group, namely conformal field theories. From this point of view, supersymmetric quantum field theories are ideal theoretical laboratories; they enjoy special structure properties that not only improve their tractability but position them centrally in several areas of contemporary mathematics. Additionally, the landscape of known superconformal field theories is much richer than its non-supersymmetric counterpart and includes many models of interest due to their connections with string theory, holography, and particle physics. In recent years it has been recognized that the combination of (extended) supersymmetry and conformal symmetry guarantees the existence of several remarkable cohomological reductions of the full operator algebras of these theories. This is a proposal to establish a world-leading research team to develop these "superconformal operator algebras" into a coherent framework that can be used as a non-perturbative backbone for the analysis of such models. The team will include a diverse array of researchers with expertise in conformal field theory, supersymmetric localization, topological field theory, geometric representation theory, and vertex algebras. Our framework will be used to constrain, organize, and classify the landscape of SCFTs, as well as to solve for supersymmetric observables in theories of interest. It will also serve as a rigorous mathematical entry point for the study of these theories more generally.

Mots-clés : conformal field theory,strong coupling,supersymmetry,duality,vertex operator algebra,deformation quantization,conformal bootstrap,topological field theory,supersymmetric localization,class s
Projet ERC : SHADES (Horizon 2020, appel 2019, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Fundamental constituents of matter
Entité participante : National Institute for Nuclear Physics — Pays : Italie — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : INFN
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 140528.75 €

A crucial source of neutrons in stars is the nuclear reaction Ne-22(alpha,n)Mg-25, of major importance for the synthesis of heavy elements. Currently there is an established picture of the astrophysical scenario but only limited availability of reliable experimental data, with several key ingredients under dispute. SHADES will perform a direct measurement of the reaction to resolve the main open questions. The goal is to decrease the uncertainty in the astrophysical reaction rate in the relevant temperature range by at least one order of magnitude, providing a significant leap ahead from the state of the art. SHADES will deliver an increase in sensitivity of more than two orders of magnitude over the state of the art. We will gather direct experimental data over the entire astrophysically relevant energy range. We will construct a neutron detector specifically designed for this measurement. Beam-induced background, a severe problem in the past, will be discriminated by measuring the neutron energy while still maintaining a very detection high efficiency. In recent years research on capture-gated techniques and combinations of different detector types to measure neutron energies has increased greatly. The novel detector array will perfectly fit this profile and find a large field of applications also outside of nuclear astrophysics. The main measurements will be done with the new accelerator LUNA MV, allowing long-term high-intensity, high-energy resolution alpha bombardments. An extended, recirculating gas target will guarantee target stability under intense ion beams. The location of the experiment deep underground will drastically reduce the external background, the main limiting factor so far for low-energy measurements. In my team there will be also leading experts in the field to update the current stellar models using the new dataset to provide a greatly improved and much more robust picture of this important branch of stellar nucleosynthesis.