Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : POLYBOTA (Horizon Europe, appel 2025, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Texts and Concepts
Entité participante : École pratique des hautes études — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : EPHE PSL
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1498105.0 €

Ancient Greek polytheism was embedded in the botanical environment. Plants served as the foci of cultic activities and as a means of anchoring the presence of a divine power at a particular site. Ancient Greek cities often honored their gods by assigning them botanical names and epithets. Myths connected elements of the landscape to the past actions of gods and heroes, or to the presence of lesser deities. Texts represented gods acting in and through landscapes, interacting with plants, and even having their favorite biotopes.  Textual evidence, both literary and epigraphic, spanning a wide chronological and geographical range, attests to this phenomenon. To date, however, its collection and interpretation have remained unsystematic and largely anchored in outdated interpretive categories. Moreover, while there is a growing interest in the nexus of religion, environment, and ecology, specialists of ancient Greek polytheism have been reluctant to enter the debate. This is all the more paradoxical at a time when many, both inside and outside academia, are looking to ancient Greek culture and religion for models for rethinking our relationship with the environment.  POLYBOTA proposes the first thorough and methodologically up-to-date analysis of the texts that testify to the cultural significance of the vegetal environment in ancient Greek polytheism. At a first level, this study advances our understanding of the importance of plants to ancient Greek literature and religion, as well as our knowledge of the ways in which the ancient Greeks imagined the action of their gods in and through the natural environment. Moreover, POLYBOTA will offer new models for the analysis of the embedding of human cultures in the living environment, and for exploring the relationship between religion and the environment. Lastly, POLYBOTA contributes to the ongoing debate on nature, religion, and ecology, and fosters discussions with specialists in related disciplines and cultural areas.

Mots-clés : ancient greek religion,ancient greek literature,ancient botany,anthropology of ancient greece
Projet ERC : EvoGenArch (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Environmental B iology, Ecology  and E volution
Entité participante : École pratique des hautes études — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : EPHE PSL
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1443750.0 €

A major challenge in evolutionary biology is to understand and predict the evolution of phenotypic traits influenced by many genes, a.k.a. quantitative traits, which represent the majority of adaptive traits. For this, we require an accurate knowledge of the ‘genetic architecture’ of a trait, here defined as the statistical distribution of the effects of the genes on the phenotype. However, it has not been possible to firmly check theoretical predictions against empirical data, due to a lack of method to accurately infer genetic architecture.  In this project, I will develop novel statistical methodology to accurately infer the genetic architecture of traits in the wild, by leveraging the statistical correlation between neighbouring sites in the genome, or linkage disequilibrium. Using the power of a new linked-read sequencing to obtain information on recombination, I will apply this novel methodology to study the link between the genetic architecture of the traits, and the ‘evolutionary regime’, i.e. characteristics of selective and neutral factors. First, I will perform an in-depth study of the link between selection and genetic architecture on a long-term-studied wild population of common lizards. Second, I will apply my method to analogous traits across more than 20 species to infer their genetic architecture and use knowledge about the evolutionary regime and phylogenetic context, to assess the influence of those components on the variation in genetic architecture.  By combining novel methodology with analysis within and across species, this project will provide a firm empirical basis for thinking about genetic architecture. In turn, this understanding of the expected distribution of the gene effects, depending on the evolutionary context, will improve our ability to forecast adaptation, predict phenotype from genomic data and locate genes in diverse fields such as evolution, agronomy, conservation and human health.

Mots-clés : quantitative genetics,statistical modelling,comparative approach,wild population,zootoca vivipara
Projet ERC : HUMANads (Horizon Europe, appel 2021, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Institutions, Governance and Legal Systems
Entité participante : Université d'Utrecht — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1500000.0 €

Human ads are Internet influencers who earn revenue by creating and monetizing authentic and relatable advertising content for their armies of followers, by relying on business models such as influencer and affiliate marketing. This content often results not only in commercial but also political (hidden) ads, which look the same, are posted by the same persons, are displayed in the same digital space, to the same audiences, and raise the same transparency issues. In this environment, consumers and citizens can no longer distinguish between ads and non-ads, and between commercial and political communications. They are faced with a double transparency problem: (i) human ads have incentives to hide commercial interests, and (ii) platforms have incentives to algorithmically amplify human ads engagement in opaque ways. This reflects a general good faith and fair dealing problem: the social media economy is increasingly based on deceit, which leads to new forms of vulnerability for consumers and citizens on digital markets. Given its complexity and relative novelty, this phenomenon has not yet been the object of sustained academic or regulatory inquiry. HUMANads tackles this comprehensive research gap by exploring why a general European legal regime on fair advertising by human ads on social media platforms is necessary, and what it would entail. First, it articulates new theory of fair advertising in EU consumer law, in the context of content monetization by human ads across commercial and political speech. Second, it gathers evidence relating to business models, advertising prevalence and legal uncertainty through innovative interdisciplinary methods including digital ethnography, comparative law and natural language processing (NLP). Third, it proposes criteria for the assessment of resulting consumer harms, and translates them into a new normative governance model mandating more stringent transparency obligations on social media platforms.

Mots-clés : influencer marketing,advertising law,natural language processing,platform governance
Projet ERC : CROSSTALK (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Physiology in Health, Disease and Ageing
Entité participante : Université d'Utrecht — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1500000.0 €

To coordinate activities between different tissues, multicellular organisms critically rely on intercellular communication. Whereas homeostatic signalling within organs is studied extensively, inter-organ crosstalk is only starting to be unravelled. In recent years, Extracellular Vesicles (EVs) have emerged as central mediators of this pathway by shuttling specific bioactive cargo including proteins between cells. These nano-sized lipid vesicles are released by virtually every cell type, are transported via the blood and combine the intricacy of cell-cell contact with the long-acting range of cytokines. However, due to their small size and a lack of suitable approaches, to what extent endogenous EVs mediate inter-organ crosstalk and support custom cargo delivery is unclear. I recently developed a unique transparent zebrafish embryo model expressing optical EV-reporters to examine endogenous EV biology at unprecedented detail in vivo. The aim of this proposal is to understand endogenous EV-mediated organ crosstalk by studying EVs secreted by the liver, the central metabolic hub in vertebrates. To this end, I will decode hepatic EV communication routes in vivo in health and liver pathology by exploiting my model system combined with novel tools and high-resolution microscopy. I will pursue three key-objectives: 1) Targets: mapping hepatic EV target organs; 2) Contents: analysing custom cargo delivery by hepatic EVs to specific target organs. 3) Function: determining the function of endogenous hepatic EVs by developing and applying molecular tools to interfere with their release in vivo. This project will provide the first advanced mapping of endogenous EV inter-organ crosstalk in a living model organism. By studying how pathology impacts EV mediated organ crosstalk and gaining precise control over EV release in vivo I will obtain unique insights into EV pathophysiology. In turn, this will open avenues for optimized diagnostics and therapeutic intervention.

Mots-clés : extracellular vesicles,exosomes,inter organ communication,in vivo,live imaging
Projet ERC : GREENLAUND (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Soci al World and Its Interactions
Entité participante : Université d'Utrecht — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499281.0 €

The high value and scarcity of natural resources increasingly attracts criminal entrepreneurs operating in the legal economy. The laundering of natural resources is a prime example where illegally obtained natural resources are converted into legal products. Consequently, consumers buy products, such as a gold wedding ring, a hardwood floor, or endangered species, as ‘legitimate’ on the international market and unknowingly become part of a trade with devastating environmental effects. To facilitate laundering, crime groups interact with corporations and state actors, as joint crime ventures. The proposed research aims to understand how and why joint crime ventures launder natural resources and what the environmental impact is. Contemporary developments in environmental crime networks signal the expansion of grey areas of business where the separation between conventional and non-conventional criminals is no longer appropriate for understanding and dealing with the increasing complexities of environmental crime. Therefore, it is essential to develop an innovative approach to fill this theoretical and empirical gap. By analysing coercive, economic, and political interactions between crime groups, corporations, and state actors, this study will build a new line of research and reveal the causes, incentives, and environmental harms of laundering natural resources. The environmental impact of laundering is illustrated by rapidly disappearing rainforests, large-scale pollution, and the mass extinction of species. Yet, laundering natural resources has been the subject of rather limited study. This research introduces a novel combination of cluster analysis of environmental crime cases, multi-sited field research, and crime script analysis that ensures a unique mixed-method perspective. The insights will be crucial for scientists, policymakers, corporations, NGOs, and law enforcement to develop inventive solutions to prevent and tackle the laundering of natural resources.

Mots-clés : green criminology environmental crime green crimes environmental harm crimes against nature
Projet ERC : COSMO-MASTER (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Compl exity
Entité participante : Université d'Utrecht — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499790.0 €

Our most basic, fundamental assumptions are often the ones that get scrutinised the least. This very much holds true for the primary ontological and conceptual distinction that underlies much of physics, philosophy of physics and metaphysics: the idea that all entities and structures in our universe are to be categorised and conceptualized as either space (or, in modern physics, spacetime) or matter, never both, never neither. Everything must be either the “container” or the “contained”. Although this strict conceptual dichotomy did make a lot of sense in the context of our pre-20th-century worldview, the COSMO-MASTER project contends that it is no longer tenable, and even a hindrance to further progress. More precisely, each of the main ingredients—dark matter, inflation, dark energy, black holes and general relativity—of our highly-successful and well-established standard model of cosmology that was developed over the course of the 20th century puts pressure on the outdated Newtonian idea that the space(time) and matter concepts can and should be strictly distinguished. A systematic interdisciplinary analysis of the extent to which this dichotomy breaks down will have profound consequences for various debates in the philosophy of physics and metaphysics (e.g., undermining the substantivalism-relationalism debate about the metaphysics of spacetime, and providing novel opportunities to reassess and advance debates regarding conventionalism, scientific realism and scientific guiding principles) as well as for theory development and community interaction in cosmology, and physics more broadly. Far from being an unwelcome babel, a conceptual undoing, giving up the spacetime-matter distinction will provide guidance as to which traditional debates become moot and which novel avenues open up.

Mots-clés : philosophy of physics,philosophy of cosmology,metaphysics of science,substantivalism vs relationalism,conventionalism,scientific realism,dark matter,dark energy,black holes,inflation
Projet ERC : UNITES (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Human Mobility, Environment, and Space
Entité participante : CMCC Foundation - Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change — Pays : Italie — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : CMCC
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 355865.7 €

Geopolitical and socio-economic uncertainties are putting the European and Global energy transitions at stake. These deep uncertainties affect the analytical assessments underpinning energy and climate policies. For example, the models used to inform energy planning rely on uncertain forecasts and assumptions for future energy demands, macroeconomic indicators, social acceptance, fuel prices, technology costs, and climate scenarios. Due to fundamental methodological, computational, and data challenges, this uncertainty is at best rarely considered in energy planning, which increases the risk of failing to meet our urgent climate targets. This makes accounting for uncertainty one of the major unsolved problems in energy planning.  UNITES addresses these limitations to enable a new paradigm for long-term energy planning. In contrast to current approaches, which try to accurately predict the future, UNITES’ ambition is a systematic integration of uncertainty in energy-climate models. The project will result in three fundamental contributions: (i) theoretical developments to consider different types of uncertainty in energy planning models; (ii) data to quantify and characterize input uncertainties; (iii) AI methods to streamline the complex outputs of uncertainty studies into interpretable policy decisions.  The transferable and interdisciplinary developments across the data science, energy, and social sciences domains, unique to Europe and not available in concert elsewhere in the world, will bring about a breakthrough scientific contribution by overcoming important barriers for uncertainty analyses in a wide array of disciplines. The project will also be highly impactful on society, bringing together for the first time quantitative and qualitative dimensions to provide decision-makers with actionable policies to steer the energy transition, which will be central to ensuring that we can meet our climate neutrality targets in the face of a highly unpredictable future.

Mots-clés : uncertainty energy planning energy transition decision making modeling
Projet ERC : EXAFIELD (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Fundamental Constituents of Matter
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 : 1643922.86 €

Quantum Electrodynamics (QED) is the theory that unifies electromagnetism and quantum mechanics to describe how light and matter interact. Considered as one of the most accurately tested theories, it led Richard Feynman to call it “the jewel of physics”. Yet, in the strong-field (SF) regime, when the light fields are ultra-intense, this theory is only treated perturbatively and the non-perturbative regime of SF-QED remains a terra incognita as even no theory exists to predict the behaviour of nature. The advent of multi-PW laser infrastructures now makes the SF-QED regime within experimental reach when considering the collision of relativistic electrons with such light pulses focused above 10^22W/cm2. Yet, all planned experiments to probe SF-QED with current technologies only propose to investigate its perturbative regime, expected to be well described by theory.  In the EXAFIELD project, I propose a new concept of experiments to exceed the perturbative limit of SF-QED in the lab. This will be achieved by reflecting an ultra-intense laser pulse off a plasma mirror at relativistic speed. The strong Doppler effect occurring upon reflection up-converts the near-infrared laser pulse down to the extreme ultraviolet range which enables both temporal compression to the attosecond timescale and spatial compression down to sub-micron size. This results in a considerable intensity boost at focus of more than three orders of magnitude up to a few-10^25W/cm2.  The collision of such a “Doppler-boosted beam” with ultrashort electron bunches generated from laser-plasma accelerators will allow us to access regimes where the SF-QED can no longer be treated perturbatively, producing very strong signatures in the lab. Characterizing how the observations deviate from the perturbative theory will enable us to determine the limits of validity of the perturbative models and will open to a new area of research toward the understanding of the non-perturbative regime of SF-QED.

Mots-clés : laser plasma interaction,attosecond pulses,relativistic plasma mirrors,laser wakefield acceleration,strong field quantum electrodynamics,laser electron collision,compton scattering
Projet ERC : TINY (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Fundamental Constituents of Matter
Entité participante : Commissariat à l’énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CEA
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2408365.0 €

The TINY experiment will focus on the investigation of neutrinoless double beta decay (0n2b) with 96Zr and 150Nd isotopes. The search for 0n2b is a hot topic in particle physics, as the discovery of this rare nuclear process would establish the Majorana nature of neutrino, fix the neutrino mass scale, and prove lepton number non-conservation, setting the grounds for new physics beyond the Standard Model. The current and near-future large-scale searches for 0n2b do not include the nuclei chosen for the TINY project, due to the unavailability of an appropriate scalable detector technology for these candidates. Both 96Zr and 150Nd have the crucial advantage of very high transition energy for the 0n2b process, which would allow obtaining a higher sensitivity to the effective Majorana mass compared to other isotope candidates. Bolometric detectors with high energy resolution and active particle identification will be developed during the project execution. 96Zr will be embedded into ZrO2 crystals, measured with thermal sensors and coupled to auxiliary light detectors for active alpha particles rejection. 150Nd will be studied with magnetic NdGaO3 absorbers and athermal phonon sensors. Particle identification will be achieved via pulse shape discrimination. The first ever efficient measurement of a magnetic compound as a bolometer will open the way to new opportunities in low-temperature particle detection. The TINY pilot experiment, consisting of a-few-kg scale underground demonstrator, will be able to set the best limits worldwide on the 0n2b half-lives for both 96Zr and 150Nd isotopes. Very low background in the region of interest will be obtained thanks to high transition energy and alpha rejection. Not only will this project be competitive in the international context on a short time scale, but also it will open up new perspectives for ton-scale experiments that can surpass any existing technology in terms of sensitivity to the Majorana neutrino mass.

Mots-clés : neutrinoless double beta decay,neutrino nature,low temperature detectors
Projet ERC : SQiMic (Horizon Europe, appel 2021, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Systems and Communication 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 : 1499365.0 €

Optical microscopy, perhaps the most important tool in biomedical investigation and medical diagnosis, provides structural and functional information about biological specimen in a non-invasive and non-ionizing way. However, this technique still faces the challenge of imaging small and weakly scattering objects (e.g.a single cell) embedded inside complex biological tissues causing optical aberrations and scattering. This problem is even more critical in the case of samples that cannot be labelled or do not spontaneously emit light. In SQiMic, I will go one major conceptual step beyond the current paradigm by merging the fields of quantum imaging and light structuring to build a new quantum 'toolbox' for microscopy. My novel approach is based on my pioneering work showing that wavefront shaping techniques, initially developed for laser light manipulation, can also shape higher orders of optical coherence, allowing deterministic tailoring of quantum properties of light such as entanglement. I will use this approach to leverage some genuine quantum imaging concepts such as quantum holography, quantum interferences and quantum illumination, to break the current limits of fluorescent-free classical microscopy and image complex objects with higher resolution, better contrast, reduced aberrations, and less noise. Ultimately, I aim to deliver a quantum-enhanced microscope with unprecedented performances that can be used as a practical tool for biological imaging without labelling the specimens or relying on their possible ability to emit light.  From a methodological standpoint, SQiMic will bridge knowledge from quantum imaging, light structuring, adaptive optics, wavefront shaping, sensors technologies and computational imaging. It will deliver a whole new class of optical imaging methods based on quantum light manipulation and detection. Its long-term core applications are in life-science and biomedical imaging, with potential extension to quantum information science.

Mots-clés : optical imaging,microscopy,quantum imaging,light structuring