Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : PhoVeNA (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Université de technologie de Darmstadt — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

The deployment of 5G networks and the upcoming deployment of 6G in the next decade is essential to advance wireless communication for keeping pace with modern data hunger. 6G will incorporate first channels in the Terahertz domain (100 GHz -10 THz), however, terahertz technology in communication applications has a main bottle neck: the lack of powerful sources and versatile components. In order to engineer these towards maturity, sophisticated characterization tools are required to identify design flaws. The most prominent of these are Vector Network analyzers (VNAs) a class of systems currently dominated by electronics. Meanwhile, photonic technologies start to become competitive with established electronic technologies in the lower THz band and already excel beyond 1 THz in terms of dynamic range. Optical comb technologies enable frequency accuracy and stability beyond that of electronic systems, potentially at a fraction of the cost. This project aims for the development of two photonic prototype systems: (i) a photonic frequency extender for the WR10 band, compatible with electronic base band VNAs and (ii) a completely photonic VNA based on a frequency comb with a bandwidth of several THz, spectral purity better than that of electronic VNAs and seamless tunability over the whole range. The technology to be developed in this project will simplify characterizing devices over a larger frequency range at (much) lower cost, enabling large scale deployment of VNA systems. This will, in turn, foster development of Terahertz systems for further key applications besides communication, e.g. in spectroscopy, including medical applications, industrial-scale non-destructive testing and quality control as well as security.

Mots-clés : vector network analyzer,photonic system,photonic frequency extender,terahertz
Projet ERC : STAR (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Conseil national de la recherche — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CNR
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

‘STAR’ aims to increase the technology readiness level of the state-of-the-art graphene-integrated, miniaturized frequency comb (FC) quantum cascade laser (QCL), operating at terahertz (THz) frequencies, devised under the ERC consolidator grant ‘SPRINT’, and develop a detector-less sensing/imaging demonstrator apt to the translation of this technology to industrial end-users. The focus is on providing a compact, low-cost, hyperspectral, nanoscale imaging system, which creates amplitude- and phase-resolved images, employing the not-invasive broadband THz-frequency light of a metrological frequency-comb source, without making use of an external detector. This nanoscope ensures 40-100 nm spatial resolution, >100 times smaller than the THz free-space wavelength, coherent detection and mapping of the THz optical response of materials over the continuous 2-5 THz bandwidth provided by a fully stabilized THz QCL FC, with noise-equivalent-power <10pW/√Hz and fast (<ms/pixel) acquisition rates, far exceeding the performances of commercial time-domain spectroscopy near-field systems.  Specific objectives are to manufacture a compact, portable and user-friendly THz hyperspectral nanoscope, validate its core technology with commercial end-users and at trade-shows and evaluate opportunities for THz FC self-detection nanoscopy, identifying novel end-user applications, with a detailed market, IPR and regulatory compliance study. By the end of this programme, I plan to identify a solid exploitation route by directly interacting with THz instrument producers and with targeted commercial end-users.  Pushing forward a solid commercial exploitation route, STAR prospects new directions and long-term impacts on many interdisciplinary fields crossing engineering, biology, medicine, cultural heritage, material science and quantum technology, and in a frontier frequency domain where electronics and photonics find a fascinating convergence.
Projet ERC : PLATE (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Université de technologie de Darmstadt — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Advances in our capabilities to program, synthesize and modify DNA has led to a surge in the field of synthetic biology. Various gene circuits have been proposed and designed in various organisms for application domains ranging from biomedicine over biotechnology to biomaterials. Our current bottleneck is not anymore our ability to program and synthesize custom DNA, but rather our ability to design regulatory circuit that realize the desired functionality and operate reliably in a specific target host cell or in vitro systems. The largest hurdle that we identify is the context-dependency of synthetic circuits, i.e., their perturbation by other molecular factors belonging to the host cell. Given the complexity of these molecular systems, current design approaches that rely on trial-and-error will not be able to produce meaningful designs in a reliable, fast and systematic manner at the scale required for industrial applications. Although genetic design automation tools are available to overcome this unsatisfactory state of affairs their practical impact have been limited. This is due to the fact that the used models are not accurate enough, in particular, they cannot predict reliably the performance of a circuit design when operating within a host cell. The main reason for this limited predictive power is that models do not take into account the named context-dependency of circuits. The current project PLATE takes on this challenge and leverages methods developed within the ERC Project CONSYN that allow for accurate modeling of context-effects through the use of detailed biophysical models. The aim of PLATE is to integrate all those computational methods into a coherent design environment for the synthetic biology researcher in academia and in industry. The resulting PLATE software suite follows a modular approach where different analysis types and different design methods can be selected according to the specific need of a given academic or industrial project.
Projet ERC : CLEAR (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Conseil national de la recherche — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : CNR
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

‘Clear’ aims to increase the technology readiness level of the state-of-the-art miniaturized frequency comb (FC) and harmonic frequency comb (HFC) quantum cascade lasers (QCLs), operating at terahertz (THz) frequencies, devised under the ERC Consolidator grant ‘SPRINT’, and develop a portable dual-comb sensing/imaging demonstrator apt to the translation of this technology to industrial end-users.  The project aims to provide a compact, low-cost, small in production volume, size, weight and power consumption, dual-comb spectrometer (DCS) which provides short-term precision and long-term stability, superb signal-to-noise ratios, large spectral resolution, mW optical power/mode, and >1.3THz spectral coverage, employing the not-invasive broadband THz-frequency light of metrological FC sources without the need of neither complex moving parts nor gratings to separate optical frequencies and spread the optical spectrum.  Both optical paths can easily be implemented on photonic chips, significantly reducing the design complexity and with excellent compensation for external perturbations, ensuring fast acquisition rates. The envisioned DCS performance far exceeds those of commercial time-domain or asynchronous optical sampling spectroscopy systems.  Key objectives are: i) developing a compact, portable and accessible THz DCS; ii) validating its core technology with commercial end-users and at exhibitions; iii) evaluating opportunities by identifying new end-user applications, with a systematic market, IPR and regulatory compliance study. By the end of this programme, I plan to identify a solid exploitation route by directly collaborating with THz instrument producers and with targeted commercial end-users. Seeking new exploitation opportunities, ‘Clear’ prospects new directions and long-term impacts on many interdisciplinary fields crossing engineering, chemistry, biology, medicine, cultural heritage, quantum and optical communications.
Projet ERC : Real-Move (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Italian Institute of Technology — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

The ability to reliably track 3D human motion in real-time is crucial for a wide range of applications across various fields, such as healthcare, entertainment, industry, and sports. Occupational ergonomics, as the intersection of industry and healthcare, could particularly benefit from such a solution, as recent reports indicate that physical and cognitive ergonomics issues at work contribute to major economic losses in Europe. However, the existing commercial human motion capture (MoCap) systems often exploit multiple markers or inertial measurement units (IMUs), which, in addition to their high costs, suffer from many technical and usability issues. These include lengthy set-up times, compromised user comfort and bothersome wearability needs, and in case of IMU based Mo-Cap systems, large drifts and inaccuracies over time. Some of these issues can be dealt with by using vision-based human skeletal trackers, however, high vulnerability to occlusions, and often, the missing or inaccurate 3D tracking capacity have severely depreciated their reliability-of-use for real-world applications. These leave us with no existing market solutions for marker-less (comfortable), robust, economic, and real-time 3D human motion tracking. Real-Move aims to create such a solution by exploiting multi-camera views and AI algorithms. The system will be capable of tracking multiple people in the scene with high accuracy and, in addition to motion tracking data, be able to provide application-driven data services such as human factors. Real-Move has the highest innovation potential to become a key player in the multi-Billion Euros MoCap and workplace safety markets. In addition, by providing quick and easy access to vision-based risk monitoring tools, it can make a huge socio-economic impact by improving the quality of life of the individuals at work while saving a large amount of money by cutting waste.
Projet ERC : BiSCUIT (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Italian Institute of Technology — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

The lack of reliable in vitro pre-clinical models represents a critical aspect unanimously recognized by the scientific community as detrimental in the pathway of bringing new medications from the laboratory to the bedside: addressing this issue would provide immense benefits to drug discovery and development processes, by ethically limiting animal testing and drastically reducing costly failures in clinical trials. To date, most in vitro models fail at recapitulating the physiological microenvironment, and this often results in misleading data withdrawal. Starting from my prototype of real scale, dynamic and biomimetic blood-brain barrier model, in this project I aim at the validation of my system, after an upgrade step consisting in embedding sensing features in the platform, thus allowing a real-time evaluation of barrier formation and integrity maintenance. Characterized by microcapillary size/fenestrations and fluid flows similar to the in vivo physiological barrier, my tool will represent a drastic innovation over other well-established models in the literature and available on the market, allowing a reliable reproduction of the physiological environment and an accurate estimation of the amount of drug and/or nanomaterial concentration delivered through the barrier. Validation will be performed in relevant conditions, by implementing stroke and brain cancer models. All artificial components will be fabricated through two-photon polymerization (2pp), a disruptive mesoscale lithography technique that allows the fast fabrication of low-cost structures with resolution up to the nanometer scale, as well as great levels of scaffold reproducibility/accuracy. The proposed platform can be easily adopted in research laboratories and pharmaceutical industries as an advanced pre-clinical model, the primary biomedical applications of which consist in reliable screenings of drugs against pathologies of the central nervous system.
Projet ERC : MOONSHOT (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Italian Institute of Technology — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

MOONSHOT aims at developing a novel single-photon emitting material that operates in the telecommunication wavelength range (1300-1600 nm, O- and C-bands) and is compliant with the “Restriction of Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment” (RoHS). The main motivation for such objective is that single-photon sources based on epitaxial quantum dots (QDs) are now a mature technology available on the market that is outperforming laser cooled atoms or spontaneous parametric down conversion via nonlinear crystals. Yet, three major issues afflict epitaxial QDs: first, the epitaxial approach presents drawbacks in terms of limited throughput and CMOS incompatibility. Secondly, often the emission wavelength of epitaxial QDs for single-photon generation is limited to less than 1000 nm. Finally, single-photon sources based on this class of QDs require low-temperature operation (T ≈ 4K). Colloidal QDs present similar light-emission properties to their epitaxial counterpart and they can tackle most of the drawbacks of the latter. For example, solution processing enables controlled placement of QDs on-chip as well as very high throughput preparation via wet-chemistry approaches. In addition, colloidal QDs have the potential for operation beyond cryogenic temperatures. Nonetheless, state-of-the-art colloidal QDs with shortwave infrared emission (SWIR, 750-1600 nm) contain either lead or mercury, which are severely restricted by the RoHS. Indium arsenide (InAs) QDs are among the few SWIR-emitting RoHS-compliant materials; yet only a limited number of synthetic approaches lead to emissive QDs. MOONSHOT will focus on developing highly emissive and blinking-free InAs colloidal QDs based on a synthetic route employing commercially available precursors. MOONSHOT adopts a high-risk strategy to realize a new technology in the field of quantum light sources with an immediate outcome in the form of optimized single-photon SWIR emitting QDs.
Projet ERC : ARIEL (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Italian Institute of Technology — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Investigating object manipulation is crucial for the comprehension of child development and the early assessment of sensorimotor impairments. However, no current available methods allow a complete and widespread characterization of the process: (i) they do not measure all the core components of manipulation, such as the object motion and the forces applied; (ii) they are too expensive due to the cost of the devices or the need of expert annotators; (iii) they are not designed for children. ARIEL (Assessing childRen manIpulation and Exploration skiLls) aims to develop myCube (multisensory Cube) a tool enabling quantitative assessment of object manipulation, designed to be engaging for children and accessible at low cost, both for neurotypical children and those with neurological and developmental disorders. MyCube is a lightweight sensorized cube measuring its orientation in space and the position and pressure of tactile contact points on its faces. It produces vibratory and auditory feedback and presents raised patterns on the surface, which can be haptically explored. The myCube design allows for easy customization of the stimulation, with a simple way of substituting the patterned silicon faces. Stemming from the promising results of the ERC wHiSPER project in the assessment of individual haptic exploration, ARIEL will: (i) develop the myCube device, software, and haptic assessment procedures; (ii) validate its effectiveness in a large cohort of school-aged healthy children and a group of children with cerebral palsy in collaboration with expert clinicians, and (iii) plan a feasible market implementation to maximize its impact. The resulting myCube kit, composed of two myCubes, the software for data analysis, and the haptic assessment testing procedure, will represent a holistic tool including all the desired features for a low-cost, non-invasive, precise, and customizable assessment of children’s haptic skills in manipulation.
Projet ERC : MiniTweezer (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Université de Göteborg — Pays : Suède — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Optical tweezers have revolutionized various scientific disciplines, especially single-molecule research and single-cell mechanobiology. For example, they have played a fundamental role in understanding the folding dynamics and mechanical properties of DNA. In 2018, recognizing their importance, Arthur Ashkin was awarded a share of the Nobel Prize in Physics for the invention of optical tweezers and their application to biological systems.  However, even though their broad range of applications attracts interest and potential users from many different fields, the expertise in optics and physics needed to operate optical tweezers has limited their accessibility to non-specialists.  To address this challenge, we have developed a compact optical tweezer, named MiniTweezer, that is capable of autonomously performing advanced experiments thanks to its Python application programming interface (API) and its integration with advanced AI tools. We have already demonstrated its automation capabilities not only in the classical pulling of a DNA molecule, but also in stretching red blood cells (of interest for medical diagnostics) and in measuring electrostatic interactions between colloidal microparticles (of interest for the consumer goods industry).  Preliminary market analyses show that the MiniTweezer is of great interest to academia and industry thanks to its ability to perform automatized and high-throughput experiments in life sciences and colloidal sciences. This project aims at improving the MiniTweezer to obtain a more user-friendly and powerful device and make it available to a broader research community to test in different use-case scenarios and to gather valuable end-user feedback. The ultimate goal of this project is to create a start-up company to commercialize the MiniTweezer.
Projet ERC : MetaSafe (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Université d'Amsterdam — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UvA
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Preventing thermal run-away (resulting in fire) of batteries in electrical vehicles which can result from impingement of the protecting battery box during side impact collisions is a critical design consideration for vehicle safety. This challenge requires a careful trade-off between the shock-absorbing capabilities and the lightness of the material to ensure both safety and efficiency in vehicle design. We have developed a new class of mechanical metamaterials that are lightweight and highly dissipative and that outperforms traditional protections for battery boxes by orders of magnitude. The goal of this ERC POC project is to establish metamaterials as a commercially viable solution for a new generation of battery boxes. Our metamaterials will allow to increase the safety of electric vehicles and reduce their CO2 footprint by making them lighter. More broadly, our new generation of metamaterials could potentially be used in aerospace and seismic protection applications, hence paving the way for being the firsts to use mechanical metamaterials in industrial high-tech applications.
Projet ERC : TRANSFORMER (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Proof of concept grants)
Entité participante : Université polytechnique de Catalogne — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 150000.0 €

Improving the survival of patients with osteosarcoma has long proved challenging. Osteosarcoma is a rare bone cancer (less than 0.2% of all cancers). However, it affects mainly children and young adolescents. The standard therapy for osteosarcoma consists in the surgeon removing the entire tumor with negative margins (resection of larger areas of bone than the tumor itself), to ensure that no cancer cells are found at the edge of the tissue removed. This means that in some cases these surgeries associate limb amputation and even when it is not the case, most patients that undergo limb-sparing surgery need reconstructive surgery to regain limb function. The aim of TRANSFORMER is to bring closer to the market a solution that will allow to simultaneously treat bone cancer in absence of side effects while allowing bone regeneration. The product to be developed in TRANSFORMER puts together for the first time bone regeneration biomaterials with an innovative therapy for cancer that – in contrast to chemotherapy – up to now has shown no secondary effects: cold atmospheric plasma-treated hydrogels. The technology is protected by two PCT. TRANSFORMER value proposition: the product focused in in TRANSFORMER will have a double advantage for the patients and clinicians: it will be a local therapy that will allow simultaneous bone cancer treatment and bone regeneration. TRANSFORMER is structured along several objectives: (i) to preclinically validate the plasma-treated biocomposite as a potential therapy against bone cancer and towards bone regeneration, advancing the technology from TRL of 3 to 5, subsequently making it ready for clinical development and transfer to a spin-off or a third party company. (ii) To consolidate our IP position. (iii) To adapt the development roadmap to the regulatory requirements. (iv) To build a comprehensive business case for the exploitation of the technology and subsequent strategy for knowledge transfer.