Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : ALH (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Environmental Biology, Ecology and Evolution
Entité participante : National University of Ireland — Pays : Irlande — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : NUI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499202.0 €

Understanding how and why individuals develop strikingly different life histories is a major goal in evolutionary biology. It is also a prerequisite for conserving important biodiversity within species and predicting the impacts of environmental change on populations. The aim of my study is to examine a key threshold phenotypic trait (alternative migratory tactics) in a series of large scale laboratory and field experiments, integrating several previously independent perspectives from evolutionary ecology, ecophysiology and genomics, to produce a downstream predictive model. My chosen study species, the brown trout Salmo trutta, has an extensive history of genetic and experimental work and exhibits ‘partial migration’: individuals either migrate to sea (‘sea trout’) or remain in freshwater their whole lives. Recent advances in molecular parentage assignment, quantitative genetics and genomics (next generation sequencing and bioinformatics) will allow unprecedented insight into how alternative life history phenotypes are moulded by the interaction between genes and environment. To provide additional mechanistic understanding of these processes, the balance between metabolic requirements during growth and available extrinsic resources will be investigated as the major physiological driver of migratory behaviour. Together these results will be used to develop a predictive model to explore the consequences of rapid environmental change, accounting for the effects of genetics and environment on phenotype and on population demographics. In addition to their value for conservation and management of an iconic and key species in European freshwaters and coastal seas, these results will generate novel insight into the evolution of migratory behaviour generally, providing a text book example of how alternative life histories are shaped and maintained in wild populations.
Projet ERC : EDeN (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Neuroscience and Disorders of the Nervous System
Entité participante : Institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : Inserm
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1999484.0 €

Understanding how billions of neurons are born, migrate and integrate into functional circuits has proved useful in elucidating the pathomechanisms of many neurodevelopmental disorders. Multiciliated ependymal cells have attracted less interest and their development is still enigmatic. However, their strategic location at the interface between brain ventricles and parenchyma and their unique morphology and functions strongly suggest that defects in the generation of these cells may be associated with a variety of severe neurological disorders. Multiciliated ependymal cells are epithelial cells that line all brain ventricles. The coordinated and oriented beating of their cilia is crucial for the flow of cerebrospinal fluid through the ventricles and the migration of new neurons. These cells also provide physical and trophic support that creates a permissive neurogenic environment in the adult. We have shown that elongated bipolar radial glial cells transform into ependymal cells at late embryonic stages through mechanisms that remain largely to be explored. The overall objective of this grant application is to develop a new line of research to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in ependymal cell development. We will use a multidisciplinary approach involving mouse molecular genetics, biophysical approaches, ex-vivo culture systems and advanced live cell imaging to investigate: i) the mechanisms that direct the transformation of RGC into ependymal cells; ii) the mechanisms of centriole amplification in ependymal cell progenitors; iii) how developing ependymal cells contribute to ventricular morphogenesis and adult neurogenesis. This ambitious project will pave the way for the identification of new therapeutic targets for a variety of neurological disorders.

Mots-clés : cilia,centrosome,cell specification,cell differentiation,glial cell,genetics,cell biology,live imaging,brain ventricle,ependyma
Projet ERC : PhytoTrace (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Biotechnology and Biosystems Engineering
Entité participante : University of Vienna — Pays : Autriche — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : Univie
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 89462.5 €

Understanding how plants respond to micronutrient deficiency and which biogeochemical processes are induced at the root-soil interface, i.e. the rhizosphere, is crucial to improve crop yield and micronutrient grain content for high quality food and feed. Iron nutrition by grass species relies on the release and re-uptake of phytosiderophores, which are root exudates that form stable complexes with Fe but also other trace metals such as Zn and Cu. However, neither the importance of phytosiderophores under Zn and Cu deficient conditions nor the interplay of plant responses and rhizosphere processes are well understood as the majority of studies in the past was carried out under ‘soil-free’ hydroponic conditions. In this project, I aim to elucidate the mechanisms controlling phytosiderophore-mediated micronutrient acquisition of barley (Hordeum vulgare) under Zn, Cu, and as reference, Fe deficient conditions, with particular emphasis on soil environments. Barley is the fifth most produced crop worldwide and of great importance in regions that are characterized by harsh living conditions. In a holistic approach, my team and I will apply innovative soil-based and traditional hydroponic root exudation sampling approaches in combination with advanced plant molecular techniques to study the phytosiderophore release and uptake system under different experimental conditions. The chemical synthesis of otherwise commercially unavailable phytosiderophores in their natural and 13C-labelled form will allow us to trace their decomposition and metal solubilizing efficiency in the plant-microbe-soil system to uncover the interplay of plant genetic responses and rhizosphere processes affecting the time-window of PS-mediated MN acquisition. Moving beyond ‘soil-free’ experimental designs of the past, this project will generate key knowledge to improve selection of crops with highly efficient micronutrient acquisition traits to alleviate micronutrient malnutrition of people world-wide.

Mots-clés : phytosiderophores,barley,root exudates,micronutrient deficient soils,rhizosphere,microbial decomposition,plant transcriptome responses
Projet ERC : Agglomerates (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Integrative Biology: from Genes and Genomes to Systems
Entité participante : Weizmann Institute of Science — Pays : Israël — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2574819.0 €

Understanding how proteins respond to mutations is of paramount importance to biology and disease. While protein stability and misfolding have been instrumental in rationalizing the impact of mutations, we recently discovered that an alternative route is also frequent, where mutations at the surface of symmetric proteins trigger novel self-interactions that lead to infinite self-assembly. This mechanism can be involved in disease, as in sickle-cell anemia, but may also serve in adaptation. Importantly, it differs fundamentally from aggregation, because misfolding does not drive it. Thus, we term it “agglomeration”. The ease with which agglomeration can occur, even by single point mutations, shifts the paradigm of how quickly new protein assemblies can emerge, both in health and disease. This prompts us to determine the basic principles of protein agglomeration and explore its implications in cell physiology and human disease. We propose an interdisciplinary research program bridging atomic and cellular scales to explore agglomeration in three aims: (i) Map the landscape of protein agglomeration in response to mutation in endogenous yeast proteins; (ii) Characterize how yeast physiology impacts agglomeration by changes in gene expression or cell state, and, conversely, how protein agglomerates impact yeast fitness. (iii) Analyze agglomeration in relation to human disease via two approaches. First, by predicting single nucleotide polymorphisms that trigger agglomeration, prioritizing them using knowledge from Aims 1 & 2, and characterizing them experimentally. Second, by providing a proof-of-concept that agglomeration can be exploited in drug design, whereby drugs induce its formation, like mutations can do. Overall, through this research, we aim to establish agglomeration as a paradigm for protein assembly, with implications for our understanding of evolution, physiology, and disease.

Mots-clés : structural systems biology,protein evolution,mutations,protein interactions,homo oligomers,homomers
Projet ERC : SLAB (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Computer science and informatics
Entité participante : Institut national de recherche en sciences et technologies du numérique — Pays : France — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : Inria
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1380141.59 €

Understanding how the brain works in healthy and pathological conditions is considered as one of the challenges for the 21st century. After the first electroencephalography (EEG) measurements in 1929, the 90’s was the birth of modern functional brain imaging with the first functional MRI and full head magnetoencephalography (MEG) system. In the last twenty years, imaging has revolutionized clinical and cognitive neuroscience. After pioneering works in physics and engineering, the field of neuroscience has to face two major challenges. The size of the datasets keeps growing. The answers to neuroscience questions are limited by the complexity of the signals observed: non-stationarity, high noise levels, heterogeneity of sensors, lack of accurate models. SLAB will provide the next generation of models and algorithms for mining electrophysiology signals which offer unique ways to image the brain at a millisecond time scale. SLAB will develop dedicated machine learning and signal processing methods and favor the emergence of new challenges for these fields. SLAB focuses on five objectives: 1) source localization with M/EEG for brain imaging at high temporal resolution 2) representation learning to boost statistical power and reduce acquisition costs 3) fusion of heterogeneous sensors 4) modeling of non-stationary spectral interactions to identify functional coupling between neural ensembles 5) development of fast algorithms easy to use by non-experts. SLAB aims to strengthen mathematical and computational foundations of brain data analysis. The methods developed will have applications across fields (computational biology, astronomy, econometrics). Yet, the primary impact of SLAB will be on neuroscience. The tools and high quality open software produced in SLAB will facilitate the analysis of electrophysiology data, offering new perspectives to understand how the brain works at a mesoscale, and for clinical applications (epilepsy, autism, tremor, sleep disorders).
Projet ERC : Liquid2DM (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Physical and analytical chemical sciences
Entité participante : University of Manchester — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1998829.0 €

Understanding molecular organization and dynamics which are governed by electrostatic and electrodynamics interactions on the nanoscale requires the measurement of dielectric polarization at the molecular level. Yet, this has remained a formidable challenge because standard dielectric spectroscopy is limited to the micrometer scale that is achieved by using microfabricated electrodes at low frequencies and optical approaches at high frequencies. At the same time, despite the advances in atomistic calculations, theorists struggle to predict dielectric polarization when the system approaches molecular sizes. During the last years I pioneered the development of scanning dielectric microscopy, measuring the dielectric constants of nano-objects as small as tens of nanometers in size - a resolution unparalleled world-wide. In the next five years, I will push the boundaries of the technique and probe the polarizability of liquids and biological macromolecules under two-dimensional (2D) confinement by implementing novel experimental and theoretical approaches. By engineering 2D liquid cells with controlled properties by van der Waals assembly, I will probe polarization and thermodynamic properties of nanoconfined molecular liquids for the first time on the molecular scale with fundamental implications for physical and life sciences. It will provide the experimental data to validate first-principles predictions and mean-field computational methods on which the study of condensed/soft matter and molecular biology is based. The proposal will exploit my current lead to access a key physical property of matter that has remained unknown so far, enabling a wealth of new science in a vast range of research fields, from physical sciences to chemistry and biology, and facilitating the design of devices with novel functionalities.

Mots-clés : scanning probe microscopy,atomic force microscopy,dielectric polarization,nanofluids,2d materials,electrostatic interactions
Projet ERC : LANGDYN (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : University of Cambridge — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : U. Cambridge
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2185856.0 €

Understanding spoken language involves a complex set of processes that transform the auditory input into a meaningful interpretation. Our percept is not of acoustic-phonetic detail but of the speaker’s intended meaning. This effortless transition occurs on millisecond timescales, with remarkable speed and accuracy, and without any awareness of the complex computations on which it depends. How is this achieved? What are the processes and representations that support the transition from sound to meaning, and what are the neurobiological systems in which they are instantiated? In this proposal, we combine advanced techniques from neuroimaging, multivariate statistics and computational linguistics to probe directly the dynamic patterns of neural activity, over bilateral fronto-temporal and parietal cortices, that are elicited by spoken words and sentences. Combined MEG + EEG imaging, linked to parallel fMRI studies, capture the real-time electrophysiological activity of the brain. Representational Similarity Analysis (RSA) and related multivariate techniques make it possible to probe the different types of neural computation that support these dynamic processes of incremental interpretation. Computational linguistic analyses of language corpora allow us to build quantifiable models of different dimensions of language interpretation – from phonetics and phonology to argument structure and anaphora - and to test for their presence, using RSA, as the utterance unfolds in real time. By this means we aim to determine directly the nature of the intermediate processes involved in the transition from early perceptual processing through different representational states to the development of a meaningful representation of an utterance, the dynamic spatio-temporal relationship between these processes, and their evolution over time.

Mots-clés : cognitive neuroscience
Projet ERC : FLUDYCO (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Condensed matter physics
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 : 1992602.0 €

Understanding the flows in planetary cores from their formation to their current dynamics is a tremendous interdisciplinary challenge. Beyond the challenge in fundamental fluid dynamics to understand these extraordinary flows involving turbulence, rotation and buoyancy at typical scales well beyond our day-to-day experience, a global knowledge of the involved processes is fundamental to a better understanding of the initial state of planets, of their thermal and orbital evolution, and of magnetic field generation, all key ingredients for habitability. The purpose of the present project is to go beyond the state-of-the-art in tackling three barriers at the current frontier of knowledge. It combines groundbreaking laboratory experiments, complementary pioneering numerical simulations, and fruitful collaborations with leaders in various fields of planetary sciences. Improving on the latest advances in the field, I will address the fluid dynamics of iron fragmentation during the later stages of planetary accretion, in order to produce innovative, dynamically reliable models of planet formation. Considering the latest published data for Earth, I will investigate the flows driven in a stratified layer at the top of a liquid core and their influence on the global convective dynamics and related dynamo. Finally, building upon the recent emergence of alternative models for core dynamics, I will quantitatively examine the non-linear saturation and turbulent state of the flows driven by libration, as well as the shape and intensity of the corresponding dynamo. In the context of an international competition, the originality of my work comes from its multi-method and interdisciplinary character, building upon my successful past researches. Beyond scientific advances, this high-risk/high-gain project will benefit to a larger community through the dissemination of experimental and numerical improvements, and allow promoting science through an original outreach program.

Mots-clés : fragmentation,stratified and convective flows,rotational fluid dynamics,planetary cores
Projet ERC : GESTURALORIGINS (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : University of St Andrews — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1500000.0 €

Understanding the origins of language speaks to the fundamental question of what it means to be human. Other species’ communication contains rich information exchange; but humans do more than broadcast information. Language is used to communicate goals to partners, it goes beyond information: it has meaning. Only great ape gestures show similarly systematic meaningful communication; they are essential to understanding how human language evolved. Beyond meaning, two core features of human language are social learning and syntactic structure. These are universals, present across cultures. We all learn words and how to use them from others, leading to languages and dialects. We all use syntax; expressing different meanings by recombining words. In fact, these two features are common in animal communication: sperm whales learn songs from others; finches re-order notes into different songs. But, in a significant evolutionary puzzle, both appear absent in the communication of our closest relatives. The discovery of meanings in ape gesture resulted from studying ape communication under the challenging natural conditions that allow its full expression. A single study of a single group: it was the tip of the iceberg. Employing pan-African data across 17 ape and 9 human groups. I will tackle three major objectives. (1) Is there cultural variation in ape gesture? We will look at how species, physical environment, and social interaction affect how apes acquire and use gestures. (2) When apes combine signals, does it change their meaning? Moving beyond sequential structure we will look at how apes combine signals to construct meaning, and how the speed, size, and timing of gestures impacts meaning. (3) Human-ape gesture. We will investigate adults’ and children’s use and comprehension of gestures to compare them directly to other apes. Using new and established techniques across a dramatically wider sample I will address the fundamental question of how human language evolved.

Mots-clés : language evolution,comparative cognition
Projet ERC : f-ex (Horizon 2020, appel 2016, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Synthetic Chemistry and Materials
Entité participante : University of Edinburgh — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2456120.0 €

Understanding, controlling, and predicting the subtle interactions that hydrocarbons form with metals is a major challenge in molecular science, and a key technology enabler in areas such as homogeneous catalysis, drug recognition, polymer properties, and metal recovery. For the f-block, it is important due to the urgent need for clean access to critical elements such as neodymium, and the safe handling of nuclear waste. However, technical challenges of paramagnetism, radiotoxicity, and relativistic effects, make quantifying and exploiting f-block hydrocarbon interactions very hard using traditional methods or calculations alone. We have used organometallic systems to study two types of poorly understood hydrocarbon interactions with f-block metal cations: arene binding which is stronger, yet controversial in terms of its electronic demands, and neutral hydrocarbon C-H bonding which is weaker, yet crucially reaction controlling. f-ex sets out a new way to experimentally measure and define these subtle hydrocarbon interactions. It then exploits the stored electrons in the metal-arene motif as a new method to control these powerful Lewis acidic metals for new hydrocarbon C-element bond formation and inert hydrocarbon C-H bond cleavage, with the ultimate aim of viable, low-energy hydrocarbon functionalisations. Uniquely, we will extend our organometallic work to the more difficult transuranic elements, and exploit high pressure solution (and single crystal) work to enhance and interrogate intermolecular C-H binding. The targets of this combined study now offer high scientific impact by demonstrating fundamental bonding insight and ground-breaking structures and reactions. Unprecedented new insight also derives from incorporating new techniques, e.g. high-pressure solution and single crystal work, and transuranic organometallic chemistry.

Mots-clés : rare earth,actinide,organometallic,x ray structure,small molecule activation