Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : DELTA-LANG (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université Pompeu Fabra — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UPF
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1213241.0 €

Mental life fluctuates, changing from moment to moment as the incessant and turbulent flow of thought rages. In 3% of the world’s population, the fragile equilibrium that we all hope to maintain gives way to dynamical changes resulting in psychotic episodes, which after remission tend to recur over time. A capacity to predict them at a clinically relevant temporal resolution, similar to our capacity to forecast a thunderstorm, would be a major advance in public health, with the important difference that, unlike thunderstorms, psychosis can be prevented. We test a previously untested and untestable hypothesis: that meaning encoded in spontaneous speech, translated into digitalized quantitative features, computationally analyzed with natural language processing (NLP) tools, can serve as a key personalized and interpretable predictor of phase transitions from remission to psychotic relapse. Addressing this hypothesis requires conceptual and methodological breakthroughs in our understanding of language and what signals its variability can carry for a pathophysiological process. We pursue these with a synergetic combination of linguistic, neuroimaging, psychiatric, and e-health insights. Using a hypothesis-driven approach we will (i) define generalizable language metrics relating to symptom variability cross-sectionally; (ii) identify individually-specific neural signatures of psychosis and remission related to changes in these linguistic metrics, using a dense-sampling approach; (iii) test the metrics retrospectively as predictors of relapse in an independent longitudinal cohort; and (iv) take the paradigm from the lab to the patient’s home in a prospective clinical study testing whether we can predict state change before it is catastrophic, at the temporal resolutions clinically required. DELTA-LANG (ΔLANG) thereby identifies the delta of language – a linguistic change that enables the prediction of clinically significant change, before it occurs.

Mots-clés : language,speech,psychosis,relapse,fmri,clinical decision support system,thought disorder
Projet ERC : DynaPLIX (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université de Copenhague — Pays : Danemark — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : KU
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2553873.0 €

Proteins are biological macromolecules that are vital to all processes of life. Understanding the functions of proteins has great scientific and commercial value: proteins are used as industrial enzymes, as pharmaceutical treatments, and many proteins are the targets of drugs. Current knowledge of protein function is primarily based on static structures, which have provided great insights about structure-function relationships that today form the basis for protein science and protein engineering. Proteins are, however, not static molecules, but undergo spontaneous transitions between alternative structural states, some of which are rare, transient conformations that are essentially invisible to traditional methods. These dynamical properties are known to be critically important for function, but high-resolution studies of dynamics have so far been conducted merely as an “add-on” following structural studies. To change the situation, we aim to establish “integrative biomolecular dynamics” by developing methods that integrate time-resolved X-ray crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, and molecular simulations to study the motions of proteins while they carry out their function. We focus on the challenging problem of molecular recognition because it represents a poorly understood frontier in molecular science where advances are expected to have great impact. Specifically, we will address the question of how proteins bind ligands by describing with atomic resolution the entire dynamic process to reach a consistent kinetic, thermodynamic, and structural view. We are at a point where it will be possible to develop the individual techniques required for our integrative biomolecular dynamics approach. As a team we can leverage ongoing developments in hardware and methods, while ensuring the tight integration between methods that is needed to study complex dynamical systems. We thus aim to move structural biology into a new era of protein dynamics.

Mots-clés : protein dynamics,ligand binding kinetics,molecular recognition,energy landscape,conformational ensembles,molecular dynamics simulations,time resolved x ray crystallography,nmr spectroscopy,nmr relaxation
Projet ERC : SKIN2DTRONICS (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : ICN2
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2598398.0 €

The goal of SKIN2DTRONICS is to demonstrate the large scale integration (LSI, transistor count larger than 1000) of soft and thin (skin-like) electronic devices on ultra-flexible substrates, capable of conformally adapting to any rough and curved surface. This vision will be realized by atomically thin two-dimensional materials (2DMs) that possess compelling properties for this application: high electronic performance, environmental stability, low toxicity and cytoxicity, and extreme resilience to mechanical deformations. With the increasing pressure towards ubiquitous electronics (wearables, Internet-of-Things, smart patches, etc.) it is urgent to develop electronics that can be easily integrated on the surface of everyday objects and, in the case of health monitoring applications, on a variety of rough biological surfaces. Today’s conformal electronics is mainly based on conformal sensors with flexible and stretchable electrodes interfaced to bulky silicon chips, responsible for processing. This approach is prone to mechanical failures, especially at the solderings, as the connection between the conformal and solid components remains very challenging. The research will rely on the complementary conjuncture of four fields: sensors, 2D-based electronics, flexible electronics and biomedical engineering that the PIs of the consortium bring, each of them recognized experts in their respective fields and with a valuable experience in leading ERC projects.

Mots-clés : conformable electronics,wearable systems,on skin electronics,ultra flexible circuits,two dimensional materials
Projet ERC : ATHENS (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université Friedrich-Schiller d'Iéna — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2669042.5 €

Information and communication technology (ICT) crucially relies on the combination of two highly complementary fields: Microelectronics, which excels in processing and storing information using CMOS circuits and photonics, which is key to fast and efficient transmission of information over large distances. Electrical-to-optical conversion in photonic integrated circuits is what links both fields. While efficient conversion from optical signals to electrical signals is straightforward even at a single-photon level, electrical-to-optical conversion represents a key challenge – with respect to efficiency, bandwidth and noise. This challenge does not only affect optical communications, where efficient generation of broadband data signals is key, but also prevents photonic integrated circuits from unfolding their full impact in highly relevant emerging application fields such as microwave photonics, artificial intelligence or quantum technologies. ATHENS aims at overcoming this deficiency by establishing the foundations of a new class of photonic integrated systems that offer unprecedented electro-optic conversion performance. The project builds upon a synergistic selection of highly disruptive approaches on the material, process and device level, reaching from theory-guided engineering of organic electro-optic materials and novel ‘crystal-on-insulator’ integration platforms to disruptive concepts for broadband optical on-chip amplifiers based on ion implantation or parametric interaction and to highly flexible photonic-electronic system-integration concepts based on additive nanofabrication. These technologies are combined on a system level, building a base for groundbreaking demonstrations in hyperscale communications, millimeter-wave signal processing and quantum technologies. The project is borne by an interdisciplinary and highly complementary team of scientist from organic chemistry, solid-state physics, quantum technologies and communications engineering.

Mots-clés : exa scale photonic computation,exa scale photonic computation,cryogenic photonic interconnects
Projet ERC : Synergy-Plague (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université de Stirling — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : Partner
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 0.0 €

Synergy-Plague is a multi-disciplinary project to bring our knowledge and understanding of plague, past and present, to new heights. Focussing on the environmental, biological, and societal aspects of plague outbreaks in Eurasia between circa 1300 and 1900 CE, it will address four main questions: (1) Why/how did plague re-emerge in 14th century Central Asia? (2) Why/how did plague re-occur and spread in Eurasia after the Black Death? (3) Why/how did clinical and demographic patterns of plague infection differ across space and time? (4) Why/how did plague disappear from Europe and the Middle East in the 18th and 19th centuries? Our project is based on the hypothesis that plague waves and clinical differences resulted from unique alignments of multiple events: environmental (climatic and soil-chemical), biological (from individual to ecosystem) and societal (demographic, socio-economic and political). Four PIs from the natural sciences and humanities, together with their team members, will jointly study how plague re-emerged in 14th century Central Asia and radiated repeatedly from Eurasian wildlife reservoirs in the following centuries, only to disappear in the 18th-19th centuries. We will develop and analyse new dendrochronological and (paleo-)soil data, textual documentary evidence, and epidemiological models. To understand how plague reached and spread in human populations, paleo-environmental and historical data together with relevant experimental work will be combined with statistical and mathematical modelling. To appreciate why clinical signs and mortality rates varied in space and time, historical evidence will be examined together with new entomological data and ancient DNA (aDNA) of historical plague strains (from humans and anthropophilic rodents). Synergy-Plague will revolutionise our understanding of plague and contribute to our ongoing struggle with epidemic diseases, present and future.

Mots-clés : black death,plague pandemics,rodent burrow systems,human and rodent ectoparasites,plague reservoirs,soil properties,past cimate,epidemiology,statistical and mathematical modeling,experimental work
Projet ERC : Host4Hypnozoites (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Biomedical Primate Research Centre — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : BPRC
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 5800000.0 €

What?  Hypnozoites are dormant liver stage malaria parasites that can reactivate and cause repeated blood-stage infections without the bite of an infectious mosquito. We will, for the first time: - characterize the cellular environment contributing to dormancy at systems level (WP1) - explore the reactivation kinetic and tissue environment of hypnozoites within the natural host (WP2) - functionally characterize host & parasite factors governing dormancy or reactivation (WP3)  Why? - Dormancy and reactivation of hypnozoites is an unresolved biological mystery since decades - Dormant parasites are a major obstacle to the curative treatment of malaria  The challenge: Tracking the in vivo development and understanding the biology of these rare, quiescent parasites that normally reside inside the liver of the host  The solution: A synergistic, multidisciplinary investigation, which is only possible if we combine the unique resources and complementary expertise of three leading laboratories in: - Radiopharmaceutical chemistry for the development of dedicated Positron Emission Tomography tracers for non-invasive investigation of the parasites in situ, as well as to capture infected tissue samples for systems level investigations - Systems biology for simultaneous multi-omics profiling of the parasite and the host cell at single-cell resolution and in the spatial context to be validated by parasitological assays - Parasitology for functional investigation through genetic engineering and manipulation of the parasites in vitro and validation within the natural host  Anticipated project outcomes: - Detailed insights into the relapse characteristics of the parasite in vivo - Understanding how host and parasite factors collectively determine the fate of infection - Novel imaging, transfection and omics methods for malaria research and beyond - Opportunities for novel therapeutic strategies for awakening and killing these vicious pathogens

Mots-clés : relapsing malaria,dormancy,in vivo imaging,host pathogen interaction,liver,radiopharmaceutical chemistry,genetic micro manipulation,multi omics,pet tracers,epigenetics,translational repression
Projet ERC : BEMOSAIC (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université Yale — Pays : Etats-Unis — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 3253300.0 €

Endothelial cells (ECs) form a dynamic monolayer lining the lumen of vessels. While single-cell data have revealed high degrees of heterogeneity amongst ECs at the inter- and intra-organ levels, the prevailing notion has long been that vessels themselves are composed of largely similar ECs. Instead, data from our labs challenge this view by showing that vessels are built of highly diverse ECs displaying different behavioral properties, a feature we term intravessel EC behavioral mosaicism. While these findings are promising, there is still much to learn about the range of behavioral variability among ECs within vessels and how this intricate mosaic of behaviors is orchestrated to optimize vascular function. Building on our past achievements, we now aim towards novel directions- to push forward a fresh conception of vessels, as mosaic composites of specialized ECs. Here, we will integrate our synergistic expertise in live imaging, sophisticated genetic approaches, and spatial omics to map EC behaviors in zebrafish and mice. In addition, we will harness oncogenic mutations causing vascular malformations in humans to investigate how they alter the behavioral map. Finally, we will decode mechanisms of vessel tolerance and co-optation in response to stochastic expression of mutations to understand how vessels cope with EC mosaic behaviors. The important and unique aspects of our approach are the focus on in vivo dynamics and the cross-animal and organ comparisons, which will provide much needed knowledge on vessel architecture and function, making substantial advances at the frontier of vascular biology. Overall, we envision that shifting the paradigm of vessel heterogeneity to behavioral mosaicism will provide a better understanding of vascular-related pathologies and will lay the foundation for improving vascular therapies by targeting specific EC subsets. Moreover, we expect to offer means to understand other diseases involving mosaic responses, including cancer.

Mots-clés : endothelial cells,vessels,vascular malformations,live imaging
Projet ERC : DELTA-LANG (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université de Zurich — Pays : Suisse — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UZH
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 3291528.0 €

Mental life fluctuates, changing from moment to moment as the incessant and turbulent flow of thought rages. In 3% of the world’s population, the fragile equilibrium that we all hope to maintain gives way to dynamical changes resulting in psychotic episodes, which after remission tend to recur over time. A capacity to predict them at a clinically relevant temporal resolution, similar to our capacity to forecast a thunderstorm, would be a major advance in public health, with the important difference that, unlike thunderstorms, psychosis can be prevented. We test a previously untested and untestable hypothesis: that meaning encoded in spontaneous speech, translated into digitalized quantitative features, computationally analyzed with natural language processing (NLP) tools, can serve as a key personalized and interpretable predictor of phase transitions from remission to psychotic relapse. Addressing this hypothesis requires conceptual and methodological breakthroughs in our understanding of language and what signals its variability can carry for a pathophysiological process. We pursue these with a synergetic combination of linguistic, neuroimaging, psychiatric, and e-health insights. Using a hypothesis-driven approach we will (i) define generalizable language metrics relating to symptom variability cross-sectionally; (ii) identify individually-specific neural signatures of psychosis and remission related to changes in these linguistic metrics, using a dense-sampling approach; (iii) test the metrics retrospectively as predictors of relapse in an independent longitudinal cohort; and (iv) take the paradigm from the lab to the patient’s home in a prospective clinical study testing whether we can predict state change before it is catastrophic, at the temporal resolutions clinically required. DELTA-LANG (ΔLANG) thereby identifies the delta of language – a linguistic change that enables the prediction of clinically significant change, before it occurs.

Mots-clés : language,speech,psychosis,relapse,fmri,clinical decision support system,thought disorder
Projet ERC : BATPROTECT (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université nationale de Singapour — Pays : Singapour — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : NUS
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2487378.75 €

The medical, financial, and emotional costs imposed by ageing and infectious diseases are major challenges for our societies. Strikingly, while past research has not provided solutions for extending human healthspan and preventing the harmful consequences of infections, nature has solved both problems in the only flying mammals – the bats. Among mammals, bats exhibit an exceptional longevity with little signs of age-related diseases. Despite being reservoirs for numerous deadly viruses, viral infections in bats are mostly asymptomatic due to unique immune system adaptations. The overarching goal of BATPROTECT is to achieve breakthroughs in our understanding of the molecular basis of bats’ extended healthspan and disease resistance to ultimately discover new directions to improve human healthspan and disease outcome. BATPROTECT integrates a team of world-leading experts in bat biology, genomics, immunology and gerontology to synergistically: (i) elucidate the molecular mechanisms that bats use to slow down expected ageing; (ii) identify the driving molecular mechanisms behind bats’ viral tolerance and limited age-related inflammation; (iii) uncover the genomic basis and evolution of extended healthspan and disease tolerance in bats; and, (iv) develop transgenic animal models to functionally validate the uncovered bat adaptations. We will generate 150 reference quality bat genomes, the novel immunological, bioinformatic, cellular and molecular tools required to take an integrative multi-omics approach and uncover the age and immune changes that occur in wild and captive bats across the ageing spectrum. We will identify the top regulators of longevity and immunity, using deep neural networks analyses, to functionally validate in our cellular systems and novel transgenic animal models- BatWorms and BatMice. Ultimately, we will provide a deeper understanding of extended healthspan and disease resistance and will pave the way for future therapeutics.

Mots-clés : bat biology,healthy ageing,antiviral responses,c elegans,genome sequencing,comparative gerontology,wildlife immunology,multi omics,ecology,evolution
Projet ERC : BLOCKADE (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : Université norvégienne de sciences et de technologie — Pays : Norvège — Rôle : CO-PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2797713.0 €

The main aim of BLOCKADE is to investigate how blockades shaped the course, outcome and aftermath of the world wars. In both wars, belligerents sought to blockade their enemies, cutting them off from vital resources such as food, oil, information and capital to hasten their defeat. Existing research is contradictory and fragmentary, leaving us in the dark as to the scope and the effects of blockades, just as the world is confronted with new blockades.  Our hypothesis is that understanding the blockades is critical to the era of the world wars (ca. 1900-1960). The blockades affected societies the world over, testing their resilience and vulnerability. They produced new forms of violence and humanitarian care, prompted innovation and learning, and had integrative and disintegrative effects on wartime societies, alliances and the world order. The project’s ambitious approach transcends the traditional fixation on western Europe and integrates actors long seen as ‘peripheral’. It connects the disparate histories of the First and Second World Wars in a single explanatory frame by uncovering the shared generational experiences and learning processes related to blockades, allowing us to assess their impact on the wars and the peace that followed them. The high gain promised by this project comes with the high risk that we might fail to separate the impact of blockades from other effects of warfare; but it is a risk we believe we can mitigate via innovative methodology and careful source analysis.  BLOCKADE requires input from a range of academic disciplines (economics and economic history, international history, cultural and war studies, statistical and digital analysis and many languages). Only the synergy resulting from combining the four PI and the larger team’s different qualifications and research methodologies will realise the potential for high scientific gains with the necessary complexity and range.

Mots-clés : first world war,second world war,aftermaths of war,globalization,deglobalization,violence,humanitarianism,resilience,international order,innovation