Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : ISOCRYPT (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Computer science and informatics
Entité participante : KU Leuven — Pays : Belgique — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : KUL
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2495575.0 €

A quantum computer exploits quantum-mechanical effects such as superposition to solve hard mathematical problems that are intractable on classical computers. The most prominent example is Shor's algorithm that renders all widely deployed cryptographic systems such as included in TLS totally insecure, and thus also all digital services that crucially rely on them. Post-quantum cryptography deals with the design and analysis of cryptographic algorithms that remain secure against attacks not only by classical computers, but also by quantum computers. The threat of quantum computers is a very real and pressing issue as evidenced by the ongoing NIST standardization effort for post-quantum cryptographic algorithms. Isogenies are maps between elliptic curves, and hard problems related to the computation of such maps, have recently been proposed as a candidate for post-quantum cryptography. Due to its versatility, isogeny-based cryptography has the potential to become the only fully fledged alternative to lattice-based cryptography, providing much needed diversity. The goal of ISOCRYPT is to develop the full potential of isogeny-based cryptography into a secure, efficient and practical approach to post-quantum cryptography, and to provide a toolbox to easily instantiate secure isogeny-based applications. To achieve this goal, a number of key research challenges need to be solved: determining the exact security of isogeny-based systems, providing efficient and secure implementations and building a suite isogeny-based post-quantum secure applications. Our approach to solving these challenges relies on a deep exploration of the mathematical properties of isogenies, guided by the functionalities needed to build practical applications. This proposal will build on the renowned expertise of the PI and his team in mathematical foundations of post-quantum cryptography to ready isogeny-based cryptography for real world deployment.

Mots-clés : post quantum cryptography,isogeny based cryptography
Projet ERC : BioMagMat (Horizon 2020, appel 2017, Proof of concept grants)
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 : 149997.0 €

A range of new medical therapies and diagnostics based on magnetic nanomaterials have recently been proposed. These include cancer therapies, stem cell therapies, microfluidic diagnostic devices and immunoassays. However, very few biotechnology magnetic nanomaterials are currently available commercially; most investigators fabricate their own. This is a serious limitation to the development of this emerging area within nanomedicine. This proposal aims to transfer a number of magnetic nanomaterials from the University physics laboratory where they were developed as part of an ERC AdG grant into an existing small company where they can then be made available to researchers across the world on a commercial basis.

Mots-clés : nanomagnetism,thin films,biotechnology,functional materials,nanomaterials
Projet ERC : DINA (Horizon 2020, appel 2019, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : École d'économie de Paris — Pays : France — Rôle : CO-PI
Acronyme de l'entité : EEP
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 6054110.0 €

A renovated approach to the measurement of economic inequality consistent with macro aggregates should rebuild the bridges between distributional data available from micro sources and national accounts aggregates in a systematic way. This is the main goal pursued through DINA-Distributional National Accounts. The aim is to provide annual estimates of the distribution of income and wealth using concepts that are consistent with the macroeconomic national accounts. In this way, the analysis of growth and inequality can be carried over in a coherent framework. This endeavour also involves the production of synthetic micro-files (i.e. individual level data that are not necessarily the result of direct observation but rather through estimations that reproduce the observed distribution of the underlying data, including the joint distribution of age, gender, numbers of dependent children, income and wealth between adult individuals) providing information on income and wealth, which will also be made available online. The global aim is to release income and wealth synthetic DINA micro-files for all countries on an annual basis. Such data will certainly play a critical role in the public debate, and will be used as a resource for further analysis by various actors in civil society and in the academic, business and political communities.

Mots-clés : distribution  income  wealth  inequality  national accounts  returns
Projet ERC : DINA (Horizon 2020, appel 2019, Synergy grants)
Entité participante : University of Oxford — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2359793.0 €

A renovated approach to the measurement of economic inequality consistent with macro aggregates should rebuild the bridges between distributional data available from micro sources and national accounts aggregates in a systematic way. This is the main goal pursued through DINA-Distributional National Accounts. The aim is to provide annual estimates of the distribution of income and wealth using concepts that are consistent with the macroeconomic national accounts. In this way, the analysis of growth and inequality can be carried over in a coherent framework. This endeavour also involves the production of synthetic micro-files (i.e. individual level data that are not necessarily the result of direct observation but rather through estimations that reproduce the observed distribution of the underlying data, including the joint distribution of age, gender, numbers of dependent children, income and wealth between adult individuals) providing information on income and wealth, which will also be made available online. The global aim is to release income and wealth synthetic DINA micro-files for all countries on an annual basis. Such data will certainly play a critical role in the public debate, and will be used as a resource for further analysis by various actors in civil society and in the academic, business and political communities.

Mots-clés : distribution  income  wealth  inequality  national accounts  returns
Projet ERC : HiSS (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Fundamental constituents of matter
Entité participante : University of Mons — Pays : Belgique — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1992507.0 €

A serious open issue is that there is no widely accepted solution to the Quantum Gravity Problem. This results in paradoxes and clouds the study of many problems from the cosmology of the early Universe to unified theories of fundamental interactions that should incorporate both the Standard Model of Elementary Particles and Gravity. This proposal aims at attacking the old problems from a new vantage point and to achieve long-awaited breakthroughs. The potential reward is enormous as the project aims to shed light on the wide range of problems by exploring a new avenue provided by the first working example of a Higher Spin Gravity (HiSGRA). It will (A) attack the Quantum Gravity Problem and give new consistent theories that should significantly extend our understanding; (B) the underlying higher spin symmetry should govern a number of condensed matter systems and we expect to prove the recently discovered remarkable dualities relating them; (C) these symmetries are also related to extensions of Deformation Quantization, which should lead to new developments in pure mathematics and consolidate A+B. HiSGRA's, as rather simple models, can give keys to the puzzles of the early Universe with potentially observable effects in the near future, to the old paradoxes of black hole physics and to real-world processes of black hole scattering, which together with B applies HiSGRA to physics. This project is timely and feasible thanks to the recent ground-breaking results obtained by me and collaborators: (1) the very first example of a quantum consistent HiSGRA has been constructed and shown not to suffer from the UV-divergences that are at the core of the Quantum Gravity Problem; (2) the same theory was instrumental in attacking the dualities in three-dimensional conformal field theories that govern the physics of many second-order phase transitions; (3) it made new verifiable predictions for correlation functions, which is the very first solid prediction from HiSGRA

Mots-clés : higher spin symmetry,higher spin gravity,quantum gravity,three dimensional bosonization duality,black hole physics
Projet ERC : XAI (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Computer science and informatics
Entité participante : National Research Council — Pays : Italie — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : CNR
Type d'entité : Recherche
Financement ERC de l'entité : 562500.0 €

A wealthy friend of mine asks for a vacation credit card to his bank, to discover that the credit he is offered is very low. The bank teller cannot explain why. My stubborn friend continues his quest for explanation up to the bank executives, to discover that an algorithm lowered his credit score. Why? After a long investigation, it turns out that the reason is: bad credit by the former owner of my friend’s house. Black box AI systems for automated decision making, often based on ML over (big) data, map a user’s features into a class or a score without explaining why. This is problematic for lack of transparency, but also for possible biases inherited by the algorithms from human prejudices and collection artefacts hidden in the training data, which may lead to unfair or wrong decisions. I strive for solutions of the urgent challenge of how to construct meaningful explanations of opaque AI/ML systems, introducing the local-to-global framework for black box explanation, articulated along 3 lines: a) the language for explanations in terms of expressive logic rules, with statistical and causal interpretation; b) the inference of local explanations for revealing the decision rationale for a specific case; c), the bottom-up generalization of many local explanations into simple global ones. An intertwined line of research will investigate both causal explanations, i.e., models that capture the causal relationships among the features and the decision, and mechanistic/physical models of complex system physics, that capture the data generation mechanism behind specific deep learning models. I will also develop: an infrastructure for benchmarking, for the users' assessment of the explanations and the crowdsensing of observational decision data; an ethical-legal framework, for compliance and impact of our results on legal standards and on the “right of explanation” provisions of the GDPR; case studies in explanation-by-design, with a priority in health and fraud detection.

Mots-clés : automated decision making,black box models,machine learning,data mining,statistical,logic,rules,rule learning,transparency,right to explanation,participatory platform
Projet ERC : SM-IMPORT (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Molecules of Life: Biological Mechanisms, Structures and Functions
Entité participante : Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : LMU
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 500000.0 €

ABC (ATP Binding Cassette) transporters represent the most abundant and diverse family of transport proteins known that play crucial roles in numerous cellular processes. Despite their importance, all proposed molecular models for transport are based on indirect evidence due to the inability of classical biophysical and biochemical techniques to directly visualize dynamic structural changes. To solve this problem, I suggest a novel approach that can decipher the molecular mechanisms of transport, with the ultimate goal to use this knowledge against pathogenic bacteria, for treatment of ABC-related diseases or multi-drug resistance of cancer cells. I propose to use single-molecule fluorescence microscopy for the study of conformational states of an ABC model system in vitro, and thus to observe directly how elementary transport steps are coordinated. This will open up a virtually unexplored biophysical research area and provide a detailed understanding of the molecular mechanisms of ABC transporters. The key questions of this proposal are: Aim 1: What is the mechanism of substrate binding in ABC transporters? The conformational equilibrium (open vs. closed state) of ABC-associated substrate-binding proteins will be studied to understand the molecular mechanism of binding, i.e., induced fit vs. conformational selection. Aim 2: What are relevant conformational states and changes for substrate translocation? The time- and length-scales of conformational changes in transmembrane and nucleotide binding domains as well as interactions with other domains will be characterized using the osmoregulator OpuA as a model system. Aim 3: How are substrate binding, energy utilization and translocation coordinated in ABC transporters? Finally, a complete model of transport will be developed to decipher the coordination of transport events, i.e., how substrate binding and ATP-hydrolysis are coupled and transferred into conformational changes that drive substrate transport.

Mots-clés : abc transporter,single molecule studies,f rster resonance energy transfer,fluorescence microscopy
Projet ERC : ACCUPOL (Horizon 2020, appel 2017, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Institutions, Governance and Legal Systems
Entité participante : Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : LMU
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 2359000.0 €

ACCUPOL systematically analyzes an intuitively well-known, but curiously under-researched phenomenon: policy accumulation. Societal modernization and progress bring about a continuously growing pile of policies in most political systems. At the same time, however, the administrative capacities for implementation are largely stagnant. While being societally desirable in principle, ever-more policies hence may potentially imply less in terms of policy achievements. Whether or not policy accumulation remains at a ‘sustainable’ rate thus crucially affects the long-term output legitimacy of modern democracies. Given this development, the central focus of ACCUPOL lies on three questions: Do accumulation rates vary across countries and policy sectors? Which factors mitigate policy accumulation? And to what extent is policy accumulation really associated with an increasing prevalence of implementation deficits? In answering these questions, ACCUPOL radically departs from established research traditions in public policy. First, the project develops new analytical concepts: Rather than relying on individual policy change as the unit of analysis, we consider policy accumulation to assess the growth of policy portfolios over time. In terms of implementation, ACCUPOL takes into account the overall prevalence of implementation deficits in a given sector instead of analyzing the effectiveness of individual implementation processes. Second, this analytical innovation also implies a paradigmatic theoretical shift. Because existing theories focus on the analysis of individual policies, they are of limited help to understand causes and consequences of policy accumulation. ACCUPOL develops a novel theoretical approach to fill this theoretical gap. Third, the project provides new empirical evidence on the prevalence of policy accumulation and implementation deficits focusing on 25 OECD countries and two key policy areas (social and environmental policy).

Mots-clés : public policy,public administration,policy change,implementation
Projet ERC : ALPI (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Proof of concept grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Systems and communication engineering
Entité participante : University of Trento — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 125000.0 €

ALPI aims at the integration of a photonic neural network within an optical transceiver to increase the transmission capacity of the optical link. Based on a deep learning approach, the new compact device provides real time compensation of fiber nonlinearities which degrade optical signals. In fact, the tremendous growth of transmission bandwidth both in optical networks as well as in data centers is baffled by the optical fiber nonlinear Shannon capacity limit. Nowadays, computational intensive approaches based on power hungry software are commonly used to mitigate fiber nonlinearities. Here, we propose to integrate in the optical link the neuromorphic photonic circuits which we are currently developing in the ERC-AdG BACKUP project. Specifically, the proposed error-correction circuit implements a small all-optical complex-valued neural network which is able to recover distortion on the optical transmitted data caused by the Kerr nonlinearities in multiwavelength optical fibers. Network training is realized by means of efficient gradient-free methods using a properly designed data-preamble. A new neuromorphic transceiver demonstrator realized in active hybrid Si/InP technology will be designed, developed and tested on a 100 Gbps 80 km long optical link with multiple-levels symbols. The integrated neural network will mitigate the nonlinearities either by precompensation/autoencoding at the transmitter TX side or by data correction at the receiver RX side or by concurrently acting on both the TX and RX sides. This achievement will bear to the second ALPI’s goal: moving from the demonstrator to the industrialization of the improved transceiver. For this purposes, patents will be filed and a business plan will be developed in partnership with semiconductor, telecom and IT companies where a path to the commercialization will be individuated. The foreseen market is the big volume market of optical interconnection in large data centers or metro networks.

Mots-clés : neural network,deep learning,optical communication,optical transceiver,integrated optics,photonics
Projet ERC : ANINAN (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Cultures and cultural production
Entité participante : Aarhus University — Pays : Danemark — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : AU
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1368977.0 €

ANINAN investigates literary and cultural representations of travel and mobility – the often temporary move of a person from her or his home to another location – in ancient Israelite/Jewish narratives, including selected texts of the Hebrew Bible and other Jewish writings from the Hellenistic and early Roman eras (ca. 300 BCE – 100 CE). The sources, which originate from different parts of the Mediterranean region, are written or preserved in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, and Ge’ez. The aim is to understand how human mobility was perceived and/or imagined in Jewish antiquity, including its agents, motives, and outcomes. The main objectives are: (1) to produce a series of case-studies that illustrate the portrayal of human mobility and its social confines in Israelite/Jewish literature; and (2) to compare and theorize the cultural representations of travel in an intersectional frame and, as a result, to provide a ground-breaking interpretative framework for the study of mobility in texts from the human past. The selected intersectional approach is novel and specifically unearths questions of power and social stratification that evidently pertain to (in)voluntary forms of mobility, including the individual profile of the traveller and the social realities that prompted, enabled, or compelled her or his travel in the first place. The challenge is that we know nothing about the power dynamics of ancient Israelite/Jewish travel accounts. They are expected to reveal striking intersectional concerns, highlighting the complexity of human phenomena such as mobility. While multiple ‘categories of difference’ characterize the travelling agents, mobility also affects and shapes these categories, e.g., by leading the agent to negotiate, refine, or recreate aspects of her or his identity. The narratives also illustrate encounters between the Israelites/Jews and ‘others’, which results in a new understanding of cultural interaction in the ancient eastern Mediterranean.

Mots-clés : biblical studies,jewish studies,hebrew bible,second temple judaism,ancient eastern mediterranean,human mobility,travel narratives,intersectionality
Projet ERC : DUPDOWN (Horizon 2020, appel 2019, Proof of concept grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment of Human Diseases
Entité participante : University of Milan — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UNIMI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 108345.0 €

ASD is a very prevalent neurodevelopmental condition affecting more than 1% individuals, and represents a major unmet medical need since no effective treatment is available. Despite the phenotypic convergence of its core symptoms (impaired language, restriction in sociability and stereotypies, invariably coupled to anxiety and often associated to varying degrees of intellectual disability), ASD is genetically highly heterogeneous, with hundreds of bona fide causative genetic lesions. This genetic architecture breaks down ASD into a collection of rare and highly penetrant genetic syndromes, presenting key challenges but also decisive applicative opportunities: i) the accelerated regulatory path for drug approval/repurposing; and ii) the possibility that few paradigmatic syndromes may yield generalizable therapeutic inroads for ASD treatment. Duplication at 7q11.23 (7Dup), encompassing 26-28 genes, is one of best characterized ASD-causing copy number variations and offers unique translational opportunities, also because hemydeletion of the same interval causes Williams-Beuren syndrome, a condition characterized by hypersociability and language strengths, thereby providing a unique reference standard to validate treatments for the core ASD symptoms. Within my ERC-Consolidator project we successfully completed a high-throughput screening on 7q11.23 CNV patient-derived neurons and discovered that deacetylase inhibition lowers the abnormal levels of a key gene underlying the cognitive/behavioral traits of 7Dup. Having defined robust 7Dup neurodevelopmental and electrophysiological phenotypes, both in patients’ neuronal lineages and in mouse models, we now aim to generate proof of concept for the preclinical validation of selected deacetylase inhibitors in rescuing ASD phenotypes in vitro and in vivo. For this we pursue an integrated experimental and business plan, buttressed by key industrial partnerships, to advance the most inhibitors towards ASD treatment.

Mots-clés : autism spectrum disorder  asd,sociability,preclinical validation,hdac inhibitors,induced pluripotent stem cells  ipsc,brain organoids,gtf2i