Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : LIGHTUP (Horizon 2020, appel 2017, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : University of Oxford — Pays : Royaume-Uni — Rôle : Partner
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 266250.0 €

Visual awareness affords flexibility and experiential richness, and its loss following brain damage has devastating effects. However, patients with blindness following cortical damage may retain visual functions, despite visual awareness is lacking (blindsight). But, how can we translate non-conscious visual abilities into conscious ones after damage to the visual cortex? To place our understanding of visual awareness on firm neurobiological and mechanistic bases, I propose to integrate human and monkey neuroscience. Next, I will translate this wisdom into evidence-based clinical intervention. First, LIGHTUP will apply computational neuroimaging methods at the micro-scale level, estimating population receptive fields in humans and monkeys. This will enable analyzing fMRI signal similar to the way tuning properties are studied in neurophysiology, and to clarify how brain areas translate visual properties into responses associated with awareness. Second, LIGHTUP leverages a behavioural paradigm that can dissociate nonconscious visual abilities from awareness in monkeys, thus offering a refined animal model of visual awareness. Applying behavioural-Dynamic Causal Modelling to combine fMRI and behavioral data, LIGHTUP will build up a Bayesian framework that specifies the directionality of information flow in the interactions across distant brain areas, and their causal role in generating visual awareness. In the third part, I will devise a rehabilitation protocol that combines brain stimulation and visual training to promote the (re)emergence of lost visual awareness. LIGHTUP will exploit non-invasive transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in a novel protocol that enables stimulation of complex cortical circuits and selection of the direction of connectivity that is enhanced. This associative stimulation has been proven to induce Hebbian plasticity, and we have piloted its effects in fostering visual awareness in association with visual restoration training.

Mots-clés : blindsight,visual awareness,cortical blindness,striate cortex,fmri,computational neuroimaging
Projet ERC : MEMTICIPATION (Horizon 2020, appel 2019, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam — Pays : Pays-Bas — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : VU
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499746.0 €

Visual working memory allows us to hold in the fore of our mind those visual representations that are anticipated to become most relevant for ensuing behaviour – guiding our perception as well as action. Thus, while working memories inherently regard the past, their purpose is to guide adaptive behaviour in the near future. Yet, conventional studies of visual working memory consider memory retention (how we remember) regardless of anticipated memory use (what we remember for), and neglect that representations that are held in memory concurrently often serve distinct purposes and afford specific actions. I posit that the accessibility and neural recruitment of individual working memories are fundamentally determined, and dynamically sculpted, by their anticipated use – i.e. by our expectations of when we need individual memory items, and what we need them for. This opens the fundamental, yet largely overlooked, question of how visual working memories are ‘prepared for action’. To target this central question, this project will pioneer multiple innovative memory tasks and combine these with cutting-edge brain imaging approaches to dynamically track how working memories are optimised to be ready for the right action (theme 1), ready at the right time (theme 2), and ready for the right task (theme 3). Having made considerable progress, this project will then also asses the identified ‘forward thinking' memory dynamics as a key novel dimension to charter relevant individual and group differences in working memory (theme 4). Together, this is anticipated to uncover ground-breaking novel insights into the pro-active mechanisms that ensure adaptive memory-guided behaviour – and to change not only the way we view visual working memory, but also how we study and use this core cognitive construct.

Mots-clés : visual working memory,anticipation,preparation,action planning,temporal expectation,attention,goal directed,cognitive neuroscience,gaze behaviour,decoding,sensory motor,affordance
Projet ERC : VOIMA (Horizon 2020, appel 2020, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Complexity
Entité participante : Eötvös Loránd University — Pays : Hongrie — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : ELTE
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1900000.0 €

Vocalizations of any mammal carry prominent cues about the inner states and identity of the vocalizer. Voice is also a prevalent channel for humans’ recently emerged communication system, speech. Recent evidence suggests that certain human auditory brain specializations and mechanisms, relevant for voice and speech perception, reflect abrupt shifts in human capacities compared to other primates. Do these brain specializations for voice and speech perception reflect human-specific predispositions and are thus human-unique, or are they the consequence of rapid evolutionary adaptations or developmental accommodations of the ancient voice perception system to recent demands imposed by the presence of speech? I hypothesize that in general voice perception mechanisms are conserved across mammals, and provide a neuronal niche in which specializations for human voice and speech perception may arise also in non-humans. The case of companion animals provides an unparalleled model system to study the possible evolutionary and experiential effects of the presence of speech on the mammalian voice perception system. Dogs and pigs are phylogenetically distant, highly vocal species that live, when kept as companions, with humans. VOIMA combines ethology and brain imaging (EEG/fMRI/HD-DOT) to compare voice and speech processing in humans, dogs and pigs: WP1 seeks evidence for selective processing of conspecific voices, human voice, and speech. WP2 explores the mechanisms and specific sensitivities for inner state coding, voice identity recognition and vocalizer normalization, from con- and heterospecific voice. WP3 tests how sensitivities to human voice and speech emerge across dog breed types, in neonate dogs, pigs, wolves and wild boars, and in input-manipulated developing dogs. Revealing how adaptation to the human social niche shapes domestic mammals' voice perception, this project will provide new insights on how speech shaped human voice perception.

Mots-clés : voice perception,speech perception,comparative ethology,cognitive neuroimaging,auditory cortex,domestic pig,functional magnetic resonance imaging,event related potentials,optical imaging
Projet ERC : FEVER (Horizon 2020, appel 2015, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Earth system science
Entité participante : University of Geneva — Pays : Suisse — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UNIGE
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1458192.0 €

Volcanic eruptions occur with a frequency that is inversely proportional to their magnitude. Datasets of natural volcanic events, currently used to determine the recurrence rate of volcanic eruptions are intrinsically biased. Combining physical modelling of processes with detailed statistical analysis has been demonstrated essential for assessing reliably the recurrence rate of natural hazards, such as floods and earthquakes. This would be the first attempt to apply a similar, integrated approach to explosive volcanic eruptions. The high-gain final target of FEVER is to produce a physically based statistical model able to ForEcast the recurrence rate of Volcanic Eruptions both at regional and global scale. This is the first project of this kind and consequently involves a significant risk. Because 500 million people live in proximity of volcanoes and eruptions have a significant social and economical impact, forecasting the recurrence rate of volcanic eruption remains a great challenge in Science. This project builds on two main directions of my research: a) Thermo-mechanical and statistical modelling targeting the identification of the main physical factors controlling the recurrence rate of volcanic eruptions. We showed that the flux of magma from depth directly controls the magnitude of the largest possible eruptions. Thus, b) we developed a novel method to determine such magma fluxes. These two lines of research combine perfectly in FEVER and will be integrated to answer questions such as: What is the probability of an eruption similar to the Tambora 1815 to occur in the next 100 years on Earth or in Europe? What is the largest physically possible eruption that can occur in Europe? The high-gain target of FEVER is to mitigate the impact of volcanic eruptions on our society, by producing research of interest for governmental agencies dealing with location of strategic infrastructures, and for businesses such as aviation.

Mots-clés : volcanic eruptions,physical modelling,statistical analysis
Projet ERC : THERA (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Earth system science
Entité participante : University of Bern — Pays : Suisse — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UB
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1978923.0 €

Volcanic eruptions play a dominant role in driving climate, in ways beyond the established short-term influence on surface air temperatures. In order to mitigate and adapt to the climate effects of future large volcanic eruptions we need to better quantify the risk of these eruptions including 1) the probability of their occurrence and 2) their expected climatic impact. The observational record of the timing of volcanic eruptions, their locations, magnitudes of sulphate aerosol injection is incomplete which limits our understanding of the sensitivity of the Earth system to volcanism and the vulnerability of social and economic systems to the climate impact of past and future eruptions. The primary goal of this proposal is to extract data on the timing, magnitudes and source locations of all major volcanic eruptions occurring during the Holocene (i.e., the past 12,000 years) to answer the questions: What is the likelihood of a stratospheric sulfur injection as large as that from the colossal eruption of Tambora in 1815 to occur somewhere on the globe within the next 100 years? What is the role of effusive eruptions on past, present and future climate? This will be achieved by employing novel, precisely dated, high-time resolution aerosol measurements from bipolar ice-core arrays. New tools will be used to constrain source parameters of the eruptions (location, plume injection height) that control their effects on climate. THERA will constrain recurrence rates for one of the largest global-scale natural hazards, while also assessing linkages between volcanic perturbations and key components of the climate systems (e.g., atmospheric circulation, droughts, ice-sheets and sea-level) through interdisciplinary case studies. As a final goal, THERA will generate global-scale, space-and-time resolved stratospheric aerosol properties for climate models to simulate the volcanic influence on Holocene climate evolution.

Mots-clés : paleoclimate,holocene,climate forcing,volcanism,ice cores,climate reconstructions,aerosols,cryptotephra,geochronolgy,thera debate
Projet ERC : PRO-TOOLKITS (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Consolidator grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Physical and analytical chemical sciences
Entité participante : University of Rome Tor Vergata — Pays : Italie — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1999375.0 €

WHY: The biological complexity of tumours and the large diversity of diagnostic biomarkers call for the development of innovative analytical tools that can detect multiple targets in a sensitive, specific and low-cost way and allow real-time monitoring of disease pathways and therapeutic effects. To provide such transformative tools creative thinking, innovative approach and the exploration of new research avenues that span different disciplines is necessary. WHAT: The goal of the PRO-TOOLKITS project is to address this need by developing innovative cell-free point of care diagnostic kits and genetically encodable biosensing tools. HOW: I oriented my independent career as a P.I. towards the design and development of synthetic nucleic acid-based nanodevices and nanomachines. With the help of an ERC Starting Grant I made ground-breaking contributions in the field of nucleic acid Nanotechnology. Motivated by these advancements I propose to challenge my know-how and expertise to explore new research avenues that will open exciting possibilities in biosensing applications. The key, ground-breaking IDEA underlying this project is to take advantage of my expertise and harness the advantageous features of RNA synthetic modules that can translate the expression of proteins in controlled in-vitro cell-free systems and can be also genetically encoded in living organisms and function inside the cells. I will develop rationally designed programmable nucleic acid modules that respond to a wide range of molecular markers and environmental stimuli through innovative nature-inspired mechanisms and that can be orthogonally wired to provide cell-free diagnostic kits and genetically encoded live-cell biosensing tools. The project will provide transformative approaches, methods and tools that will represent a genuine break-through in the fields of in-vitro diagnostics, biosensing and synthetic biology.

Mots-clés : biosensors,dna nanotechnology,aptamers,cell free systems,synthetic biology,nanobiotechnology
Projet ERC : WATUSO (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Advanced grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Synthetic Chemistry and Materials
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 : 2498750.0 €

Water is the sustainable solvent of excellence but its high polarity limits the solubility of non-polar compounds. Confinement of water in hydrophobic pores alters its hydrogen bonding structure and related properties such as dielectric constant and solvation power. Whether this special state of confined water can be rendered useful in chemical processes is hitherto underexplored. The original idea of this project is to modulate water solvent properties through hydrophobic nano-confinement. Pressure is applied to force a heterogeneous mixture of poorly soluble molecules and water into hydrophobic nanopores of host material where the lowered polarity of water enhances dissolution. Decompression after reaction causes expulsion of the solution from the pores and spontaneous demixing of reaction products as water returns to its normal polar state. Temporary dissolution enhancement during confinement is expected to be advantageous to chemical reaction and molecular storage. Development of dedicated hydrophobic nanoporous materials and research methodologies providing in situ characterization of confined water, solutes and host material using NMR, EIS, DRS, X-ray and neutron scattering under static and dynamic conditions are key aspects of this project. Nano-confined water offers a potential alternative to compression for storing CH4 and H2 gas, and opens new opportunities for green chemistry such as aqueous phase hydrogenation reactions which benefit from enhanced hydrogen solubility. Unprecedented control in time and space over H2O solvation properties in a WATUSO system will enable new technologies with major scientific and societal impact. WATUSO will lead to new insights in water research and deliver new multi-diagnostic characterization tools. WATUSO could revolutionize chemical manufacturing and gas storage and the concept could spill over to many more solvent-based processes. WATUSO will contribute significantly to a greener, more sustainable chemical industry.

Mots-clés : tunable solvent system,nano confinement,hydrophobic porous materials
Projet ERC : 3D-FIREFLUC (Horizon 2020, appel 2018, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Fundamental constituents of matter
Entité participante : Universidad de Sevilla — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1512250.0 €

Wave-particle interactions are ubiquitous in nature and play a fundamental role in astrophysical and fusion plasmas. In solar plasmas, magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) fluctuations are thought to be responsible for the heating of the solar corona and the generation of the solar wind. In magnetically confined fusion (MCF) devices, enhanced particle transport induced by MHD fluctuations can deteriorate the plasma confinement, and also endanger the device integrity. MCF devices are an ideal testbed to verify current models and develop mitigation / protection techniques. The proposed project paves the way for providing active control techniques to tame the MHD induced particle transport in a fusion plasma. A solid understanding of the interaction between energetic particles and MHD instabilities in the presence of electric fields and plasma currents is required to develop such techniques. I will pursue this goal through innovative diagnosis techniques with unprecedented spatio-temporal resolution. Combined with state-of-the-art hybrid MHD codes, a deep insight into the underlying physics mechanism will be gained. The outcome of this research project will have a major impact for next-step MCF devices as I will provide ground-breaking control techniques for mitigating MHD induced particle transport in magnetized plasmas. The project consists of 3 research lines which follow a bottom-up approach: (1) Cutting-edge instrumentation, aiming at the new generation of energetic particle and edge current diagnostics. (2) Unravel the dynamics of energetic particles, electric fields, edge currents and MHD fluctuations. (3) From lab to space weather: The developed models will revolutionize our understanding of the observed particle acceleration and transport in the solar corona. Based on this approach, the project represents a gateway between the fusion, astrophysics and space communities opening new avenues for a common basic understanding.

Mots-clés : plasma physics,solar physics,energetic particles,particle transport and acceleration,magnetohydrodynamics,electric fields,plasma currents,magnetic confinement
Projet ERC : GalNUC (Horizon 2020, appel 2014, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Universe sciences
Entité participante : Eötvös Loránd University — Pays : Hongrie — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : ELTE
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1191149.04 €

We address some of the major unsolved questions of galactic nuclei using methods of condensed matter physics. Galactic nuclei host a central supermassive black hole, a dense population of stars and compact objects, and in many cases a bright gaseous disk feeding the supermassive black hole. The observed stellar distribution exhibits both spherical and counterrotating disk-like structures. Existing theoretical models cannot convincingly explain the origin of the stellar disks. Is there also a “dark cusp” or “dark disk” of stellar mass black holes? Are there intermediate mass black holes in the Galactic center? We examine the statistical physics of galactic nuclei and their long term dynamical evolution. A star orbiting a supermassive black hole on an eccentric precessing orbit covers an axisymmetric annulus. The long-term gravitational interaction between such annuli is similar to the Coulomb interaction between axisymmetric molecules constituting a liquid crystal. We apply standard methods of condensed matter physics to examine these astrophysical systems. The observed disk and spherical structures represent isotropic-nematic phase transitions. We derive the phase space distribution and time-evolution of different stellar components including a population of black holes. Further, we investigate the interaction of a stellar cluster with a gaseous disk, if present. This leads to the formation of gaps, warps, and spiral waves in the disk, the redistribution of stellar objects, and possibly the formation of intermediate mass black holes. We explore the implications for electromagnetic and gravitational wave observatories. Dark disks of black holes could provide the most frequent source of gravitational waves for LIGO and VIRGO. These detectors will open a new window on the Universe; the proposed project will open a new field in gravitational wave astrophysics to interpret the sources. We also explore implications for electromagnetic observations.

Mots-clés : black hole physics,gravitational waves,nonlinear dynamical systems,hamiltonian physics,mean field theory,active galactic nuclei,accretion disks,disordered systems,quenched states