Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : RETRO-PUMP (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Environmental B iology, Ecology  and E volution
Entité participante : Université de Marbourg — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1771359.0 €

The history of life on Earth is intricately tied to the story of molecular oxygen (O2). Given that we breath O2 every day, the quest to understand its rise over billions of years is inherently tied to the fundamental question of our existence. However, critical turning points in our planet’s oxygenation, including the Great Oxidation Event, continue to escape our full comprehension. O2’s narrative involves a complex interplay of microbial life, biogeochemical processes, and geological factors, all intricately woven into the carbon cycle. Within the web of transformations, a black hole persists: the Biological Carbon Pump (BCP). The BCP is a crucial component of the Earth's carbon cycle, sequestering carbon from the atmosphere and transferring it to the ocean depths for burial over geological timescales. This burial process directly impacts global O2 levels, making the understanding of the ancient BCP crucial for unlocking Earth's oxygenation mysteries. However, deciphering how the ancient BCP functioned is challenging, as insights from the modern BCP, which is predominantly shaped by complex life forms, offer limited guidance when it comes to understanding its ancient counterpart, which operated in a world ruled by microorganisms. RETRO-PUMP sets out to unveil the secrets of the Precambrian BCP by reconstructing an ancient and evolving BCP with the goal of unravelling its regulation of O2 levels. It challenges the conventional view of a less efficient Precambrian BCP and explores uncharted relationships between microbial carbon cycling and major O2 transitions. This journey follows a simulated ocean pipeline, from the sunlit photic zone to the deep ocean, culminating in an integration of insights into a numerical framework. By tackling the drivers behind Earth’s oxygenation, RETRO-PUMP has substantial implications for understanding how the interplay of biological and geological factors ultimately paved the way for the rise of complex life as we know it today.

Mots-clés : precambrian,photosynthesis,biological carbon pump,microbial ecology,microbial physiology,biogeochemistry,geomicrobiology,model,molecular mechanisms,marine snow,global burial fluxes,atmospheric oxygen,cyanobacteria,photoferrotrophy,great oxidation event,banded iron formations,microenvironments
Projet ERC : INTEGRAL (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Systems and Communication Engineering
Entité participante : Université technique de Berlin — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1654850.0 €

Measuring and linking brain network activity to human physiology and behavior in natural everyday situations promises profound new insights into healthy brain function and disorders. However, the absence of suitable mobile neurotechnology presents a significant roadblock. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has greatly advanced our understanding of brain function and networks, but it is limited to single-snapshot experiments in constrained lab settings. Electroencephalography (EEG), while mobile, cannot directly be linked to brain networks captured by fMRI. To overcome these roadblocks and to advance neuro-inspired treatments and discoveries to natural environments, a hybrid wearable platform is required that combines innovations in hardware and analysis methods to enable continuous and stable measurements of brain network activity maps in the everyday world. Advancing high-density diffuse optical tomography (HD-DOT) can provide such a suitable alternative to fMRI. With a unique systems engineering concept, INTEGRAL aims to miniaturize and integrate DOT, EEG, and physiological sensors with advanced multimodal machine learning to improve spatio-temporal contrast in mobile brain-imaging. To this end, Objective 1 (Instruments) will develop hardware for unobtrusive and continuous wearable brain-body imaging with HD-DOT-EEG. Objective 2 (Experiments) will collect extensive multimodal data for measuring brain networks while controlling for environmental and physiological artifacts. Objective 3 (Analysis) will enable estimation of brain network activity with multimodal sensor fusion and machine learning and Objective 4 (Integration) will provide validation of robust brain-networks imaging in ecologically valid everyday world environments. If successful, this new platform will provide unprecedented opportunities to study brain function with global impact on neurotechnology applications and research from Neuroscience of the Everyday World to digital health.

Mots-clés : functional near infrared spectroscopy,fnirs,diffuse optical tomography,dot,multimodal signal processing,multimodal machine learning,electroencephalography,physiological sensors,neuroimaging,wearables,brain networks,neuroscience of the everyday world
Projet ERC : METABIONT (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Physiology in Health, Disease and Ageing
Entité participante : Université de Heidelberg — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1218937.5 €

Intestinal bacteria have been associated with the most diverse aspects of our physiology, and large efforts are being undertaken to determine how the metabolic repertoire of the microbiome impacts host nutrition and health. These efforts, however, face major obstacles. First, we have a very poor understanding of how bacterial metabolism is regulated in the different sections of the gastrointestinal tract. It is also becoming increasingly clear that symbionts support their hosts by means that extend beyond the provision of nutrients, and these effects can hardly be predicted from metagenomic analyses. We will use ambitious approaches borrowed from several fields, including microbiology, genetics, and cell biology, to dissect how the crosstalk between hosts and their symbionts shapes metabolism and physiology at the scale of the holobiont. We will leverage the relevant Drosophila gastrointestinal tract and use multi-omics approaches to dissect, in mechanistic depth, how the metabolism of a model enteric bacterium is regulated in the different sections of the digestive tract (Aim 1 – The microbe). In parallel, our work suggests that symbionts exert a broad control over intestinal digestive and metabolic activities, and act potentially through host bacterial sensing and epigenetic mechanisms to play these roles. We will dissect these regulatory links in Drosophila, and investigate their conservation in mammals (Aim 2 – The host). Finally, we have evidence that hosts cooperate with their symbionts to regulate gastrointestinal transit, a vital but underappreciated factor that shapes nutrition in both partners. We will use two-sided genetic screens to uncover the bacterial metabolites and the host factors that regulate transit, and determine if this regulation involves the gut-brain axis (Aim 3 – The holobiont). Together, these studies will bring major advances in our understanding of the nutritional and metabolic interactions between hosts and their symbionts.

Mots-clés : microbiome,microbiota,drosophila,gut brain axis,metabolism,intestine,immunity
Projet ERC : SODI (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Soci al World and Its Interactions
Entité participante : Université de Heidelberg — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 816251.25 €

Over millions of years, human survival has crucially depended on rapport building, seeking others’ social support, and sharing resources in groups. This social context has created constant evolutionary pressure to develop specific biological systems geared to interacting face-to-face with physically present others. For just a few years, we have been living in a rapidly developing digital world where interactions across society (education, friendship, health care) shift to face-to-screen interaction – strongly accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. How does this core change affect our social interactions? In SODI, I will contrast face-to-face with face-to-screen “live” interactions of many individuals, taking a multi-method, biopsychological approach. According to my theoretical working model, face-to-screen interactions fail to entirely engage specific, socially relevant hormonal systems (oxytocin, μ-opioids, testosterone), which evolved to process context-dependent stimuli from face-to-face contact (mutual eye gaze, physical contact, social odour). Consequently, hormone-mediated beneficial social effects should be attenuated, while adding social stimuli should ameliorate this difference. To test my model’s assumptions, I will tackle three objectives. How do face-to-screen interactions differ from face-to-face ones? Can we “socially enrich” face-to-screen interactions by adding previously lacking social stimuli? Does experimentally modulating hormone levels in the brain affect differences between face-to-face and face-to-screen interactions? In a radically innovative approach, my research combines experimental-psychological interaction paradigms, neurophysiological and subjective measures, and hormone administration to understand the merits and flaws of interacting in a digital reality. Moreover, my project aims to strike new paths for “socially enriching” face-to-screen interactions, thereby unfolding the full potential of the digital (r)evolution.
Projet ERC : LIGHTHEART (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Materials Engineering
Entité participante : Université de Heidelberg — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499705.0 €

Heart failure remains a leading cause of mortality worldwide taking an estimate of 16 million lives each year. Cardiac tissue engineering solutions that can improve the quality of life of those with advanced heart disease have proved challenging so far. Bioprinting is an exciting technology that holds promise to fabricate tissues and organs. Lab-grown engineered cardiac muscle requires at least four weeks to maturate in a bioreactor. In LIGHTHEART, an off-the-shelf solution will be developed for treating injured myocardium in vivo. An unconventional combination of bioprinting and optogenetics will be used to surgically fabricate engineered cardiac muscle directly at the patient’s heart. A surgical bioprinting tool will be constructed to achieve vascularization and cellular architectures as that observed in native cardiac muscle. Induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiac cells will be the basis of the bioinspired biomaterial-free ink that will be printed. Optogenetic expression of different light-sensitive proteins at the cell surfaces will be the sole trigger of cellular assembly, thus omitting the need to embed cells in hydrogels or printing in a supporting bath. Surgical optogenetic bioprinting will be first tested ex vivo using a silicone human phantom with a mimicking beating heart, and later in vivo in a large animal model in accordance with the 3R principles. LIGHTHEART opens up new horizons in the way heart failure can be clinically treated and brings hope to patients who are desperately waiting for a heart transplantation. The disruptive nature of LIGHTHEART will unite engineers, surgeons and scientists to change the future of transplantation medicine with modular bottom-up technologies that allow for in vivo tissue and organ restoration or replacement directly at the operating theatre.

Mots-clés : in vivo bioprinting optogenetics tissue engineering cardiac muscle heart failure
Projet ERC : ISM-METALS (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Universe Sciences
Entité participante : Université de Heidelberg — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1500000.0 €

The introduction of heavy elements (metals) into the interstellar medium (ISM) via stellar feedback processes is crucial for the regulation of star formation and thus galaxy evolution. Metals set the heating and cooling balance in star-forming regions, and establish the carbon chemistry that is necessary for life on our planet. The gas-phase metal abundance (metallicity) is the most accessible measure of the build-up of chemical enrichment over cosmic time. However, there are large systematic uncertainties in our metallicity measurements, to the extent that we do not know if most galaxies are metal-rich or metal-poor compared to the Milky Way. These long-standing uncertainties plague our understanding of metal variations, but can now be addressed by vast new homogeneous data sets resolving tens of thousands of individual HII regions across nearby galaxies. This ambitious ERC starting grant tackles this problem by applying a data-driven approach to emission line measurements in our own Milky Way, Local Group galaxies (SDSS-V/LVM) and more distant Local Volume galaxies (PHANGS-MUSE). This project aims to resolve long-standing discrepancies in absolute metallicity calibrations and develop new and robust prescriptions that directly address electron temperature uncertainties. We will apply our methods to map out metallicity variations across more than 50 galaxies, providing quantitative constraints on the mixing scale and correlations with local physical conditions in the ISM. My leadership roles in LVM and PHANGS uniquely qualify me to lead this proposed ERC project. By establishing a new homogeneous local benchmark for absolute metallicity measurements, the ISM-METALS project will build a foundation for future studies of galaxy metallicities, enabling the robust interpretation of metallicity variations soon to be measured across cosmic time with upcoming new facilities (JWST, ELT).
Projet ERC : RE-TWIST (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Products and Processes Engineering
Entité participante : Université libre de Bruxelles — Pays : Belgique — Rôle : Partner
Acronyme de l'entité : ULB
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 728750.0 €

The concept of digital twins promises to revolutionize engineering by offering new avenues for optimization, control, and predictive maintenance. Digital twins seek to virtually replicate systems using models that continuously "learn" from data, automatizing data collection, validation, and refinement and becoming "self-learning" models. However, this concept is not yet established in engineering and requires significant developments in integrating machine learning with traditional "domain-specific" knowledge. The Re-Twist project tackles this challenge with two objectives. The first objective is to develop a new framework that puts fundamental principles at the core of digital twinning and combines the training of a digital twin with the training of a controlling agent in ways that allow one to learn from the other. The agent learns by trial and error, as in reinforcement learning, while interacting with the system and using the digital twin as a playground. I call this novel framework Reinforcement Twinning (RT). The second objective is to develop RT on lab-scale prototypes of systems at the centre of global challenges. These are the optimal operation of wind turbines, drone propellers, sloshing tanks, and cryogenic liquid storage. Wind turbines drive the fastest-growing renewable energy sector; drones have the potential to revolutionize monitoring, inspection, rescue missions, swift delivery of medical supplies and more. The optimal management of cryogenic tanks, controlling the dynamics of sloshing and the thermodynamics of boil-off, will be essential to the economic viability of green fuels such as liquid hydrogen. This project is "high risk" because it endeavours to establish a new discipline at the intersection of machine learning and energy engineering. It promises "high gains" by aiming to experimentally validate twinning systems that could significantly impact society.

Mots-clés : digital twins,machine learning reinforcement learning,wind turbines,drone propellers,sloshing,thermal management of cryogenic tanks
Projet ERC : WiseSeek (Horizon Europe, appel 2025, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Compl exity
Entité participante : Université libre de Bruxelles — Pays : Belgique — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : ULB
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499934.0 €

Each day, 60% of the world’s population engages in online information consumption, often encountering negative content. For example, social media contains three times more negative than positive information. This exposure to negative information has been linked to adverse effects on people’s well-being and mental health. For example, persistent engagement with negative online content, often termed ‘doomscrolling’, heightens the risk of psychopathological conditions. This is an issue for both individuals grappling with deteriorating mental health and governments contending with such a decline. WiseSeek aims to confront this challenge by developing an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the mechanisms underlying decisions to consume information with such negative consequences, referred to as doom information consumption. First, I propose a new hypothesis that doom information consumption arises as a result of altered reinforcement learning dynamics within the value of information, and I introduce a novel computational model to test this. Second, I hypothesize that the neurotransmitter dopamine (DA) plays a key role in computing such a value to guide information consumption. I will test this hypothesis using an innovative methodology that measures subsecond fluctuations in DA signals in conscious humans and pharmacological interventions. Third, I will test whether attention-based interventions can interfere with how the value of information is computed to change information consumption. Finally, lab findings will be translated to the real world by developing a novel web-based methodology. Laying at the frontiers of cognitive neuroscience, psychology, and computer science, WiseSeek will provide the first insights into the mechanisms underlying decisions to consume information with negative consequences on people’s well-being and mental health, with major implications for behavioral science, clinical psychology, public policy, and society as a whole.

Mots-clés : seeking information in the digital landscape information seeking decisions and motivations reinforcement learning models dopamine subsecond fluctuations in dopamine signals pharmacological interventions changing behavior with attention based interventions from lab to society
Projet ERC : SensationaHL (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Compl exity
Entité participante : Université libre de Bruxelles — Pays : Belgique — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : ULB
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1476432.0 €

Orienting oneself in a crowded playground, understanding the teacher’s explanation despite the surrounding chatter, lip-reading to support auditory perception in noisy backgrounds: these are all complex but essential skills for navigating lively schools. In children with normal hearing, the auditory system is functionally mature by 6 months of age. Yet complex auditory processing remains immature until mid to late adolescence. Strikingly, adolescence is characterized by the onset of puberty, which triggers a cascade of hormonal changes that drive neural plasticity, and vice-versa. The overarching hypothesis of SensationaHL is that adolescence might present a second sensitive period for complex auditory processing. Just like puberty is a gradual process spanning years, sensitive periods unfold over time. In this project, I propose a multi-method approach to advance our understanding of maturation of complex auditory processing at adolescence. Specifically, I will combine neuroendocrinology, neuroimaging and psychophysics to identify the mechanisms that govern sensitive periods as they unfold over time. First, I will zoom in on the onset of puberty as a potential trigger for heightened plasticity associated with sensitive periods. Next, I will investigate the effect of altered auditory input (due to hearing loss, noise exposition or auditory training) on maturation of complex auditory processing in adolescents. Last, I will focus on the braking factors that contribute to a decrease in plasticity observed at the end of adolescence. SensationaHL uses an innovative multidisciplinary perspective to tackle a remaining challenge in the field of (developmental) auditory cognitive neuroscience. It will have significant impacts on public health (i.e., prevention and clinical management of hearing loss), language education (i.e., speech perception in challenging backgrounds in children) and theoretical understanding of sensitive periods across the lifespan.

Mots-clés : psychoneuroendocrinology auditory processing hearing loss
Projet ERC : DRESSCODE (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Materials Engineering
Entité participante : Université de Fribourg-en-Brisgau — Pays : Allemagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1497778.0 €

No drug can be effective without an appropriate delivery system; this is why the development of formulations for effective and safe drug delivery currently raises major interests, in all clinical applications. While the use of therapeutic proteins has substantially increased in the last four decades, there is an entire class of proteins that has not yet been explored as drugs: the transmembrane receptors. In fact, the delivery of receptors for clinical applications remains very challenging and has only been achieved via genetic engineering of cells, referred as gene therapy. To date, most gene therapies remain extremely expensive and therefore, poorly accessible to patients. DRESSCODE proposes to innovate cutting-edge protein engineering technologies to deliver and enhance receptors at the cell membrane, using recombinant proteins only. By doing so, we aim to create a paradigm shift from genetic engineering to protein engineering of the cell membrane, with the ambition of developing cost-effective protein-based therapies. In DRESSCODE, we will first engineer independently the extracellular, intracellular, and transmembrane parts of a receptor, before combining our technologies to reconstruct functional receptors with enhanced bioactivity. Particularly, we will generate fusion proteins that 1) target the cell surface with super-avidity, to enhance receptor sensing; 2) penetrate the cell membrane and target its inner side, to enhance receptor signaling; and 3) insert across the cell membrane to reconstitute the receptor transmembrane domain using pH-low inserting peptides. DRESSCODE will demonstrate Proof-of-Technologies in two high-impact clinical applications, focusing on the engineering of VEGFR-2 for therapeutic angiogenesis and of the CAR for T cell-based cancer immunotherapy. Its success will lead to the development of novel therapeutic proteins and inspire the future use of receptors as drugs, while providing valuable tools for biological research.

Mots-clés : protein engineering,drug delivery,transmembrane receptors,cell membrane targeting,therapeutic angiogenesis,cancer immunotherapy