Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-erc-participations-et-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Projet ERC : UHealth (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Soci al World and Its Interactions
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 : 1498694.0 €

The core purpose of UHealth is to assess the relationship between trade unions and workers’ health taking a broad definition of what trade unions are and looking at several health indictors including physical and mental health and wellbeing. This innovative project will assess the specific dimensions the underlie such a relationship within three work packages (WP). WP1 will employ several longitudinal British Birth Cohorts to examine the extent to which trade union membership and trade union presence within the company as well as changes in the collective bargaining structure over the life course are associated with changes in health outcomes. WP2 will compare five countries (Germany, Korea, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Japan) using specific panel homogenised datasets to better capture how the presence of a trade union within the workplace could impact health and wellbeing both directly and indirectly through job satisfaction, gender pay gap, precarious employment and flexible work arrangements. Specific attention will be given to national collective negotiation structures. For both packages, sensitivity analyses will test model assumptions and longitudinal analyses and negative outcomes and propensity score matching will be used to assess causation and intervention selection. Finally, using a qualitative comparative approach of the freight transport and cleaning sectors in the United Kingdom and Belgium, WP3 will pay attention to the way trade unions organisations are involved in health and safety committees and how workers’ health is an object of collective negotiation across different types of national and international structures that vary across countries and sectors. UHealth will result in a set-change in research on the work and employment determinants of health providing evidence for research and policy communities to reduce health inequalities.

Mots-clés : trade union labour union employment work quantitative methods longitudinal methods panel data international comparison health mental health physical health wellbeing transport
Projet ERC : PRIMETIME (Horizon Europe, appel 2021, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Earth System Science
Entité participante : Université de Stockholm — Pays : Suède — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499230.0 €

Rapid warming is accelerating Arctic carbon cycling, including CO2 release by degradation of thawing soil organic matter and CO2 uptake by better-growing plants. Projections of future Arctic greenhouse gas fluxes retain large uncertainties and do not consider plant-soil interactions that can substantially affect CO2 release - the RHIZOSPHERE PRIMING EFFECT. Theoretical considerations, comparison of ecosystem carbon stocks and model extrapolation of temperate studies suggest a high potential for globally-relevant, priming-induced CO2 emissions from a warming Arctic following shifts in vegetation and rooting patterns. PRIMETIME aims to provide the first observation-based estimate of total plant effects on circum-Arctic soil and ecosystem carbon stocks in a changing climate. Central questions include: (1) How do different vegetation types affect soil and ecosystem carbon stocks and CO2 balance? (2) How do changes in rooting depth interact with depth gradients of soil properties to affect carbon stocks and CO2 fluxes? (3) What is the net effect of expected changes in plant productivity, vegetation distribution and rooting on ecosystem carbon storage across the circum-Arctic?  The EXPERIMENTAL MODULE will quantify plant-soil carbon fluxes and plant impacts on soil CO2 release for different vegetation types and soil depths, combining a novel living-plant macrocosm experiment with field observations, cutting-edge 14C-dating (high risk) and 13C-labelling. The MODELLING MODULE will take our recent model to the next level and integrate experimental data to calculate the combined plant effect on ecosystem CO2 sink/source strength in a changing Arctic. The model will be validated against Eddy Covariance-observed CO2 fluxes (high risk). The integrated PRIMETIME approach will break new ground by shedding light on plant impacts on belowground carbon cycling, and provide a tool box to quantify and integrate these fine-scale processes in large-scale emission estimates.
Projet ERC : GloNoMo (Horizon Europe, appel 2025, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Environmental B iology, Ecology  and E volution
Entité participante : Université de Bâle — Pays : Suisse — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : UniBasel
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499606.0 €

The current biodiversity crisis is characterized by unprecedented rates of species extinctions, and invasive species are one of the most important drivers of this loss. Yet, many invasive species were only recognized as such when already widely naturalized in a region. A major challenge is thus to identify which non-native species have the potential to spread into natural ecosystems and become invasive before their eradication becomes unfeasible. Mountain ecosystems remained comparatively natural and harbour high levels of unique biodiversity but are disproportionately affected by climate change. So far, they are considered to be only minimally affected by non-native species and are thus the frontiers of their distributions. Yet, many non-native plant species spread upslope along roads, from where they might continue to spread into the surrounding undisturbed habitats. Indeed, non-native plant species have been recorded in mountains on all populated continents, and might hence be substantially more widespread than assumed. However, due to data deficiency, it remains unknown whether non-native plant species already occur in undisturbed habitats, which species have the potential to spread and which drivers besides roads are decisive. Even less is known about their impacts in mountains and thus which species should be classified as invasive, as impacts are least investigated in mountains of all terrestrial habitats. This project will fill these knowledge gaps by integrating field observations, experiments and macroecological analyses based on so far untapped global monitoring data from all populated continents, ranging from valleys to the upper limits of plant life in disturbed to undisturbed habitats. It will conduct the first global quantification of the status, trends, drivers and impacts of non-native plant species in mountains. The outcomes have thus not only a high scientific relevance but are also essential for the conservation of the world’s biodiversity.

Mots-clés : global change,invasive species,macroecology,monitoring,mountains,non native species,plants,species distributions,vegetation
Projet ERC : SUBTREAT (Horizon Europe, appel 2021, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Life Science
Panel : Prevention,  Diagnosis and T reatment of Human Diseases
Entité participante : Institut Karolinska — Pays : Suède — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1500000.0 €

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a leading contributor to disability and suicide. It is the most costly brain disorder in Europe. Although multiple treatments are of proven efficacy, individual responses to treatments vary considerably and MDD recurrence is common. There is considerable motivation to improve treatment regimen for individuals with MDD. However, it has been challenging because of the fundamental lack of understanding about the causes of variable treatment outcomes. MDD is widely accepted as a heterogeneous disorder; yet, most research strategies effectively consider MDD as a single disorder. Progress in understanding the variable treatment response will depend on “patient stratification”, i.e., identifying and accounting for patient heterogeneity when evaluating treatment efficacy.  SUBTREAT proposes a unique direction which considers subtype as the key to link aetiological and treatment effect heterogeneity. Our approach is to break down the heterogeneous treatment outcomes of MDD into more narrowly defined subtypes with divergent aetiologies. Specially, I propose three work packages: 1) dissect treatment heterogeneity across subtypes; a particularly innovative aspect of SUBTREAT is that we will use advanced data science approaches to identify novel subtypes which correlate with differential treatment outcomes; 2) determine divergent causes underlying MDD subtypes; we will comprehensively investigate causes at three levels including genetic and causal epidemiological risk factors, and brain cell types; 3) develop a novel prediction algorithm for treatment outcomes stratified by patient subgroups. SUBTREAT will illuminate the causes of MDD subtypes and the principal patterns of how subtypes contribute to differential long-term treatment outcomes. SUBTREAT findings will promote targeted drug development and treatment optimization for patient subgroups to achieve precision psychiatry.

Mots-clés : major depressive disorder,heterogeneity,treatment outcome,subtype,genetics,cell type,prediction,machine learning
Projet ERC : InternalFortress (Horizon Europe, appel 2023, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Study of the Human Past
Entité participante : Université norvégienne de sciences et de technologie — Pays : Norvège — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1426851.0 €

Against the prevailing view that freedom of movement lowered internal barriers to movement while raising walls against outsiders to create a ‘fortress Europe,’ this project investigates how the introduction of freedom of movement may have strengthened national political authority over European migration within the member states of the European Economic Community (EEC). InternalFortress suggests that as governments gradually lifted entry restrictions across the EEC, they also built out new internal administrative machinery to insert ‘Community migrants’ into key areas of social and economic life, placing migrants from outside the bloc at a disadvantage within local communities. The project explores this hypothesis in three key areas: social security, skill development, and union participation. The PI will lead a team of two PhD researchers and one postdoc to deploy a methodologically innovative multi-layered research program that analyses the interplay between national, European, and international institutions, as well as the private NGO networks that flowed between those formal frameworks. In contrast to previous histories of freedom of movement, which explain policy outcomes leading up to today’s regime of European citizenship, InternalFortress makes an important interpretive innovation by focusing squarely on the early process of transition from the 1950s to the 1970s. The project will investigate how the improvised nature of early integration created gaps and tensions that were consolidated in the 1970s as national and regional migration policies settled into more rigid patterns. InternalFortress suggests that policies behind the border matter as much as policies at the border for understanding the acrimonious debates around European migration that continue through the present.

Mots-clés : european integration,multi layered governance
Projet ERC : SPEGEOCHERT (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Study of the Human Past
Entité participante : Université de Barcelone — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1500000.0 €

In Palaeolithic archaeology, steep mountain ranges have been perceived as geographical barriers, impeding human mobility from the territories that flank them on both sides. This is the case of the Pyrenean mountain chain, a key area for studying mobility and territoriality of prehistoric hunter-gatherers, especially during the last glaciation (c. 120.000 – 11.000 BP), due to its geographic location and harsh environmental conditions. The Pyrenees were until recently considered by archaeologists as a complete hindrance to human mobility and the only possibility, it was thought, was through the less abrupt extremes. However, in my earlier work I was able to suggest that humans may have crossed over the mountains by several alternative itineraries, proposing that the classic view is most probably wrong. These works were based on a new approach to the analysis of prehistoric chert tools using geochemical methods and it is in this context that the SPEGEOCHERT project aims to investigate. The project will innovatively employ an array of interdisciplinary methods to explore the possible routeways humans followed through the Pyrenees to overcome the rough milieu. This pioneering approach will be based on portable, low-cost, non-destructive, fast and accurate techniques consisting on the use of reflectance spectroscopy combined with geochemistry and the application of multi-variate statistics and GIS to develop predictive modelling. Through the analysis of large series of materials directly at the museums, the SPEGEOCHERT project will create a novel data corpus with accurate information related to the geological chert sources exploited by Palaeolithic groups. The results obtained in this project will not only significantly broaden our knowledge on human adaptations to harsh ecological conditions and the understanding of mobility through mountains, but will also radically change the archaeological approach to the analysis of lithic raw materials.

Mots-clés : chert procurement,human mobility in mountain environments,upper palaeolithic
Projet ERC : SYNAPS (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Physical Sciences and Engineering
Panel : Synthetic Chemistry and Materials
Entité participante : Université de Barcelone — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : PI
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1688047.0 €

The brain is a complex network of inter-connected neurons that communicate through synapses. SYNAPS aims to for the first time mimic such synapses using liposomes as artificial cells, and visible light to trigger a signal from a ‘sender’- to a ‘receiver’-liposome. Mimicking such communication processes will help with understanding how complex natural emergent properties arise, and could ultimately allow for the construction of a chemical computer. SYNAPS will excel beyond the state-of-the-art by maintaining chemical isolation between liposome interiors, ensuring local, time-bound communication between connected liposomes, and using light as an external stimulus and fuel. These concepts are essential to construct artificial tissues that can communicate on an individual liposome-to-liposome basis, in contrast to the state-of-the-art where communication generally occurs with the bulk solution. To achieve this, a messenger compound will be locally photosynthesised through transmembrane electron transfer by porphyrin dimers that portray a charge-transfer excited state. The liposomes will be organised into a synaptic cleft through the use of synthetic complementary clustering compounds that provide stable adhesion between sender and receiver liposomes. The messenger compound will be recognised by reversible and selective membrane-spanning receptors in the receiver liposome, that will output the signal through fluorescence. In addition, a reaction cascade network will be constructed involving the messenger to produce an artificial action potential, that is, a transient peak in the concentration of the messenger, ensuring a time-bound dissipative signal. Altogether, SYNAPS will provide advances in systems chemistry by providing a nanoscale platform for communication between chemically isolated systems, but also results that are useful for applications such as light-to-chemical energy conversion, chemical sensing and smart drug-delivery.

Mots-clés : photochemistry,photocatalysis,systems chemistry,biomimetics,supramolecular chemistry,liposomes
Projet ERC : PalaeOrigins (Horizon Europe, appel 2021, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Study of the Human Past
Entité participante : Université de Barcelone — Pays : Espagne — Rôle : Partner
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 35000.0 €

The transition from foraging to farming represents one of the most transcendental shifts in the history of humanity. Decades of research in southwest Asia have shown that this process culminated with the development of Neolithic agricultural systems c. 10 ka cal. BP. Yet, how it started, that is, how hunter-gatherers became, for the first time, engaged with the management of plants, continues to be largely undetermined. Palaeorigins aims to fill this major gap of knowledge. Benefiting from the exceptional Epipalaeolithic archaeobotanical materials that are now available (c. 23-11 ka cal. BP), it will ask: To what extent were Epipalaeolithic hunter-gatherers managing the land and the plant resources around them? Did climatic factors trigger plant resource intensification, or were cultural dynamics, like the need for specific foodstuffs, that first motivated plant-food production? To achieve such an ambitious aim PalaeOrigins will pioneer a holistic and high-resolution approach to study the plant-based subsistence. It will use a unique combination of traditional and most novel archaeobotanical materials, state-of-the-art stable isotope analyses, computational science, and theoretical models to: 1) Reconstruct the distribution and availability of plant resources during the environmental shifts of the late Pleistocene and the early Holocene; 2) Determine how plant procurement strategies, land uses and management activities articulated during the Epipalaeolithic period; and 3) Define hunter-gatherers' food culture, assessing their plant-food selection, processing and consumption practices. Taken together, PalaeOrigins will move beyond traditional Neolithic-centred paradigms to explain the origins of plant-food production. It will open up new research horizons, merging science and theory, to elucidate the nature of the human-environment interactions that paved the way to agriculture, and ultimately, changed the course of our history.

Mots-clés : epipalaeolithic,archaeobotany,human niche construction,plant domestication,climate change,archaeology of food,southwest asia,stable isotope analyses,computer modelling
Projet ERC : MemoryLane (Horizon Europe, appel 2024, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : The Human Mind and Its Compl exity
Entité participante : Université de Vienne — Pays : Autriche — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : Uni Wien
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1499755.0 €

The fact that the brain is influenced by the microorganisms that make up the gut microbiome substantially widens the scope of how we need to view human neurocognition and behaviour. However, a clear understanding of underlying mechanisms is scant and mainly grounded in animal work. This proposal aims at major contributions towards overcoming these limitations. The core hypothesis is that gut bacteria are key in shaping neural plasticity, and in this way, influence human memory abilities. Changes in gut microbial signalling may contribute to altered neurocognition in individuals who are genetically predisposed to Alzheimer’s disease. MemoryLane’s results will thus also have important implications for an ageing society. To systematically test the role of gut bacteria in neural plasticity, I will take a strong, theory-driven cognitive neuroscience approach. Under my lead, my research team will perform a fine-grained analysis of hippocampus-dependent memory and plasticity, using cognitive-behavioural testing and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in healthy adults with and without a genetic risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease. Concomitant measures of gut microbial community structure will be essential. To establish causality, we will shape hippocampus-dependent plasticity and memory by modulating the gut microbiome with probiotic bacteria in a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. This interdisciplinary approach will answer whether gut bacteria play a role in human neurocognition. Results will transform the way we understand memory processes, building translational bridges to prior animal and future clinical work. The insights gained may serve as a blueprint for pushing human gut-brain research to the next level, paving the way for potential interventions to alleviate the detrimental effects of altered gut-brain dynamics in genetic risk, older age, and disease.

Mots-clés : human cognitive neuroscience,functional magnetic resonance imaging fmri,memory,gut brain axis
Projet ERC : MULTIREP (Horizon Europe, appel 2022, Starting grants)
Domaine scientifique : Social Sciences and Humanities
Panel : Institutions, Governance and Legal Systems
Entité participante : Université de Vienne — Pays : Autriche — Rôle : PI
Acronyme de l'entité : Uni Wien
Type d'entité : Enseignement supérieur ou secondaire
Financement ERC de l'entité : 1498727.0 €

Political representation - the relationship between politicians and citizens - is at the core of democracy's legitimacy and functioning. Most empirical research in political science studies two aspects of representation: 1) whether politicians' substantive policy preferences match those of the citizenry, or 2) whether representatives are "like" their constituents in terms of descriptive characteristics (e.g. gender or race). However, recent research in political theory has highlighted additional dimensions of the citizen-politician relationship (e.g. whether citizens identify with politicians they have not voted for, how politicians relate to their party) and argued that citizens' own views of how they want to be represented should be the starting point for studying representation. Yet, these insight have barely affected how representation is studied in quantitative political science, suggesting that we may currently neglect important aspects of representation. MULTIREP aims to ascertain whether citizens care about further dimensions of representation and develop the methodological tools to study them, thereby fundamentally reshaping the scope and depth of empirical research in the field. First, it uses in-depth citizen interviews and survey-experimental techniques to determine how people think about representation and which dimensions are most important to them. Second, for the most important dimensions, it develops novel quantitative survey and text-analytical tools to measure citizens' preferences and politicians' behavior. Third, it advances and operationalizes normative standards to assess the quality of representation on these dimensions on the basis of empirical data. Thereby, MULTIREP will enable an alternative research agenda on the citizen-politician relationship that takes a broader perspective. Given citizens' declining trust in democratic politics, we cannot afford to maintain an incomplete picture of what it means for citizens to feel "represented".

Mots-clés : political representation political theory quantitative text models survey methods