Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Quasistatic and Dynamic Evolution Problems in Plasticity and Fracture (QUADYNEVOPRO)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Mathematical foundations
Countries involved: Italy
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-03-01
End date: 2017-02-28
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 968500.0
EU funding (EUR): 968500.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

This research project deals with nonlinear evolution problems that arise in the study of the inelastic behaviour of solids, in particular in plasticity and fracture. The project will focus on selected problems, grouped into three main topics, namely: 1. Plasticity with hardening and softening, 2. Quasistatic crack growth, 3. Dynamic fracture mechanics. The analysis of the models of these mechanical problems leads to deep mathematical questions originated by two common features: the energies are not convex and the solutions exhibit discontinuities both with respect to space and time. In addition, plasticity problems often lead to concentration of the strains, whose mathematical description requires singular measures. Most of these problems have a variational structure and are governed by partial differential equations. Therefore, the construction of consistent models and their analysis need advanced mathematical tools from the calculus of variations, from measure theory and geometric measure theory, and also from the theory of nonlinear elliptic and parabolic partial differential equations. The models of dynamic crack growth considered in the project also need results from the theory of linear hyperbolic equations. Our goal is to develop new mathematical tools in these areas for the study of the selected problems. Quasistatic evolution problems in plasticity with hardening and softening will be studied through a vanishing viscosity approach, that has been successfully used by the P.I. in the study of the Cam-Clay model in soil mechanics. Quasistatic models of crack growth will be developed under different assumptions on the elastic response of the material and on the mechanisms of crack formation. For the problem of crack growth in the dynamic regime our aim is to develop a model that predicts the crack path as well as the time evolution of the crack along its path, taking into account all inertial effects.

Keywords: free discontinuity problems,rate independent processes,quasistatic evolution problems,functions with bounded deformation
Spectroscopy, Quantum Dynamics and Electroweak Parity Violation in Chiral Molecules (SPEQUACHIRAL2)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Physical and Analytical Chemical sciences
Countries involved: Switzerland
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2011-12-01
End date: 2015-11-30
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1579600.0
EU funding (EUR): 1579600.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

The PI and his group have in theoretical and preparatory experimental efforts approached one of the most fundamental questions of molecular physics, concerning the role of parity violation in chiral molecules, with consequences for physical stereochemistry. The traditional point of view assigns exactly equal ground state energies to the enantiomers of chiral molecules. However, with the discovery of parity violation in physics we expect a small “parity violating” energy difference D, corresponding to an in principle measurable reaction enthalpy. Because D is expected typically in the subfemto eV range these energies were in the past considered to be immeasurably small. Recent theoretical and experimental progress initiated by our group has led to order of magnitude larger predicted values for D and has also made rovibrational line assignment of optical spectra of chiral molecules possible (Quack, Stohner, Willeke, Ann. Revs. Phys. Chem. 2008). Thus the outlook to carry out successful experiments on D is now good, following a scheme previously published by us. The present proposal describes in detail several logical steps for these experiments. 1. Theoretical analysis and high resolution spectroscopy of selected chiral molecules. 2. Quantum tunneling dynamics from spectroscopy to identify appropriate quantum states for the experiment. 3. Preparation of superposition states of otherwise stable R and S enantiomer quantum levels to generate “parity isomer” states (never before prepared) 4. Spectroscopic observation of the time dependent change of the parity isomer spectra resulting in a first determination of the parity violating D in chiral molecules. We also discuss the feasibility and the outlook to gain fundamentally new knowledge.

Keywords: molecular chirality,molecular parity violation,molecular quantum dynamics,fundamental symmetries and conservation laws
Critical State Soil Mechanics Revisited: Fabric Effects (SOMEF)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Products and process engineering
Countries involved: Greece,France,France
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-03-01
End date: 2018-02-28
Duration (months): 72.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1924000.0
EU funding (EUR): 1924000.0
Participants: 4
Project status: CLOSED

The theory of Critical State Soil Mechanics (CSSM) has become a paradigm within the framework of which elastoplastic soil constitutive models have been developed for the last 50 years. The present project will constructively challenge this paradigm from a missing fundamental perspective, namely the effect of soil fabric on the premises of CSSM. The current CSSM postulates that at critical state the stress and void ratios reach critical values with no reference to orientational aspects of the soil fabric, such as particles long axes, contact normals or void vectors statistical orientations. Thus, several soil mechanical response characteristics associated with fabric anisotropy cannot be adequately or even correctly described within the existing theory. The hypothesis that an evolving soil fabric tensor must also acquire a critical value for critical state to occur will be investigated by theoretical, numerical and experimental means, including continuum and discrete elements methods (DEM) of analysis for cohesive and cohesionless soils, X-ray Computed Tomography studies on real soil samples, and triaxial, biaxial and hollow cylinder experiments. The results of this investigation will be used to propose a new enhanced CSSM theory with fabric playing a distinct role. Particular tasks will include the derivation of an objective rate equation of evolution of the fabric tensor, the formulation of classes of constitutive models for sands and clays within the new fabric-enhanced framework of CSSM, and the Finite Elements analysis of selected geomechanics boundary value problems illustrating the effect of soil fabric by comparing the results with and without fabric effects. Successful completion of this project will change the way Soil Mechanics is taught at Universities and applied in advanced analysis of geomechanics problems, a field of increasing social impact in regards to hazard mitigations related to earthquakes and landslides.

Keywords: plasticity,soil mechanics,constitutive models,anisotropy,critical state,fabric
Chemical and photochemical dynamics of reactions in solution (CAPRI)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Physical and Analytical Chemical sciences
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-02-01
End date: 2017-01-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2666684.0
EU funding (EUR): 2666684.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Ultrafast laser methods will be employed to examine the dynamics of chemical and photochemical reactions in liquid solutions. By contrasting the solution phase dynamics with those observed for isolated collisions in the gas phase, the fundamental role of solvent on chemical pathways will be explored at a molecular level. The experimental studies will be complemented by computational simulations that explicitly include treatment of the effects of solvent on reaction energy pathways and reactant and product motions. The research addresses a major challenge in Chemistry to understand the role of solvent on the mechanisms of chemical reactions. Questions that will be examined include how the solvent modifies reaction barriers and other regions of the reaction potential energy surface (PESs), alters the couplings between PESs, most importantly at conical intersections between electronic states, influences and constrains the dynamical stereochemistry of passage through transition states, and dissipates excess product energy. The experimental strategy will be to obtain absorption spectra of transient species with lifetimes of ~100 fs – 1000 ps using broad bandwidth light sources in the infrared, visible and ultraviolet regions. Time-evolutions of such spectra reveal the formation and decay of short-lived species that might be highly reactive radicals or internally (vibrationally and electronically) excited molecules. The transient species decay by reaction or energy loss to the solvent. Statistical mechanical theories of reactions in solution treat such processes using linear response theory, but the experimental data will challenge this paradigm by seeking evidence for breakdown of the linear response interaction of solvent and solute on short timescales because of microscopic chemical dynamics that perturb the solvent structure. The work will build on our pioneering experiments at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory that prove the feasilbility of the methods.

Keywords: ultrafast condensed phase chemical dynamics
Adaptive nanostructures in next generation metallic materials: Converting mechanically unstable structures into smart engineering alloys (SMARTMET)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Materials and Synthesis
Countries involved: Germany
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-02-01
End date: 2017-01-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2920000.0
EU funding (EUR): 2920000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

The design of advanced high strength and damage tolerant metallic materials for energy, mobility, and health applications forms the engineering and manufacturing backbone of Europe's industry. Examples are creep-resistant Ni-alloys in power plants and plane turbines; ultrahigh strength steels, Al- and Mg-alloys for light-weight mobility and aerospace design; or Ti-implants in aging societies. Since the Bronze Age the design of metallic alloys rooted in trial and error, owing to the complexity of the physical and chemical mechanisms involved and the engineering conditions imposed during manufacturing. This traditional approach has two shortcomings. First, current alloys are not developed via systematic design rules but via empirical methods. This approach is time consuming and inefficient. Second, the increase in strength via traditional hardening mechanisms always causes a dramatic decrease in ductility, i.e., making the material brittle and susceptible to failure. SMARTMET aims at solving this inverse strength-ductility problem: The joint use of advanced synthesis and atomic characterization (expertise of PI) together with ab initio modeling (expertise of Co-PI) opens a new path to the design of next generation metallic alloys. The objective is to use these methods to identify and utilize strengthening mechanisms that allow to overcome the inverse relationship between strength and ductility. The key idea is to incorporate phases into alloys that are close or beyond their mechanical and thermodynamic stability limit. They undergo transformations under load acting as self-organized repair mechanism. SMARTMET contains risks and gains: (i) Mechanical stability through unstable phases includes the risk of material weakening but it may break the inverse strength-ductility principle. (ii) New metallurgical alloys (PI) designed via quantum mechanics (Co-PI) is risky owing to the complexity of metallic nanostructures but allows alloy tailoring based on first principles.

Keywords: alloy design,metallurgical engineering,high strength alloy,inverse strength-ductility problem,mechanical property,microstructure,simulation,electron microscopy,metallurgical process
Frontiers for multi-scale computational fluid dynamics (ELBM)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Products and process engineering
Countries involved: Switzerland
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-01-01
End date: 2016-12-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1656800.0
EU funding (EUR): 1656800.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Computational fluid dynamics remains challenged with the complexity of fluid motion on all scales from atmospheric phenomena down to flows in micro- and nano-devices. The lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) has been conceived to replace the conventional methods of computational fluid dynamics. Due to its computational efficiency and simplicity in handling complex geometries, LBM was only partly successful in simulating incompressible flows. However, it faced stiff challenges in other domains of fluid dynamics due to low isotropy of the lattice and lack of stability. Recently, a new generation of entropic lattice Boltzmann models (ELBM) restored second law of thermodynamics in the lattice Boltzmann kinetics and made lattice Boltzmann unconditionally stable. Armed with new higher-order entropic lattices, ELBM project will open up high Reynolds number flows, compressible flows, multi-phase and micro flows and other domains for fast and efficient simulations. New ELBM models retain all the advantages of LBM in terms of efficiency, parallelism, and handling of complex geometries. This project will serve as unique source of largest possible benchmark simulations and engineering applications in fluid dynamics; thus challenging or even replacing the most advanced methods of computational fluid dynamics as well as particle methods in micro flows.

Keywords: lattice boltzmann method turbulence combustion
Multiscale Thermal Management of Computing Systems (MULTITHERMAN)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Computer science and informatics
Countries involved: Italy
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-04-01
End date: 2018-03-31
Duration (months): 72.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2483397.0
EU funding (EUR): 2483397.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

As computing platforms evolve into heterogeneous, 3D-integrated many-cores, increasing performance per unit area (or volume) comes unavoidably with growing power density, which becomes heat, leading to degradation, acceleration of chip aging and increase in cooling costs. Thermal dissipation is difficult to control at the micro-scale, where typically spatial and temporal power gradients are orders-of-magnitude higher than at the macro-scale. MultiThermMan will move beyond the unsustainable worst-case design practices adopted in traditional thermal planning and reactive thermal management. We propose to integrate thermal-aware platform design, thermal control with workload management and shaping in a distributed, multi-scale strategy. This would enable to dynamically adjust the operating mode and active cooling control of each component in complex computing platforms to achieve the highest performance compatible with temperature constraints. The development of a synergistic performance, power and thermal management strategy requires major breakthroughs in several areas, namely architectures, run-time systems, resource management middleware, code optimization tools and programming models. To meet this challenge, MultiThermMan will bring together concepts and techniques from several disciplines: computer architecture and circuits, control theory, combinatorial and continuous optimization. statistical model-building and artificial intelligence. Results will be demonstrated on physical and virtual prototypes, proving practical applicability and relevance for industrial applications.

Keywords: thermal management
Coupled and Competing Instabilities in Complex Oxides (CCICO)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Condensed matter physics
Countries involved: Switzerland
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-03-01
End date: 2017-02-28
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1999999.6
EU funding (EUR): 1999999.6
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

The CCICO project will build a comprehensive understanding of how proximity to previously unexplored combinations of instabilities, as well as previously unidentified types of ordering, manifest in novel behaviors, and will develop design guidelines for practical realization of new materials with such behaviors. Taking transition-metal oxides as our model systems, we will develop and apply first-principles electronic structure theory methods to explore an extensive array of new combinations of orderings, with a focus on interactions between the electronic -- Jahn-Teller, orbital and charge -- and structural -- rotations, ferroelectric and other distortions -- degrees of freedom. Our goal is to spawn a new field of study based on a novel combination of orderings in the same way that the field of multiferroics was jump-started ten years ago by our work understanding the coexistence of ferroelectricity and magnetism. Conversely, we will apply the computational tools developed in our history of studying multiferroics, particularly descriptions of proximity to structural and magnetic phase transitions, to characterizing observed behaviors such as exotic superconductivity in existing materials. In the process we will search for and characterize elusive or poorly characterized forms of order in solids, with a focus on ferrotoroidicity and emergent local dipoles. A final application is to create designer materials for solid-state experiments relevant to high-energy physics and cosmology. Promising compounds that are amenable to bulk synthesis will be made in our new oxide single-crystal growth laboratory; materials that require thin-film routes will be pursued in collaboration with colleagues.

Keywords: mutliferroics strongly correlated materials density functional theory
Deciphering River Flood Change (FLOODCHANGE)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Earth system science
Countries involved: Austria
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-04-01
End date: 2017-03-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2263565.0
EU funding (EUR): 2263565.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Many major and devastating floods have occurred around the world recently. Their number and magnitude seems to have increased but such changes are not clear. More surprisingly, the exact causes of changes remain a mystery. Although, drivers such as climate and land use change are known to play a critical role, their complex interactions in flood generation have not been disentangled. The main objectives of this project are to understand how changes in land use and climate translate into changes in river floods, what are the factors controlling this relationship and what are the uncertainties involved. We decipher the relationship between changes in floods and their drivers by analysing the processes separately for different flood types such as flash floods, rain-on-snow floods and large scale synoptic floods. We then use data from catchments in transects across Europe to build a probabilistic flood-change model that explicitly describes the change mechanisms. The model is unconventional as it does not take a reductionist approach but conceptualises the dominant flood change processes at the catchment scale. We test the model on long high-quality flood data series. We use the model as well as the temporal and spatial data variability to quantify the sensitivity of floods to climate and land use change and estimate the uncertainties involved. The data are already available to me or will be made available through my excellent contacts in Europe. For the first time, it will be possible to systematise the effects of land use and climate on floods which will provide a vital step towards predicting how floods will change in the future.
A large-area detector for precision time-of-flight measurements (TORCH)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Fundamental constituents of matter
Countries involved: United Kingdom,Switzerland,United Kingdom,United Kingdom
Call:  (ERC-2011-ADG_20110209, 2011)
Start date: 2012-06-01
End date: 2017-05-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2696243.0
EU funding (EUR): 2696243.0
Participants: 4
Project status: CLOSED

We propose to construct and prototype an innovative high-precision time-of-flight system suitable for large areas, up to tens of square metres. The TORCH (Time Of internally Reflected CHerenkov light) detector provides a time-of-flight measurement from the imaging of photons emitted in a 1 cm thick quartz radiator, based on the Cherenkov principle. The photons propagate by total internal reflection to the edge of the quartz plane and are then focused onto an array of Micro-Channel Plate (MCP) photon detectors at the periphery of the detector. A timing resolution of 15 ps per particle can be achieved over a flight distance of 10 m. This will allow particle identification in the challenging intermediate momentum region, up to 20 GeV/c. The TORCH detector is highly compact, and the technique will have wide-ranging use in particle and nuclear physics experiments, and especially those where space is at a premium. The work involves a number of ground-breaking and challenging techniques. We will develop ultra-fast Micro-Channel Plate (MCP) photon detectors that can survive for several years in high radiation environments. The MCPs will be procured in industry to our specification with customized active area and granularity. We will also develop state-of-the-art electronics to read out the MCPs with picosecond precision. Photon imaging will be achieved with milliradian resolution over the large optical volume of the TORCH. Whilst the TORCH detector has its primary application in the field of particle physics, the MCP and optical developments will also have applications in space physics, nuclear physics, as well as medical imaging.

Keywords: picosecond time of flight measurement. cherenkov light. microchannel plate photon detectors.