Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
PURA - a chemical- free water purification and disinfection solution. (PURA)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Industrial Leadership
Programme: Innovation in SMEs
Action type: SME instrument
Countries involved: Italy
Call: SME instrument (H2020-SMEInst-2018-2020-1, 2019)
Start date: 2020-01-01
End date: 2020-04-30
Duration (months): 4.0
Total project cost (EUR): 71429.0
EU funding (EUR): 50000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Despite safe drinking water being essential for human health, welfare and productivity, there are still 2.1 billion people (29% of the global population) who do not have access to a safely managed drinking source. According to the European Commission, water scarcity affects 11% of the EU population with an estimation of 14 deaths per day in Europe as a result of water consumption, poor hygiene and ineffective sanitation process. This is because water collected in bottles, tanks or cans, for later use, storage or distribution tends to accumulate bacteria from the surrounding environment. This is known as last-mile contamination and it can cause severe gastroenteritis and diarrhoea. In addition, lack of access also forces people to buy bottle water. Thus, improving access to safe water would help just in EU a saving of more than €600 million per year. Based on these figures, Solaris has developed “PURA”, a solution based on a natural ionizing resin. This resin purifies water and eliminates bacteria and fungi. It is chemical-free and very easy to use, as you only need to introduce a small quantity of the resin for it to be effective. Our certified tests have shown that after a maximum of 30 minutes the resin can remove all traces of salmonella and E.coli and significantly reduce traces of Legionella. In order for PURA to change the lives of millions of people, we plan to further analyse its effectiveness in different environments. Tests will be aligned to legal requirements for water treatment technologies and we will begin introducing our technology to key potential customers such as: 1) large-scale distributions that are involved in the distribution of tanks, water dispensers, dehumidifiers, etc interested to provide an innovative, efficient and cost-efficient production to their end users; 2) governmental organization and 3) NGOs who have the common goal to provide safe water to all. We estimate that the PURA could reach €117M in revenue by 2026.

Keywords: water,water purification,chemical free,water disinfection,potable water,water contamination
Active Sensation In Motor-control Of Flies (ASIMOF)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Spreading excellence and widening participation
Programme: Widening participation and spreading excellence
Theme: Other Widening
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Countries involved: Portugal
Call: Widening Fellowships (H2020-WF-02-2019, 2019)
Start date: 2020-11-01
End date: 2022-10-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 147815.04
EU funding (EUR): 147815.04
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

All animals need to solve some key tasks in order to survive: they need to find food, mates, and avoid threats. To do this they have evolved sensory systems of various modalities, to obtain relevant information from their environment. However, sensation does not happen in isolation: in order to respond to salient environmental cues, sensory information needs to be coupled to movement, and thus motor systems. Furthermore, sensation itself is an active process: animals sense environment by moving in it. This movement in space (whether eyes scanning the environment, or the animal itself moving through it) sets the reference frame for sensory information. We have developed a virtual reality arena that allows online tracking of the fly locomotion, and control of their visual environment. When exploring their environment Drosophila locomotion consists of straight runs and fast saccadic turns. However, when sensing a directional aversive cue (the heated wall of the arena) the flies perform a fast, evasive saccadic turn directly away from it. In order to do this optimally, they need to integrate their self-motion with the aversive stimulus, by using the former as a reference frame for the latter, and compute the angle of the evasive maneuvre. We will use this active sensation behaviour (with components of self-motion, spatially localized sensory signal, and a directional motor response) as a model for how the fly brain responds to sensory stimuli in space. We will first assess the behavioural capacities of the flies in this context, and whether their behaviour changes as a function of experience. We will identify underlying visuomotor pathways by functional imaging of targeted neurons while the flies are performing the behaviour in a virtual reality environment, and by Electron Microcopy based reconstruction of neuronal connectivity. Finally, we will determine the computations that the underlying circuits are performing by combination of functional imaging and modelling.

Keywords: sensorimotor integration,navigation,connectomics,imaging,virtual reality
Effective Field Theory predictions for Higgs production processes at the Large Hadron Collider (HEFTinLOOPS)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie-Sklodowska-Curie Actions
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Individual Fellowships (IF)-Standard European Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Physics
Countries involved: Switzerland
Call: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF-EF) (H2020-MSCA-IF-2015, 2015)
Start date: 2017-09-01
End date: 2019-08-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 175419.6
EU funding (EUR): 175419.6
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

The first run of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the European Centre for Nuclear Research (CERN) has brought the discovery of the Higgs boson, a result of hard work by thousands of experimental and theoretical physicists. The Higgs boson was the final piece of the Standard Model (SM), a theory describing elementary particles and their interactions. The current run of the LHC at higher energy aims to thoroughly explore the interactions of the Higgs boson and search for deviations from the SM predictions. A model-independent framework to organise and parametrise deviations from the SM is that of Effective Field Theory (EFT), in which higher-dimension operators modify the interactions of the SM particles. Further work is needed to consistently examine all Higgs production channels within the EFT and in the most accurate way possible, a topic which the proposed work aims to address. In particular, the applicant aims to study a class of Higgs production processes starting at leading order with one loop, the so-called loop-induced processes, including all relevant dimension-6 operators and providing accurate predictions for the differential observables. Additionally, tree-level processes that have not been explored so far will be studied to next-to-leading order in QCD. The project will result in a public Monte Carlo implementation, which combined with the experimental measurements will be used to set constraints on the EFT operators in the last part of the project. The project meets important needs in particle physics, especially with the LHC collecting more data in the coming years. The applicant's expertise in Monte Carlo generators and Higgs physics are crucial for the completion of the proposed project, while CERN will offer an ideal environment for the researcher to strengthen ties with the experimental physicists and maintain important global collaborations, in line with the European scientific excellence commitment.

Keywords: large hadron collider,higgs boson,new physics effects,effective field theory,loop induced processes,accurate predictions,constraints on dimension 6 operators
Expert in selective/genetic breeding (OF vacancy)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Industrial Leadership
Programme: Innovation in SMEs
Action type: Coordination and support actions
Countries involved: Portugal
Call: European SME innovation Associate - pilot (H2020-INNOSUP-02-2016, 2016)
Start date: 2017-09-01
End date: 2018-08-31
Duration (months): 12.0
Total project cost (EUR): 165000.0
EU funding (EUR): 165000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Oceano Fresco (OF) is a private innovative science-based company, in Portugal, that develops and produces bivalves’ varieties with superior performance for shellfish farmers at a competitive cost, respecting environmental sustainability and ensuring consumer safety. Oceano Fresco is applying for H2020 SME Innovation Associate to have the opportunity to recruit highly qualified specialists on the international job market (due to absence or unaffordability in national job market), whose knowledge will be crucial to open up opportunities for innovation and significant growth for the enterprise in the company in a near future. The experienced associate will objectively contribute to the development of a radical and innovative seletive/genetic breeding program for bivalves that does not exist in OF. In fact, worldwide this type of breeding plan is already performed on plants and fish, but no company is conducting it on bivalves. Thus, the innovative associate (a leading researcher) should be able to combine the currently experience of OF’s core team in bivalves with the knowledge/experience of other species to create the first seletive/genetic breeding program for clams in the world. This program will contribute to enhance clam market value, that currently, moves about €3000 millions per year. An innovative and competitive selective/genetic breeding program will allow Oceano Fresco (OF) responds assertively and competitively to worldwide client needs in order to become, in a near future, a reference leader for sector agents, as already envisaged by present company’s innovation strategy.

Keywords: leading researcher,breeding,bivalves
COronavirus Vulnerabilities and INFOrmation dynamics Research and Modelling (COVINFORM)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Societal Challenges
Programme: Health, demographic change and wellbeing
Theme: Understanding health, wellbeing and disease
Action type: Research and Innovation actions
Countries involved: Austria,Spain,Italy,Italy,Israel,Germany,Ireland,Belgium,Sweden,Romania,Greece,United Kingdom,United Kingdom,United Kingdom,Portugal
Call: Behavioural, social and economic impacts of the outbreak response (H2020-SC1-PHE-CORONAVIRUS-2020-2-RTD, 2020)
Start date: 2020-11-01
End date: 2023-10-31
Duration (months): 36.0
Total project cost (EUR): 4941656.25
EU funding (EUR): 4941656.0
Participants: 17
Project status: SIGNED

Policymakers and public health experts unanimously recognise the disproportionate impacts of COVID-19 on vulnerable persons: even in countries with well-developed responses, the outbreak and its repercussions imperil the basic well-being of social groups whose livelihoods are already precarious, while the uneven distribution of suffering threatens to aggravate inequality and division. One complicating factor here is the intersectional nature of health and socioeconomic vulnerabilities. Another is the complexity of risk in contemporary socioecological systems. The COVINFORM project will draw upon intersectionality theory and complex systems analysis in an interdisciplinary critique of COVID-19 responses on the levels of government, public health, community, and information and communications. The project will conduct research on three levels: 1) on an EU27 MS plus UK level, quantitative secondary data will be analysed and models will be developed; 2) Within 15 target countries, documentary sources on the national level and in at least one local community per country will be analysed; 3) in 10 target communities, primary empirical research will be conducted, utilising both classical and innovative quantitative and qualitative methods (e.g. visual ethnography, participatory ethnography, and automated analysis of short video testimonials). Promising practices will be evaluated in target communities through case studies spanning diverse disciplines (social epidemiology, the economics of unpaid labour, the sociology of migration, etc.) and vulnerable populations (COVID-19 patients, precarious families, migrating health care workers, etc.). The project will culminate in the development of an online portal and visual toolkit for stakeholders in government, public health, and civil society integrating data streams, indices and indicators, maps, models, primary research and case study findings, empirically grounded policy guidance, and creative assessment tools.

Keywords: intersectionality,misinformation,emergency medicine,migration studies,anthropology,epidemiology,virology,gender studies,economics,risk communication,crisis management,journalism
Transposable element Impacts on Gene Expression and Regulation (TIGER)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie-Sklodowska-Curie Actions
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Individual Fellowships (IF)-Standard European Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Life Sciences
Countries involved: France
Call: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF-EF) (H2020-MSCA-IF-2014, 2014)
Start date: 2015-10-19
End date: 2017-10-18
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 185076.0
EU funding (EUR): 185076.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Transposable elements (TEs) are DNA sequences that are able to spread within and between genomes. While transposition may lead to evident harmful effects, TEs can also positively impact the host genome by, for instance, donating intrinsic regulatory elements such as promoters. The main goal of this research project is to understand the regulatory changes that TEs engage within host genomes. While in mammals TE-derived promoters are often observed, only recently Drosophila TEs were described as potential platforms of gene regulatory networks, opening a new field for important discoveries. Since TEs are extremely active in fruit flies and Drosophila is found worldwide, TE copies that are population-specific are observed. Drosophila constitutes therefore a perfect model to study the impact of TEs in the host transcriptome. We hypothesize that Drosophila TEs are able to act as gene promoters and cause differential gene expression between wild-derived strains. Our first aim is to discover strain-specific TE-derived promoters involved in differential gene expression between Drosophila melanogaster populations by using a genome-wide high throughput sequencing method named RAMPAGE. In our second aim we will determine how histone modifications regulate TE-derived promoters by producing chromatin maps for each strain studied. The comparison of full sites (sites containing the insertion of a TE in one population) with empty sites (sites devoid of a TE insertion in another population) allow us to clearly demonstrate the impact and regulation of TE promoters.

Keywords: gene regulation,transposable elements,exaptation,comparative genomics,drosophila,plasticity,adaptation,genome wide high throughput sequencing
High-Dimensional Convexity, Isoperimetry and Concentration via a Riemannian Vantage Point (CONC-VIA-RIEMANN)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Mathematics
Panel description: All areas of mathematics, pure and applied, plus mathematical foundations of computer science, mathematical physics and statistics
Countries involved: Israel
Call: ERC Starting Grant (ERC-2014-STG, 2014)
Start date: 2015-10-01
End date: 2021-09-30
Duration (months): 72.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1194190.0
EU funding (EUR): 1194190.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

In recent years, the importance of superimposing the contribution of the measure to that of the metric, in determining the underlying space's (generalized Ricci) curvature, has been clarified in the works of Lott, Sturm, Villani and others, following the definition of Curvature-Dimension introduced by Bakry and Emery. We wish to systematically incorporate this important idea of considering the measure and metric in tandem, in the study of questions pertaining to isoperimetric and concentration properties of convex domains in high-dimensional Euclidean space, where a-priori there is only a trivial metric (Euclidean) and trivial measure (Lebesgue). The first step of enriching the class of uniform measures on convex domains to that of non-negatively curved ("log-concave") measures in Euclidean space has been very successfully implemented in the last decades, leading to substantial progress in our understanding of volumetric properties of convex domains, mostly regarding concentration of linear functionals. However, the potential advantages of altering the Euclidean metric into a more general Riemannian one or exploiting related Riemannian structures have not been systematically explored. Our main paradigm is that in order to progress in non-linear questions pertaining to concentration in Euclidean space, it is imperative to cast and study these problems in the more general Riemannian context. As witnessed by our own work over the last years, we expect that broadening the scope and incorporating tools from the Riemannian world will lead to significant progress in our understanding of the qualitative and quantitative structure of isoperimetric minimizers in the purely Euclidean setting. Such progress would have dramatic impact on long-standing fundamental conjectures regarding concentration of measure on high-dimensional convex domains, as well as other closely related fields such as Probability Theory, Learning Theory, Random Matrix Theory and Algorithmic Geometry.

Keywords: concentration inequalities,asymptotic geometric analysis,phenomena in high dimension,isoperimetric inequalities,functional inequalities,generalized ricci curvature,curvature dimension condition
Modeling Energy for Sustainable Development in Ethiopia (MEND)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie-Sklodowska-Curie Actions
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Individual Fellowships (IF)-Standard European Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Economic Sciences
Countries involved: Italy
Call: Individual Fellowships (H2020-MSCA-IF-2019, 2019)
Start date: 2020-11-15
End date: 2022-11-14
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 183473.28
EU funding (EUR): 183473.28
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Energy is key for economic development. Especially in the era of sustainable development, the source, the type, and the mix of energy are as important as access to energy. This is particularly important in least developed countries (LDCs) such as Ethiopia which heavily relies on traditional biomass energy sources. Barely a quarter of total households in Ethiopia use electricity as a source of light in their houses while 96% of the households depend on biomass for cooking fuel. This in turn contributes to indoor air pollution which causes more than 50,000 deaths annually and nearly 5% of the burden of disease in the country. Besides, the sources of electricity are least diversified. About 95% of electricity comes from hydro-power with thermal, geothermal, and wind sources contributing the rest. Yet, the country regards hydro-power electricity as one of its potential export item. For instance, in the year 2017/2018, electricity contributed to 3% of the total merchandise export earnings. On the other hand, however, petroleum products make up to 10-14% of the country’s spending on imports. As such, in Ethiopia, investment in energy transition has many implications for the economy (e.g. on total factor productivity, structural change, trade balance), the environment (e.g. deforestation and soil fertility), and human health (e.g. indoor air pollution). In light of this, the use of scientific studies on the energy-economy-environment inter-linkages will be paramount. However, the research in this subject is yet nascent in Ethiopia. The existing literature overwhelmingly focuses on the supply side of a specific energy source barely touching the interaction among energy sources, the interaction of energy with environment and economy, and the demand side. This project primarily intends to fill these appealing gaps, and examine the environment-energy-economy inter-linkages in Ethiopia using partial equilibrium energy model and an economy-wide general equilibrium model.

Keywords: energy,sustainable development,africa,ethiopia
Debt and Persistence of Financial Shocks (PERSISTDEBT)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Consolidator grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Individuals, Markets and Organisations
Panel description: Economics, finance and management
Countries involved: Spain,Denmark
Call: ERC Consolidator Grant (ERC-2014-CoG, 2014)
Start date: 2015-07-01
End date: 2021-12-31
Duration (months): 78.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1308676.0
EU funding (EUR): 1208676.0
Participants: 2
Project status: CLOSED

In 2007 the US and Europe were overwhelmed by a banking crisis, which was followed by a severe economic recession. Historical studies show that financial crises are followed by periods of substantially stronger contraction of aggregate output and employment than non-financial recessions. Those studies also point out that the best predictor of financial crises is an ex-ante strong credit boom which, after the beginning of the crisis, followed by negative overall credit growth. Lastly, financial crises take a long time until recovering the pre-crisis levels. Why are the effects of credit shocks so strong and persistent over time? Is this effect explained by costly household deleveraging? What is the effect of household debt on consumption, savings and employment? Are there any benefits of debt in crises? Do some effects of the financial crisis work through a reduction in credit supply to firms and projects with high innovative content and productivity (high overall return, but with high credit and liquidity risk for the lenders)? Or are the cleansing effects in financial crises concentrated on the less productive firms? Can macroprudential policies based on strict control of loan-to-value ratios stop the building up of excessive household debt? We plan to construct several new datasets to study these issues by merging information from different sources. For some issues, like the analysis of the effect of household debt on consumption and employment, we can take advantage of a natural experiment of randomized allocation of debt among individuals derived from the use of lotteries to allocate the rights to buy housing in Spain. In comparison to the existing literature, we can exploit the exogenous variation generated by these lotteries and some other combination of data (including exhaustive credit data) to obtain causal evidence and quantification on the interaction between debt, systemic risk, crises, and the new macroprudential policy.

Keywords: financial crises,systemic risk,credit,debt,balance sheet channel,macroprudential policy,innovation,debt overhang,loan evergreening,excessive risk taking,conflicts of interest,banking