Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Statistical Methods for Accurate Quantification of MicroRNA Expression via Small RNA Sequencing (miRAQEL)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Postdoctoral Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Life Sciences
Countries involved: Spain,United States
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2023 (HORIZON-MSCA-2023-PF-01, 2023)
Start date: 2025-01-01
End date: 2028-04-30
Duration (months): 40.0
Total project cost (EUR): 315332.8
EU funding (EUR): 315332.8
Participants: 4
Project status: SIGNED

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of highly conserved small non-coding RNAs that regulate the expression of most protein coding genes. MiRNAs have been extensively studied, not only to understand their molecular function but also due to their potential as therapeutic and diagnostic tools. Most current studies rely on small RNA sequencing (sRNA-seq), recently extended to single cells, because it allows to measure all miRNAs present in a sample even at low input amounts. However, state-of-the-art statistical analysis of sRNA-seq data is still performed using standard mRNA-seq software. This is inappropriate because miRNA counts violate several assumptions of these methods. In extreme cases, upregulated miRNAs will falsely seem down-/upregulated because of technical effects. Technical bias is even more severe in low input applications, e.g., single-cell, so decreasing the RNA input lowers quantification accuracy. By developing statistical methods specifically tailored to model sRNA-seq complexities, miRAQEL aims to dramatically improve the accuracy of miRNA quantification through sRNA-seq, contributing to solve challenges in the field. Appropriate statistical methodology is urgently needed to fully elucidate the role miRNAs play in many diseases and improve their biomarker potential. The fellow will receive specialized training in standard single-cell RNA-seq and statistical analysis of miRNA data from a leading research team in the field. In turn, he will bring his pipeline development and miRNA genomics expertise to implement and evaluate sRNA-seq modelling software using ground truth data and simulations. A placement will ensure transfer of this knowledge to an European start-up. The emerging unique skill set will provide him with a privileged interdisciplinary view that he can leverage to kick-start an independent academic career in the analysis of small RNA molecules at the single cell level, getting ahead in a field that is expected to develop in the coming years.

Keywords: microrna isomirs statistical modelling small rnas small rna sequencing srna seq benchmarking data normalisation differential expression analysis single cell small rna seq
Pulse Charging for Lithium Metal Solid-State Batteries (PulseLiSSBs)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Postdoctoral Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Information Science and Engineering
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2024 (HORIZON-MSCA-2024-PF-01, 2024)
Start date: 2026-09-01
End date: 2028-08-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 260347.92
EU funding (EUR): 260347.92
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Lithium metal solid-state batteries (LiSSBs) are promising candidates for next-generation batteries due to their high energy density and non-flammable nature. They hold promise for accelerating the storage of clean energy sources like tidal, wind, and solar energy, as well as advancing the development of electric vehicles. Pulsed current charging is expected to extend battery lifetime and enhance safety. Although some reports have pointed this out, the lack of comprehensive mechanistic understanding and electrochemical model development makes it difficult to draw scalable conclusions or determine the optimal frequency of pulse charging. The primary goal of this proposal, “Pulse Charging for Lithium Metal Solid-State Batteries (PulseLiSSBs)”, is to extend the lifetime of LiSSBs by optimizing the battery charging protocols. This requires first understanding the internal electrochemical mechanisms under pulse charging and studying the impact of pulsed current on the lithium metal anode interface, contact impedance, and dendrite growth through experiments and electrochemical modelling. Finally, by simulation, the optimized parameters for pulsed current frequency and duty cycle will be selected. PulseLiSSBs project will be executed by experienced researchers who will work closely with a supervisor with a strong background in battery mechanism analysis, electrochemical modelling, and charging strategies. The fellow will also benefit from the research team's experience in Denmark and Germany, where Denmark has a robust battery testing research group, and Germany has a strong team focused on battery mechanism analysis. The project aligns with the Horizon Europe mission and can contribute to the EU's 2050 Climate-neutrality Goals and the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals.

Keywords: battery,pulse charging,solid state battery,electrochemical modelling
Sustainable and Circular Footwear Training Program (SCARPA)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Doctoral Networks
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Information Science and Engineering
Countries involved: Belgium,Netherlands,Spain,Italy,Denmark,Austria,Germany
Call: MSCA Doctoral Networks 2024 (HORIZON-MSCA-2024-DN-01, 2024)
Start date: 2026-01-01
End date: 2029-12-31
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 4777668.36
EU funding (EUR): 4535978.4
Participants: 29
Project status: SIGNED

Worldwide consumption of footwear per year per person has increased from 1 pair of shoes in 1950 to over 3 currently. In 2022, approximately 23.9 billion pairs of shoes were produced globally. In the EU alone, it is estimated that the amount of postconsumer shoes waste is over 1 million tonnes per year. End-of-Life (EoL) management is gaining more attention in the footwear industry, due to increased raw material costs, environmental legislations and ambitious textile waste management targets, e.g., 50% of textiles must be recycled and 20% must be reused from 2025 onwards. However, the recycling rate of footwear is still lower than 5%. This is due to the wide variety of components, e.g., footwear can consist of up to 40 different components, which makes a circular approach to EoL challenging. It is clear that footwear needs a radical shift to achieve circularity. This shift involves simpler shoe design with similar functionality, consumers willing to buy sustainable shoes and increase the longevity, installation of collection and sorting infrastructure, and cost-efficient recycling processes producing high quality secondary resources from old shoes. The SCARPA Doctoral Network on footwear circularity has a clear mission: to train a new generation of experts who possess the skills and fundamental knowledge required to understand how footwear should be designed to allow recycling, how consumers play a role in the value chain, how different recycling technologies can create high value recyclates, and how a decision in one part of the value chain influences the whole value chain’s sustainability, including LCA.

Keywords: footwear,textile,recycling,reuse,sustainability,waste management,plastics
Disentangling and enhancing the central role of predatory arthropods in trophic webs within African cacao agroforestry through ecological intensification (TheCacaoWeb)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Postdoctoral Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Life Sciences
Countries involved: Portugal,Switzerland
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2024 (HORIZON-MSCA-2024-PF-01, 2024)
Start date: 2026-09-01
End date: 2028-08-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 191343.12
EU funding (EUR): 191343.12
Participants: 2
Project status: SIGNED

West Africa produces approximately half of the cacao consumed worldwide, but yields are threatened by unsustainable farming practices and the impact of pests and diseases. It is thus urgent to develop sustainable alternatives that protect local biodiversity and enhance ecosystem services such as biological pest control. Trophic ecology research is necessary to understand the ecology of pest predators and how to enhance them, but there are still large knowledge gaps in cacao trophic webs. Mesopredatory arthropods have been rarely researched, despite being considerably more abundant and diverse than apex predators, whose effect on pests and cacao yield has been studied. TheCacaoWeb aims to address central knowledge gaps about the role of mesopredatory arthropods in biocontrol and cacao crop yield in Côte d’Ivoire, the largest cacao producer worldwide. Through a multi-factorial experiment and metabarcoding approaches, I will assess how the diversity and diet of mesopredatory arthropods changes when agroforests are managed with or without insecticides, and under the presence of different shade tree species. Through a secondment at the Swiss Ornithological Institute, I will be able to assess how insectivorous birds affect mesopredatory arthropods and their diets, and the consequences of these multi-trophic interactions for crop yield. This secondment will also allow me to work as a researcher outside academia. TheCacaoWeb will bridge key gaps in trophic ecology, while addressing pressing questions to enhance sustainable farming practices in the cacao field. I will share my results with stakeholders in Switzerland, Côte d’Ivoire, and other countries in West Africa, expanding my collaboration network and ensuring that my scientific advances impact practice. This project will position me as an independent tropical ecologist in Europe standing out for the ability to apply scientific advances to solve current problematics in tropical agriculture and biodiversity conservation.

Keywords: agroecology,trophic ecology,biodiversity monitoring
Boosting Research for a Smart and Carbon Neutral Built Environment with Digital Twins (SmartWins)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Widening Participation and Strengthening the European Research Area
Programme: Widening participation and spreading excellence
Theme: Improved access to Excellence
Destination: Improved access to Excellence
Action type: Coordination and support actions
Countries involved: Lithuania,Italy,Greece,Germany,France
Call: Twinning (HORIZON-WIDERA-2021-ACCESS-03, 2021)
Start date: 2022-10-01
End date: 2025-09-30
Duration (months): 36.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1499973.75
EU funding (EUR): 1499973.75
Participants: 5
Project status: SIGNED

The overall objective of the project “Boosting Research for a Smart and Carbon Neutral Built Environment with Digital Twins – SmartWins” is to build the capacities for the Kaunas University of Technology in Lithuania, through its “Sustainable Energy in the Built Environment” Research Group (SEBERG) within the Faculty of Civil Engineering and Architecture to conduct high-quality research on the topic of next generation digital twins, applied for allowing the transition to a smart, sustainable, resilient and carbon neutral built environment. The concept of the SmartWins project is to form a network between KTU and leading institutions in the field of energy and sustainability assessment of buildings with the use of Industry 4.0 practices related research and innovation management, for know-how transfer and development of a long-term research collaboration. KTU will twin with the Politecnico di Milano University (PoliMi, Italy), the Centre for Research and Technology, Hellas (CERTH, Greece), a spin-off of the Technical University of Berlin, Contecht GmbH (CON, Germany), and Innotrope (France), aiming to develope its excellence and international reputation in the field, to both cover fundamental research aspects, as well as to further develop its skills, practices and structures to conduct top-notch research. SmartWins includes activities in the field of research capacity building, research management upgrade, networking with the industry and the market, as well as training. SmartWins consortium will also attempt to sustain the activities of the project by achieving further funding through succeeder projects in the fields of technology transfer, innovation and research and postgraduate networks. SmartWins aspires to support the uptake and establishment of KTU's SEBERG as a research hub of scientific excellence in the Baltic region and beyond on the research topics of digitized assessment of sustainable buildings.

Keywords: digital twins,built environment,energy assessment,sustainability assessment,widening,twinning,networking
Mental illness, substance use, and cardiovascular disease: Unravelling causal relationships (UNRAVEL-CAUSALITY)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Prevention,  Diagnosis and T reatment of Human Diseases
Panel description: Medical technologies  and tools for prevention, diagnosis and treatment of human diseases, therapeutic approaches and interventions , pharmacology, preventative  medicine, epidemiology and public health , digital medicine
Countries involved: Netherlands
Call: ERC STARTING GRANTS (ERC-2022-STG, 2022)
Start date: 2023-04-01
End date: 2028-03-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1500000.0
EU funding (EUR): 1500000.0
Participants: 2
Project status: SIGNED

Serious mental illness – depression, bipolar, and psychotic disorder – is among the leading causes of disability worldwide, disproportionately affecting people of non-European ancestry. On top of the burden posed by its symptoms, mental illness is also associated with comorbid health problems. The two most important ‘comorbidities’ of mental illness, given their driving role in decreasing quality and duration of life, are substance (mis)use and cardiovascular disease. Whether these comorbidities arise due to causal relationships is surprisingly unclear. The causal direction is also uncertain: does mental illness lead to comorbidities, and / or do comorbidities increase the risk of (more severe) mental illness? Through several prestigious fellowships, I have established myself as an expert in epidemiological and genetic causal inference methods. In this ambitious project, I will bring together innovative approaches to unravel the relationships of mental illness with substance (mis)use and cardiovascular disease. My aims are to: 1) assess bidirectional relationships between mental illness and its comorbidities by conducting longitudinal analyses in (multi-ancestry) prospective cohort studies, 2) distinguish bidirectional relationships from shared genetic liability by jointly modelling the complete genetic architecture of mental illness and its comorbidities (genomic structural equation modelling), 3) establish causality by using only highly significant genetic variants as instruments for one variable and testing causal effects on another (Mendelian randomization), 4) fully unravel the nature of relationships between mental illness and its comorbidities by ‘triangulating’ evidence from aims 1 to 3, and 5) assess how informing medical doctors about the outcomes of aim 4 influences their clinical decisions in a randomized online experiment. This interdisciplinary project sets the stage for more effective prevention and treatment of mental illness, across ancestry groups.

Keywords: causal inference,mendelian randomization,triangulation,mental disorders,cardiovascular,smoking,alcohol,cannabis,comorbidity
Advanced quantum clock for real-world applications (AQuRA)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness
Programme: Digital, Industry and Space
Theme: Digital
Destination: Digital & Emerging Technologies for Competitiveness and Fit for the Green Deal
Action type: Innovation actions
Countries involved: Germany,Denmark,France,Netherlands,Poland,Finland
Call: Quantum sensing technologies for market uptake (IA) (HORIZON-CL4-2021-DIGITAL-EMERGING-02, 2021)
Start date: 2022-12-01
End date: 2026-11-30
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 8920797.69
EU funding (EUR): 7485727.25
Participants: 9
Project status: SIGNED

Optical clocks are amazingly stable frequency standards, which would remain accurate to within one second over the age of the universe. Bringing these clocks from the lab to the market offers great opportunities for telecommunications, navigation, sensing, and science, but no commercial optical clock exists. Europe's world leading optical clock technology within academia and national metrology institutes combined with its strong photonics industry, provide us with a golden opportunity to take a leading position in this strategic technology. With AQuRA we want to seize this opportunity and build up a sovereign, efficient industrial capability able to build the world’s most advanced quantum clocks. We will deliver the first industry-built, rugged and transportable optical clock with an accuracy that approaches the best laboratory clocks. Our work is based on the experience that many of us gained by building an optical clock with industry during the Quantum Flagship project iqClock (2018-2022). In AQuRA industry takes the lead and will deliver a 20x more accurate clock in a 3x smaller volume at TRL 7. This will be possible by combining our industry partners’ experience in rugged photonics products with the know-how of our world-leading academic and national metrology institute partners. We will build, strengthen and diversify the European supply chain of optical clock components, filling critical gaps in the supply chain, and thereby establish a sovereign, competitive industry for optical clocks. In particular we will develop the rugged laser sources, miniaturized optical interface circuits, and the atom source needed for an optical clock, all of which will also become products on their own. Partner Menlo Systems will integrate these components with their ultrastable laser system into the AQuRA optical clock. We will accelerate market uptake by demonstrating our clock's usefulness to applications in telecom, geodesy and metrology, and by engaging with end users.

Keywords: quantum sensing,next generation integrated optical clocks,highly reliable industrial clock components,relativistic geodesy,towards si second redefinition,network synchronization
Evolution and operation of EU Open Research Repository in Zenodo (HORIZON-ZEN Plus)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Widening Participation and Strengthening the European Research Area
Programme: Reforming and enhancing the European R&I System
Theme: Euratom
Destination: Euratom
Action type: Coordination and support actions
Countries involved: Switzerland
Call: Evolution and operations of EU Open Research Repository – enhanced depositing service for digital research objects for Horizon Europe beneficiaries (HORIZON-EURATOM-2025-REPOSITARY-IBA, 2025)
Start date: 2025-10-01
End date: 2027-09-30
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 799472.5
EU funding (EUR): 799472.5
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

The HORIZON-ZEN+ project aims to advance the EU Open Research Repository (EOR Repository) on Zenodo, a key enabler of the European Commission’s Open Science policy. Building on the success of the HORIZON-ZEN project (2023–2025), HORIZON-ZEN+ enhances the repository’s ability to support FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) and AI-ready research outputs. The project addresses two strategic challenges: enabling cost-effective, scalable data curation, and facilitating the discovery and reuse of high-quality datasets across disciplines for AI applications. To this end, the project will integrate AI-assisted curation tools, advanced metadata validation, and automated support workflows; improve deposit and discovery interfaces with support for AI-specific metadata and data packaging standards; and deepen interoperability with the EOSC EU Node and Open Research Europe platform. By embedding these enhancements directly in Zenodo and its open-source platform InvenioRDM, HORIZON-ZEN+ ensures broad uptake and long-term sustainability, strengthening Europe’s open science infrastructure and supporting researchers in meeting FAIR and AI-readiness mandates.

Keywords: open science,fair,ai ready,eu open research repository,zenodo,policy implementation
Control of Extreme Events in Turbulent Flows with Scientific Machine Learning (CONTEXT)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Products and Processes Engineering
Panel description: Product and process design, chemical, civil, environmental, mechanical, vehicle engineering, energy processes and relevant computational methods
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: ERC STARTING GRANTS (ERC-2024-STG, 2024)
Start date: 2025-04-01
End date: 2030-03-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1499068.0
EU funding (EUR): 1499068.0
Participants: 2
Project status: SIGNED

Climate change and the race to decarbonise our society is making extreme events in fluids more prevalent. These are rare events where the flow suddenly takes extreme states far from its normal state. These can be found in any flow systems, such as in the atmosphere with atmospheric blocking causing extreme heatwaves, or in our oceans with rogue waves (waves of extreme heights) capable of capsizing boats, or in engineering flows in hydrogen-based clean combustors with flashback events where the flame suddenly moves back into the injection system. Currently, we cannot accurately predict such extreme events due to several roadblocks. First, the chaotic nature of these turbulent flows makes them hard to predict: any infinitesimal perturbation leads to drastically different evolutions (the butterfly effect). Second, extreme events originate from complex nonlinear interactions which are very different for systems with different physical mechanisms. This makes any past development difficult to generalize across different flow systems. Third, we have very limited observations of such events. To revolutionize how we tackle extreme events, the CONTEXT project will create a cutting-edge scientific machine learning framework that blends deep learning with physics-based techniques. CONTEXT’s framework will provide the means to (i) identify precursors and mechanisms of extreme events, (ii) forecast the flow evolution before and during extreme events and (iii) control the flows to prevent extreme events. CONTEXT’s framework will be able to handle diverse and disparate physics, with this being demonstrated across different flows of increasing complexity and with different physics, culminating in a demonstration of the practical impact of the framework on the engineering-relevant multiphysics test case of a flashbacking hydrogen combustor. CONTEXT will provide a comprehensive framework to achieve the understanding, prediction, and prevention of extreme events in turbulent flows.

Keywords: extreme events,scientific machine learning,chaos