Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Structuring Quantum Light for Microscopy (SQiMic)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Systems and Communication Engineering
Panel description: Electrical, electronic, communication, optical and systems engineering
Countries involved: France
Call: ERC STARTING GRANTS (ERC-2021-STG, 2021)
Start date: 2022-10-01
End date: 2027-09-30
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1499365.0
EU funding (EUR): 1499365.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Optical microscopy, perhaps the most important tool in biomedical investigation and medical diagnosis, provides structural and functional information about biological specimen in a non-invasive and non-ionizing way. However, this technique still faces the challenge of imaging small and weakly scattering objects (e.g.a single cell) embedded inside complex biological tissues causing optical aberrations and scattering. This problem is even more critical in the case of samples that cannot be labelled or do not spontaneously emit light. In SQiMic, I will go one major conceptual step beyond the current paradigm by merging the fields of quantum imaging and light structuring to build a new quantum 'toolbox' for microscopy. My novel approach is based on my pioneering work showing that wavefront shaping techniques, initially developed for laser light manipulation, can also shape higher orders of optical coherence, allowing deterministic tailoring of quantum properties of light such as entanglement. I will use this approach to leverage some genuine quantum imaging concepts such as quantum holography, quantum interferences and quantum illumination, to break the current limits of fluorescent-free classical microscopy and image complex objects with higher resolution, better contrast, reduced aberrations, and less noise. Ultimately, I aim to deliver a quantum-enhanced microscope with unprecedented performances that can be used as a practical tool for biological imaging without labelling the specimens or relying on their possible ability to emit light. From a methodological standpoint, SQiMic will bridge knowledge from quantum imaging, light structuring, adaptive optics, wavefront shaping, sensors technologies and computational imaging. It will deliver a whole new class of optical imaging methods based on quantum light manipulation and detection. Its long-term core applications are in life-science and biomedical imaging, with potential extension to quantum information science.

Keywords: optical imaging,microscopy,quantum imaging,light structuring
HEALth and ENvironment in Africa and Europe (HEALENAE)

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: Social Sciences and Humanities
Countries involved: Denmark,United Kingdom,Belgium,Kenya,Uganda,South Africa,Norway,Mauritius
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): 4658684.4
EU funding (EUR): 4658684.4
Participants: 13
Project status: SIGNED

HEALENAE offers a cross-continental, innovative, interdisciplinary, and multi-sectoral anthropological approach to pressing interrelated health and environmental challenges across Africa and Europe. Concerns about interlinkages between environment and health and the inter-continental connectedness between these problems have intensified since the last pandemic. These include: rising temperatures; proliferation of vector-borne and zoonotic diseases; changes in nutrition; increase in chronic conditions such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases; chemical intensification of agriculture; and pollution, including extraction of minerals that poison local African environments while providing batteries for global “green” markets. Addressing the complex intersection of health and social consequences of globalised production and environmental change requires new kinds of social scientists, versed in environmental and health issues, able to think and work across sectors and continents. HEALENAE brings together anthropological, one health, environmental, global and regional approaches to address these problems. Seven universities—Aarhus (DK), Cape Town (SA), Edinburgh (UK), Leuven (B) Makerere (UG), Nairobi (KE), and Oslo (NO)—will offer 15 double or joint degrees for ESRs, all of them between African and European universities. Through ethnographic fieldwork, exploring specific connections between health and environment across both continents, the programme will provide insights into, and enable future mitigations of, challenges such as changing disease patterns, climate and environmental changes, shifting population demographics, accelerated urbanisation, growing inequality, emerging epidemics, changing gender and generational dynamics. The ESRs will be trained in interdisciplinary and collaborative approaches, engaging with civil society organisations and using multimodal and interactive outlets to maximize the dissemination and impact of their findings.

Keywords: medical anthropology,environment health interactions,environmental justice,postcolonial relations,africa europe,one health,climate change,multimodal collaborative ethnography,fieldwork
CoRe Defense: fortifying the resident gut microbiota’s colonization resistance to combat intestinal bacterial infections. (CoRe Defense)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Physiology in Health, Disease and Ageing
Panel description: Organ and tissue physiology, comparative physiology, physiology  of ageing , pathophysiology, inter - organ and tissue communication, endocrinology, nutrition,  metabolism, interaction with the microbiome, non -communicable diseases including cancer (and except disorders of the nervous system  and immunity -related diseases)
Countries involved: Belgium
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): 2035888.01
EU funding (EUR): 2035888.0
Participants: 2
Project status: SIGNED

Currently, we rely on antibiotics to combat potentially life-threatening gastrointestinal (GI) bacterial infections. However, the susceptibility to infection and the severity of symptoms can vary significantly among individuals exposed to the same pathogen.1–3 If we could unravel the factors responsible for differences in infection susceptibility, we could formulate strategies to reduce the incidence of symptomatic infections, ultimately saving lives and reducing the need for antibiotics. Traditionally, researchers have approached this puzzle from two main perspectives: a human-centered view, delving into the intricacies of the host immune system, or a pathogen-centered view, scrutinizing variations in bacterial strains. With CoRe defense, I advocate for a paradigm shift by adopting a microbiota-centered perspective. This approach is grounded in the concept of colonization resistance, the mechanism whereby the intestinal microbiota protects itself against incursion by new microorganisms. Despite their tremendous potential to prevent and treat bacterial infections, microbial alternatives to antibiotics are still spread thin as we currently lack adequate methods to select potential candidates. My aim is to develop a method for the selection of personalized bacterial consortia capable of preventing Campylobacteriosis. I will do so by investigating its ecological niche and competitors through metabolic modelling, screen for growth reducing bacterial strains or consortia using a newly developed in vitro co-culturing platform, and test colonization resistance predictions of a simple model based on these in silico and in vitro results in human-microbiome associated mice. By investigating the protective function of the microbiota, I will generate ground-breaking findings that will transform our understanding on factors governing bacterial infection susceptibility. It will usher in an era where we view bacteria not only as the problem but also as part of the solution.

Keywords: genome scale metabolic reconstruction of human microorganisms,community scale metabolic modelling,campylobacter,synthetic gut bacterial consortia,microbiota mediated colonization resistance
MendelScan: Accelerating diagnosis of rare diseases across Europe using AI-powered case-finding tools (MENDELIAN)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Innovative Europe
Programme: The European Innovation Council (EIC)
Theme: EIC Accelerator
Destination: Other destinations
Action type: EIC actions
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: EIC Accelerator 2024 - Short application (HORIZON-EIC-2024-ACCELERATOR-01, 2024)
Duration (months): 18.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1500000.0
EU funding (EUR): 1500000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Mendelian is a UK company with a software medical device – MendelScan – that finds undiagnosed rare disease patients. 36 million people in the EU have a rare disease, but it takes on average more than 5 years to get a diagnosis, with 50% never receiving one. MendelScan looks through routinely collected healthcare data (e.g. electronic health records – EHRs) and identifies patterns of rare diseases that have been missed. This happens continuously, proactively, outside of clinical consultations – maximising impact, minimising clinical burden. This approach currently covers 20% of the UK’s National Health Service, where 1,000 patients have been flagged as potential for a previously undiagnosed rare disease. MendelScan combines expert input, AI and collaborative health system deployment to put it far ahead of competitors – evidenced by commercial success (20% NHS, 8 global biopharma partners) and industry prizes (2023 NHS AI Award, 2023 EURORDIS Best Technology, 2023 MIT Solve). Mendelian has been invited to join the cross-EU collaborative Screen4Care, aimed at comprehensively improving rare disease diagnosis across Europe. MendelScan offers a paradigm shift for healthcare systems that must adapt operating models to the flood of patient data (and rapidly evolving disease criteria) that is impossible for human doctors to process without technology. It complements the genetic revolution by constantly evaluating real world phenotypes – essential for diagnosing complex, polygenic rare diseases. This 18 month project will see Mendelian adapt its product across new EU markets, adapting to technical, operational and commercial differences (EHR data differences, languages, evidence standards, regulatory requirements, EHR system integrations). Mendelian has successfully navigated this journey in the NHS, and seeks to do so in a primary group of EU target markets for mass-scalability (and commercialisation) post-project.

Keywords: rare diseases genetics clinical decision support tools
Value chain generator to accelerate the European transition to circular economy (VCG)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Innovative Europe
Programme: The European Innovation Council (EIC)
Theme: EIC Accelerator
Destination: Other destinations
Action type: EIC actions
Countries involved: Germany
Call: EIC Accelerator 2024 - Short application (HORIZON-EIC-2024-ACCELERATOR-01, 2024)
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2499999.0
EU funding (EUR): 2499999.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Out of 100 billion tons of resources entering the economy every year - from metals, minerals, and fossil fuels to organic materials - only 7.2% are circled back. This is a decline from 8.6% in 2022, despite over 3.4 billion EUR investments into circular economy. While the stakeholders in the circular economy accept its clear benefits – cost savings, new revenue streams, and reduced emissions, the uptake of circular business models is progressing slowly, due to the widespread belief that ROI in the circular economy takes a decade to materialize. Solving this problem can lead to 4.5 trillion EUR of business opportunities, 6 million high value-added jobs and a potential to reduce the global GHGE by 39%. The Value Chain Generator (VCG) is a cloud platform that uses AI (LLMs, NLP and deep learning) and big data to automatically and in real-time identify synergies between industrial residuals (waste producers), technology providers (turning waste into raw material) and buyers (of the waste transformed into new material) allowing for their reuse and upcycling. It gradually builds circular value chains by connecting stakeholders via BioLinks, circular business connections between millions of cross-sector companies exploiting validated potential for residuals reuse and adoption of circular business models. Exploring multidimensional synergies between materials, technologies, and climate/financial metrics, VCG enables businesses to make informed decisions and investments, fostering a circular economy that decarbonize supply chains, minimizes waste (potential to valorize over 100 million tons of residuals by 2029), reduces CO2 emissions (64 million tons savings by 2029), and maximizes ROI (up to 500%). To keep the competitive edge, adhere to the ambitious environmental goals and succeed in the demanding markets, the world’s industry must adopt circular business models and make complex decisions regarding their value chains in the coming years, and this is where VCG can help.

Keywords: circular economy,value chains,industrial residuals
Accessible MRI (AMRI)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Innovative Europe
Programme: The European Innovation Council (EIC)
Theme: EIC Accelerator
Destination: Open to supporting projects in all areas of science, technology,...
Action type: EIC actions
Countries involved: France
Call: EIC Accelerator Open 2024 (HORIZON-EIC-2024-ACCELERATOR-02, 2024)
Start date: 2024-12-01
End date: 2026-11-30
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 3571427.14
EU funding (EUR): 2499999.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

The AMRI (Accessible MRI) project by CHIPIRON aims to develop and commercialize a breakthrough, compact, and affordable MRI scanner operating at an ultra-low magnetic field of around 10mT. This radical innovation eliminates the need for costly, massive superconducting magnets used in standard clinical MRIs. CHIPIRON's proprietary SQUID-based detection system provides ultra-high sensitivity to enable diagnostic-quality imaging at 100-1000x lower field strength. The goal is to make MRI, a vital, non-invasive diagnostic tool, accessible to a much wider population, especially in developing regions and rural areas where current MRI costs and infrastructure are prohibitive. The open design of the device also accommodates patients unable to use traditional MRIs due to contraindications. Led by experienced technical experts, CHIPIRON has assembled proprietary IP and demonstrated core capabilities, reaching TRL 5 thus far. The company has raised €4.3M from investors and grants. CHIPIRON is requesting a €2.5M EIC Transition grant which will be followed by a request for €15M EIC Accelerator investment to complete development through regulatory approvals and market launch over 2024-2027. This long-term EIC support will help derisk technical milestones and provide necessary scale-up capital. It represents an ideal public-private funding mix tailored to the needs of deep tech medtech innovation. The grant and investment will catalyze CHIPIRON's progress at a crucial juncture, enabling this breakthrough deployable MRI technology to benefit healthcare systems and patients worldwide.

Keywords: mri,ultra low field mri,imaging
Fascist Literature: Three Poetry Competitions in Fascist Italy (FascLit)

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: Social Sciences and Humanities
Countries involved: Italy
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2023 (HORIZON-MSCA-2023-PF-01, 2023)
Start date: 2024-09-01
End date: 2026-08-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 188590.08
EU funding (EUR): 188590.08
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

FascLit investigates the relationship between literature and totalitarianism by focusing on three literary prizes which took place in the 1930s in Fascist Italy: “Poeti del tempo di Mussolini”, “Cervia” and “Viareggio”. While Mussolini never imposed predefined aesthetic criteria on art, he thought a new literature would rise spontaneously from living in a truly Fascist country. What is common to the three prizes analysed is that they were controlled, directly or indirectly, by Galeazzo Ciano, Minister of Press and Propaganda from 1935 and from 1936 Minister of Foreign Affairs. Thus, they represent a prominent and concrete case study for exploring how Fascist politicians tried to shape Italian culture and how artistic and personal ambitions sought to contribute to the creation of the Fascist civilisation Mussolini called for. The aim of FascLit is indeed twofold: to reconstruct the history and dynamics of the three prizes and the networks of intellectuals involved based on archival work; to analyse the prize-winning works by combining the traditional tools of literary analysis with the cutting-edge tools of digital textometry to understand what “Fascist literature” meant for the Fascists. Thanks to a multi-disciplinary approach at the intersection of history, sociology of culture and literature, this project aims to systematically analyse the three prizes, bringing together the political and institutional aspects and the cultural and literary dimension. It will result in the publication of three peer-reviewed articles and in the creation of an online publicly and freely accessible portal on literary prizes during Fascism. As such, FascLit will not only offer the first scientific study of an as yet little explored historical and literary product. By analysing the concrete relationships between literature and politics in Fascist Italy, it will also pave the way for a broader understanding and further exploration of the interrelation between culture and totalitarianism.

Keywords: fascism italy literary prizes literature poetry sociology of literature fascist intellectuals galeazzo ciano
Maximise H2 Enrichment in Direct Reduction Shaft Furnaces (MaxH2DR)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness
Programme: Digital, Industry and Space
Theme: Industry
Destination: Climate neutral, Circular and Digitised Production
Action type: Innovation actions
Partnership: Clean Steel (co-programmed)
Countries involved: Germany,France,Finland,Netherlands,Italy,Poland,Belgium
Call: Carbon Direct Avoidance in steel: Electricity and hydrogen-based metallurgy (Clean Steel Partnership) (IA) (HORIZON-CL4-2021-TWIN-TRANSITION-01, 2021)
Start date: 2022-06-01
End date: 2026-11-30
Duration (months): 54.0
Total project cost (EUR): 4476585.0
EU funding (EUR): 4161835.25
Participants: 10
Project status: SIGNED

H2-enriched direct reduction (DR) is the key decarbonisation technology for integrated steelworks mentioned in pathways of all major steel producers. Natural gas driven DR is established in industry mostly outside Europe but there are no experiences with high H2 enrichment > 80%. H2 based reduction is no principal issue but endothermic and the influences on morphology, diffusion and effective kinetics are not known. Also properties and movement of particles in the reactor are not know and issues like sticking cannot be excluded. Probably, temperature distribution and flow of solids and gas will be clearly different. No reliable prognosis is possible yet, in particular with regard to local permeability, process stability and product quality of industrial size furnaces with higher loads on the particles and larger local differences. Many activities are initiated for first industrial demonstration of H2-enriched DR but they will not close many of these knowledge gaps. MaxH2DR provides missing knowledge and data of reduction processes. A world-first test rig determines pellet properties at conditions of industrial H2 enriched DR furnaces and a physical demonstrator shows the linked solid and gas flow in shaft furnaces. This will be combined with digitals models including the key technology DEM-CFD to provide a hybrid demonstrator able to investigate scale-up and to optimise DR furnace design and operating point. This sound basis will be used to optimise the process integration into existing process chains. Simulation tools will be combined to a toolkits that covers impacts of product properties on downstream processes as well as impacts on gas and energy cycles. Thus, promising process chains, sustainable and flexible, will be achieved for different steps along the road to decarbonisation. The digital toolkits will support industrial demonstration and implementation and strengthen digitisation and competitiveness of the European steel industry.

Keywords: hydrogen,direct reduction,demonstration,iron,steel,digitisation,carbon direct avoidance
iLoF: AI-augmented photonics to identify and quantify disease biomarkers (iLoF)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Innovative Europe
Programme: The European Innovation Council (EIC)
Theme: EIC Accelerator
Destination: Open to supporting projects in all areas of science, technology,...
Action type: EIC actions
Countries involved: Portugal
Call: EIC Accelerator Open 2023 (HORIZON-EIC-2023-ACCELERATOR-01, 2023)
Start date: 2023-08-01
End date: 2025-07-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 3565500.0
EU funding (EUR): 2495850.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

iLoF is a digital health company pioneering a breakthrough AI-platform to accelerate the future of personalized drug discovery & development. Through advanced AI & photonics, we collect massive amounts of data to build a digital library of biomarkers & biological profiles, bringing together world-class physicists, biologists, & data scientists to get life-saving personalized treatments to patients faster. Our platform captures label-free patterns in biological liquid samples, to generate specific patient or disease signatures. The iLoF device generates multiple highly focused, non-destructive laser beams that interrogate the biological sample to obtain a digital signal of its light pattern. That signal is used to detect modifications providing a flexible & agnostic tool that is not limited to a single use or disease. The current project focuses on developing an Alzheimer’s disease (AD) clinical trial patient screening tool.

Keywords: alzheimer s disease,clinical trials screening,clinical trials