Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
STATic analysis with ORiginal methods (STATOR)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Computer science and informatics
Countries involved: France
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2013-01-01
End date: 2018-12-31
Duration (months): 72.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1472495.06
EU funding (EUR): 1472495.06
Participants: 2
Project status: CLOSED

Since the beginning of computing, software has had bugs. If a word processor crashes, consequences are limited. If a networked application has security bugs (e.g. buffer overflows), important information (e.g. financial or medical) can leak. More importantly, today's planes are flown by computers, voting machines as well medical devices such as infusion pumps are computerized, and surgeries are performed by robots. Clearly, it is in the best interest of society that such software is bug-free. BUGS ARE NOT A FATALITY! Traditionally, software is tested, i.e. run on a limited number of test cases. Yet, testing cannot prove the absence of bugs in untested configurations. Formal methods, producing mathematical proofs of correctness, have long been proposed as a means to give strong assurance on software. They unfortunately had a (not entirely undeserved) reputation for not scaling up to real software. Faster, automated static analysis methods were however produced in the 2000s, which could cope with some specific classes of applications: predicate abstraction, based on decision procedures (e.g. Microsoft's device driver verifier) and abstract interpretation (e.g. Polyspace and Astrée, for automotive, aerospace etc.). Yet such systems are still unusable on more common programs: they reject some program constructs, they give too many false alarms (about nonexistent problems) and/or they take too much time and memory. In the recent years, I and others proposed techniques combining decision procedures and classical abstract interpretation, so as to decrease false alarms while keeping costs reasonable. These techniques are still in their infancy. The purpose how STATOR is to develop new combination techniques, so as to break the precision/efficiency barrier. Since the only way to see if a technique really works is to implement and try it, STATOR will produce a practical static analysis tool and experiment it on real programs.

Keywords: static analysis,abstract interpretation,smt solving
Scaling Up Reinforcement Learning: Structure Learning, Skill Acquisition, and Reward Shaping (SUPREL)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Computer science and informatics
Countries involved: Israel
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2013-01-01
End date: 2017-12-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1500000.0
EU funding (EUR): 1500000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Learning how to act optimally in high-dimensional stochastic dynamic environments is a fundamental problem in many areas of engineering and computer science. The basic setup is that of an agent who interacts with an environment trying to maximize some long term payoff while having access to observations of the state of the environment. A standard approach to solving this problem is the Reinforcement Learning (RL) paradigm in which an agent is trying to improve its policy by interacting with the environment or, more generally, by using different sources of information such as traces from an expert and interacting with a simulator. In spite of several success stories of the RL paradigm, a unified methodology for scaling-up RL has not emerged to date. The goal of this research proposal is to create a methodology for learning and acting in high-dimensional stochastic dynamic environments that would scale up to real-world applications well and that will be useful across domains and engineering disciplines. We focus on three key aspects of learning and optimization in high dimensional stochastic dynamic environments that are interrelated and essential to scaling up RL. First, we consider the problem of structure learning. This is the problem of how to identify the key features and underlying structures in the environment that are most useful for optimization and learning. Second, we consider the problem of learning, defining, and optimizing skills. Skills are sub-policies whose goal is more focused than solving the whole optimization problem and can hence be more easily learned and optimized. Third, we consider changing the natural reward of the system to obtain desirable properties of the solution such as robustness, adversity to risk and smoothness of the control policy. In order to validate our approach we study two challenging real-world domains: a jet fighter flight simulator and a smart-grid short term control problem.

Keywords: reinforcement learning,high-dimensional statistics,planning,markov decision processes,dynamic programming and optimization
Exploring the Spin Physics at the Boundaries of Materials with Strong Spin-Orbit Interaction (SPINBOUND)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Condensed matter physics
Countries involved: Spain
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2013-02-01
End date: 2018-01-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1628744.0
EU funding (EUR): 1628744.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

I propose to investigate a new research frontier on spin physics at the boundaries (surfaces) of materials with strong spin-orbit interaction (SOI). Although the properties of these materials have been studied for more than half a century, researchers are just starting to grasp the richness of SOI phenomena that occur at them. SOI leads to surface and boundary states with unusually large spin splitting in simple heavy elements. It can also produce a nontrivial topology in band insulators that brings about metallic surface states with exotic spin textures that are protected by time reversal symmetry. Despite their fundamental and technological interest, information on the nature of charge transport at such states is scarce, while spin transport remains unexplored. I plan to use our cutting-edge expertise on all-electrical lateral spin injection and detection methods to unravel the spin dynamics in them, providing a wealth of information that could not be otherwise obtained. A comprehensive set of objectives will include material integration with ferromagnets and insulators, and innovative devices and measurement protocols. My team will gather information on injection, accumulation, scattering and relaxation processes of spins in the surface and boundary states. Complementary experiments will focus on current-induced spin-torque on a contacting ferromagnet and will address the question of whether spin-split metallic surfaces can enable spin information processing when deposited onto semiconductors. This is a highly challenging project, with a strong interdisciplinary nature across physical and material sciences that will open new avenues for the realization of exotic states of matter such as axions and Majorana fermions. While the research program is driven by the quest for fundamental understanding, new directions for applications could emerge from our basic science results.

Keywords: spin transport,spin orbit coupling,boundary states,rashba interaction,topological insulators,spin hall effect,spin torque,uhv processing and electrical characterization
Gain-endowed metallic meta-structures and devices: towards a unification of photonics and electronics (GEM)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Systems and communication engineering
Countries involved: France
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2012-10-01
End date: 2018-06-30
Duration (months): 69.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1497248.0
EU funding (EUR): 1497248.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

This research project aims at building a common framework for photonic and meta-material /electronic devices. As specific examples, we will focus on making key advances for THz and mid-infrared emitters and detectors. Our goal is to demonstrate device functionalities which cannot be achieved within the current scientific/technological framework. We will implement these concepts on quantum cascade lasers, a family of devices whose potential has seen an explosion in the last few years. They cover the THz (1-10THz) and mid-infrared (10-100THz) ranges of the spectrum, of great importance for medical and environmental applications, and security screening. Their spectral location - between near-infrared and microwaves - makes them ideal candidates to profit from both worlds. We will first address a fundamental physical issue, then we’ll turn to device applications. While optical resonators are constrained to a minimum dimension set by the wavelength, a peculiar signature of an electronic oscillator is its independence from it. Our first goal is the demonstration of an optical oscillator/laser with the functionalities of an electronic oscillator, i.e. with fundamentally no lower size limit in the three dimensions of space. It will behave as a point-source of radiation. We will then focus on ground-breaking demonstrations in the THz and mid-infrared ranges of the spectrum: THz lasers which are frequency tuneable acting on a disentangled (electronic) section; electronically beam-steerable devices; antenna-coupled THz quantum detectors. The integration with MEMS (micro-electro-mechanical systems) is also developed in the proposal. This project will also open up horizons and research opportunities on longer-term topics. We will develop strategies to compensate the ohmic losses of mid-IR meta-materials, in order to extend the developed concepts to mid-IR devices.

Keywords: micro- and nano-photonics,thz optoelectronics,quantum cascade lasers,metamaterials
GaAs Nano-OptoMechanical Systems (GANOMS)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Condensed matter physics
Countries involved: France
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2013-02-01
End date: 2018-01-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1495800.0
EU funding (EUR): 1495800.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

A Nano-OptoMechanical System (NOMS) is an ideal interface between nanomechanical motion and photons. The merits of such a system depend crucially on the level of optical/mechanical coupling. For sufficient coupling, the nanomechanical motion is efficiently imprinted on photons and read-out with the assets of optical detection: broadband, fast, ultra sensitive (ultimately quantum limited). Moreover, in a NOMS, the very dynamics of the motion (its frequency, damping, noise spectrum) can be controlled by optical forces. This opens novel roads for nanomechanical sensing experiments, both classical or quantum, that need now to be experimentally investigated and brought in compliance with future on-chip applications. This project relies on Gallium-Arsenide (GaAs) disk optomechanical resonators, where photons are stored in high quality factor optical whispering gallery cavities and interact with high frequency (GHz) nanomechanical modes. We have recently shown that these resonators possess a record level of optomechanical coupling and are compatible with on-chip optical integration. The first aim of the project is to investigate in depth the mechanisms leading to optical and mechanical dissipation in GaAs nanoresonators, and obtain GaAs NOMS with ultra-low dissipation. The second aim is to realize prototype nano-optomechanical force measurements with a GaAs disk resonator set in optomechanical self-oscillation, to establish the potential of this novel approach for sensing. This will be done both under vacuum and in a liquid. The behavior of two NOMS integrated on the same chip will also be studied, as first archetype of parallel architectures. A third aim is to operate GaAs NOMS at their quantum limit, using cryogenics, optomechanical cooling and novel concepts where an active optical material like a Quantum dot or Quantum well is inserted in the GaAs NOMS to enhance optomechanical interactions. Transfer of quantum states within a QD-NOMS coupled system will be explored.

Keywords: optomechanics,optics,nanomechanics,quantum dots
Hybrid laminates. Industrialization for aircraft nose fuselage. (HYBRIA)

Framework: FP7 — Cooperation
Programme: Joint Technology Initiatives (Annex IV-SP1)
Theme: Public-private partnerships
Destination: Clean Sky
Action type: Article 171 of the Treaty
Partnership: CLEAN-SKY (Art-185)
Countries involved: Spain
Call:  (SP1-JTI-CS-2011-03, 2011)
Start date: 2012-03-15
End date: 2014-03-14
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 288483.2
EU funding (EUR): 216362.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

The use of composites materials for aircraft design allows integrating other different materials with non-structural functions thanks to the layered structure. This layered structure offers the opportunity to embed damping interleaves in the CFRP laminate to improve the vibroacoustic damping behavior of the structure. These multifunctional structures will result in hybrid configurations which combine traditional CFRP laminate with other materials such as rubbers or nanoparticles. Therefore hybrid configurations need to be developed and compared with current structural solutions to quantify their improvement in terms of weight savings or functionality improvement. This proposal plans to manufacture curved (hybrid skin) panels stiffened with twisted stringers of different shape section by co-curing in female curing tool in one-shot process. Curved panels manufactured will be representative of the structure that conforms the nose fuselage stiffened skin.

Keywords: hybrid configuration,multifunctional structure,one-shot manufacturing process,co-curing,integration,industrialization.
Ergodic Group Theory (UB12)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Mathematical foundations
Countries involved: Israel
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2012-09-01
End date: 2018-08-31
Duration (months): 72.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1150000.0
EU funding (EUR): 1150000.0
Participants: 2
Project status: CLOSED

The aim of the proposed research is gaining a better understanding of locally compact groups and their lattices. Our tools are mainly ergodic theoretical. We propose a variety of novel ideas that open new horizons for research. The first meta idea is the adoption of tools from the semi-simple theory in order to apply them for general locally compact groups. In particular, we suggest a construction of a "Weyl group" and an abstract definition of rank for every locally compact group. We are able to construct a "Coxeter complex" and we foresee a construction of a "building like" object. A second set of ideas concerns the category of measure equivalences, which is a natural generalization of the notion of a lattice in a group. This category is long known to be a measurable counterpart of the better studied category of quasi-isometries, yet it misses a good definition of self measure equivalences of an object, analog to the group of quasi-isometries. We suggest such a definition, and propose to study it, among a variety of related constructions. A full implementation of our ideas requires a better understanding of locally compact groups. Thus, an important aspect of the proposed research is that it leaves plenty of room for the study of specific examples and test cases.

Keywords: locally compact groups,ergodic theory,representation theory,geometric group theory,measured group theory
Functional nano Materials for Neuronal Interfacing Applications (FUNMANIA)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Systems and communication engineering
Countries involved: Israel
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2012-10-01
End date: 2018-09-30
Duration (months): 72.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1499560.0
EU funding (EUR): 1499560.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Recent advances in nano technologies provide an exciting new tool-box best suited for stimulating and monitoring neurons at a very high accuracy and with improved bio-compatibility. In this project we propose the development of an innovative nano-material based platform to interface with neurons in-vivo, with unprecedented resolution. In particular we aim to form the building blocks for future sight restoration devices. By doing so we will address one of the most challenging and important applications in the realm of in-vivo neuronal stimulation: high-acuity artificial retina. Existing technologies in the field of artificial retinas offer only very limited acuity and a radically new approach is needed to make the needed leap to achieve high-resolution stimulation. In this project we propose the development of flexible, electrically conducting, optically addressable and vertically aligned carbon nanotube based electrodes as a novel platform for targeting neurons at high fidelity. The morphology and density of the aligned tubes will mimic that of the retina photo-receptors to achieve record-high resolution. The most challenging element of the project is the transduction from an optical signal to electrical activations at high resolution placing this effort at the forefront of nano-science and nano-technology research. To deal with this difficult challenge, vertically aligned carbon nanotubes will be conjugated with additional engineered materials, such as conducting polymers and quantum dots to build a supreme platform allowing unprecedented resolution and bio-compatibility. Ultimately, in this project we will focus on devising materials and processes that will become the building blocks of future devices so high density retinal implants and consequent sight restoration will become a reality in the conceivable future.

Keywords: bioelectronics devices,nano electrodes,neural implants,artificial retina
Real-time nanoscale optoelectronics (NANOREAL)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Condensed matter physics
Countries involved: Germany
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2012-11-01
End date: 2017-10-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1272196.18
EU funding (EUR): 1272196.18
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Is it possible to really ‘see’ how fast electrons flow in nanoscale optoelectronic circuits? Can we, in this way, get a complete understanding of the real-time dynamics of electrons in nanoscale circuits? The vision of this ERC proposal is to establish a research area at the interface of condensed matter physics, ultrafast optics, and electrical engineering which has so far been nearly completely unexplored: the investigation of real-time dynamics of photoexcited charge carriers in electrically contacted nanosystems with the highest precision possible. By doing so, unique information about the optoelectronic processes in nanoscale circuits shall be obtained. Four interconnected visions are pursued all with applications in information technology and electrical engineering. The approach is risky, however, it promises very interesting physics on the way. We will: (i) explore the fastest and smallest photoswitches fully integrated in electric circuits, (ii) probe single and collective charge excitations for the fastest nanoscale optoelectronic devices, (iii) determine the radiative and non-radiative lifetimes in photovoltaic circuits time-resolved, (iv) discover how fast nanoscale photo-thermoelectric devices operate. Towards these visions, I propose to use a real-time optoelectronic ‘on-chip’ detection scheme for nanoscale circuits, which was developed by us very recently. In this setup, I intend to carry out time-of-flight experiments of photoexcited electrons in nanoscale circuits, to investigate the ultimate switching speed of optoelectronic devices, and to explore the ultrafast dynamics of photothermo-electric currents in electrically contacted nanosystems. The project gives essential insights for designing and implementing nanoscale circuits into optoelectronic switches, photodetectors, solar cells, thermo-electric devices as well as high-speed off-chip/on-chip communication modules to make ultrafast nanoscale optoelectronics real.

Keywords: ultrafast photocurrents and time-resolved electron dynamics in contacted nanosystems
Surface Plasmon-Based Wifi for Nanoscale Optical Information Transport - SWIFT (SWIFT)

Framework: FP7 — Ideas
Programme: European Research Council
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: Support for frontier research (ERC)
Panel: Systems and communication engineering
Countries involved: France
Call:  (ERC-2012-StG_20111012, 2012)
Start date: 2013-02-01
End date: 2018-01-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1495288.8
EU funding (EUR): 1495288.8
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

This proposal focuses on the design, fabrication, characterization and optimization of novel groundbreaking communication nano-devices. SWIFT proposes resolutely innovative concepts adopting metal-based optical nano-antennas as a disruptive technological vehicle. Nanoscale electronics and photonics exploit novel fascinating physical phenomena and are among the most promising research areas for providing functional nano-components for data transfer and processing. The aim of this proposal is to interface these two device-generating technologies to create the first electrically-driven nanoscale optical antenna transceiver. The concept will enable electron/photon transduction at the nanoscale by a unique surface plasmon-assisted metal-based design, a significant leap at the forefront of research in nanoelectronics and nanophotonics. SWIFT proposes a series of fundamental advances motivated by application-driven perspectives that will push the burgeoning field of optical antenna to a new area. Deploying optical antenna transceivers enables a paradigm shift in optical interconnects and communication at ultimate device densities through the following innovations: • Development a whole new class of plasmon-assisted transducing optical functional nanodevices.This unique concept addresses the development for ultracompact nanocomponents. • Prototyping self-sustained plasmonic in/out electrical ports on SPP waveguiding platforms, removing thus complex optical interfacing that cannot be miniaturized. • Pioneering a technological breakthrough enabling nanoscale wireless broadcasting of optical information. • Using these functionalities, we will prospect new research directions by proviing a unique ground for (i) generating ultrafast electron surges in an integrated electronic layout enabling ultrafast transport studies in molecular electronics and (ii) for realizing ultrasmall THz sources enabling thus penetration of THz technology at the nanometer-scale.

Keywords: optical antennas,plasmonics,optical wireless,ultrafast electron pulses,thz source