Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Molecular choreography of bacterial chemotaxis signalling (ChemoTaxi)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Molecules of Life: Biological Mechanisms, Structures and Functions
Panel description: Molecular biology, biochemistry, structural biology, molecular biophysics, synthetic and chemical biology, drug design, innovative methods and modelling
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: ERC ADVANCED GRANT (ERC-2020-ADG, 2020)
Start date: 2021-09-01
End date: 2026-08-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1781133.0
EU funding (EUR): 1781133.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

For nearly six decades, chemotaxis - a ubiquitous biological behaviour enabling the movement of a cell or organism toward or away from chemicals -has served as a paradigmatic model for the study of cellular sensory signal transduction and motile behavior. The relatively simple chemotaxis machinery of E. coli is the best understood signal transduction system and serves as a powerful tool for investigating the molecular mechanisms that proteins use to detect, process, and transmit signals. The sensory apparatus of E. coli cells is an ordered array of hundreds of basic core signalling units consisting of three essential components, the transmembrane chemoreceptors, the histidine kinase, and the adaptor protein. The core units further assemble into a two-dimensional lattice array which allows cells to amplify and integrate many varied and possibly conflicting signals to locate optimal growing conditions. To understand the underlying molecular mechanisms of chemosensory array assembly, activation and high cooperativity, it is essential to determine the precise interactions between the core signalling components in the context of the array. We propose to use a combination of cutting-edge cryoET structural methods and multi-scale molecular simulations, as well as in vivo functional assays, to investigate the structural and dynamical mechanisms underlying signal transduction and regulation. The research plan is divided into three aims: 1. Determine the structural basis of signal transduction and array cooperativity 2. Define conformational states and dynamics of the array 3. Obtain time-resolved structural snapshots of signalling pathway Our results will establish, in atomistic detail, the chemotaxis signalling pathway that is shared by diverse chemotactic species, including a wide-range of human and plant pathogens, thus impact on multiple disciplines, from antimicrobial drug development to understanding responses to hormones and neurotransmitters in eukaryotic cells.
Neural adaptations during pregnancy (PregnantBrain)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Neuroscience and Disorders of the Nervous System
Panel description: Nervous system development, homeostasis and ageing, nervous system function and dysfunction, systems neuroscience and modelling, biological basis of cognitive processes and of behaviour, neurological and mental disorders
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: ERC Starting Grant (ERC-2019-STG, 2019)
Start date: 2019-12-01
End date: 2025-05-31
Duration (months): 66.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1494393.0
EU funding (EUR): 1494393.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

An expectant mother’s brain undergoes dramatic structural remodeling during pregnancy. These changes are thought to be elicited by hormones, orchestrating the behavioural and physiological adaptations necessary for infant care. Despite the scale of these effects, we know little about the neural mechanisms by which pregnancy affects the brain. Recent methodological advances now offer the exciting opportunity to address these questions. This project will use a multidisciplinary approach to uncover the molecular, cellular and circuit-level mechanisms of pregnancy hormone action in a mouse model. We will first focus on which aspects of parenting, feeding and aggression are affected by pregnancy – and over which time course these behavioural adaptations occur. This will provide important clues about the nature of underlying neural plasticity mechanisms. Next, we will determine which nodes of the circuits controlling these behaviours are sensitive to pregnancy hormones. This will then allow us to address the functional consequences of pregnancy at the network level, using in vivo calcium imaging approaches. Finally, we will study the biophysical and cellular mechanisms underlying pregnancy hormone action in genetically defined neurons, through a combination of electrophysiology and transcriptomic profiling. By integrating these complementary lines of evidence, we aim to obtain a mechanistic understanding of the neural adaptations occurring during pregnancy. I believe that these innovative studies will generate novel and highly generalizable insights into how physiological states shape information processing in the brain.

Keywords: neural circuits,hormones,pregnancy,parental behaviour,neuromodulation,neural plasticity,physiological state,internal state,feeding,aggression
Commercialisation of a world changing invention for the stabilisation and delivery of vaccines (StableVax)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Societal Challenges
Programme: Health, demographic change and wellbeing
Theme: Treating and managing disease
Action type: SME instrument
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: Clinical research for the validation of biomarkers and/or diagnostic medical devices (H2020-SMEINST-1-2015, 2015)
Start date: 2015-09-01
End date: 2015-10-31
Duration (months): 2.0
Total project cost (EUR): 71429.0
EU funding (EUR): 50000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Vaccination is an indispensable tool in fighting disease, annually saving up tens of millions of lives saved across the globe. Vaccines are biological products that are sensitive to temperature change and can lose their effectiveness if exposed to sub optimum temperatures. The delivery of vaccines from the factory to the customer currently relies on a closely monitored cold chain process containing a series of refrigerated storage units, designed to keep the vaccine at a constant temperature. The system frequently fails for a variety of reasons, some technical and some simply due to human error. Currently 50% of the world’s vaccines are rendered useless due to the failings of the present refrigerated ‘cold chain’ delivery systems Stablepharma has a vision to eliminate the global cold chain and unnecessary vaccine wastage by introducing an innovative method to stabilise vaccines allowing them to be transported and stored at a wide-range of temperatures. Our technology involves the ~100% removal of liquid from vaccine dissolved in a special buffer, so that it is left in a completely stable and finely divided dry state absorbed into a, compressible, porous material that is in turn inserted into a standard auto-disable syringe. The process and invention was introduced to the WHO (World Health Organisation, Geneva) by invitation in 2012 and they have been able to assist the company with guidance in the development and accreditation process. Stablepharma Ltd was incorporated in January 2012 to commercialise a revolutionary vaccine stabilisation invention and process developed and patented by our Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and Chairman, Dr Bruce Roser, a pioneer and distinguished scientist in this field.

Keywords: vaccination,stabilisation,delivery,disease,cold chain,syringe
Dark Higgs Hunting at the Large Hadron Collider (DARKHIGGS)

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: Sweden
Call: Individual Fellowships (H2020-MSCA-IF-2017, 2017)
Start date: 2018-04-01
End date: 2020-03-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 185857.2
EU funding (EUR): 185857.2
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

This project proposes a search for a novel signature of dark matter (DM) production at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) resulting from the emission of an additional Higgs boson in the dark sector. The presence of such a dark Higgs boson is motivated both by the need to generate the masses of the particles in the dark sector and the possibility to relax constraints from the dark matter relic abundance. If the dark Higgs boson is the lightest state in the dark sector and has a small mixing with the Standard Model (SM) Higgs boson, it predominantly decays into b-quarks for a dark Higgs boson mass below 160 GeV. This gives a distinct mono-dark-Higgs signature to search for consisting of a two collimated b-jets in association with missing transverse momentum from a pair of undetected dark matter particles. The new search channel probes large parts of phase space which are inaccessible to conventional mono-jet and di-jet searches and is complementary to the existing dark matter search programme at the LHC. The potential discovery of a dark Higgs boson would provide a unique window to the dark sector with excellent opportunities for further exploration, e.g. by probing the couplings of the dark Higgs boson to other SM particles. The implications would even go beyond the question of DM as it would suggest that the Higgs mechanisms is more fundamental that what is currently believed. The project described here proposes to use the data collected with ATLAS at the LHC by the end of Run-2 to search for a dark Higgs boson decaying to b-quarks. In addition, the project has a hardware part on the upgrade of the ATLAS inner tracker (ITk) for High-Luminosity LHC. This is an important element for the preparations for future searches for the dark Higgs boson, either as a means to further explore a potential positive outcome of the search with Run-2 data, or to improve the sensitivity of the search in case no evidence is found for a dark Higgs boson with the Run-2 data.

Keywords: atlas
Smart Trust: Secure Mobile ID for Trusted Smart Borders (Smart-Trust)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Societal Challenges
Programme: Secure societies - protecting freedom and security of Europe and its citizens
Action type: SME instrument
Countries involved: Portugal
Call: Engaging SMEs in security research and development (H2020-SMEINST-2-2016-2017, 2017)
Start date: 2018-01-01
End date: 2020-03-31
Duration (months): 27.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2991000.0
EU funding (EUR): 2093700.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Smart-Trust introduces a new technological enabler for Mobile ID which drastically increases the reliability and trust levels of identity verification at European borders, thus increasing the security of member states. The platform is compatible with a seamless self-service experience based on biometrics on the move which provides freedom of movements to citizens while ensuring their privacy safeguarded according to Privacy by Design principles. Smart-Trust will simultaneously address the business needs of governments, airports, airlines and border police in major pilots in the international airports of Lisbon and Schiphol. After establishing requirements sought by the various stakeholders, and integrating the Smart-Trust platform into the airport and border control infrastructure, we will define KPIs for assessing the business cases and design experiments to measure them. Smart-Trust will be implemented by delivering an agile, highly configurable, modular and open architecture platform with the following robust, versatile and scalable core components: • Mobile ID services and app, mobile identity enrolment and verification services • TrustChain, a blockchain-based infra-structure to assert citizen transactions in a distributed and self-regulatory fashion • Workflow Orchestration, a workflow management component which caters for stakeholder-driven business rules • Analytics and Risk-Assessment, an industrial-strength real time analytics platform able to deliver professional customized monitoring dashboards as well as detecting passenger trends and anomalies. These components will be developed as part of Vision-Box’s overarching Services Platform and hence compatible with standard Vision-Box services such as Automated Border Control, including Advance Passenger Information Systems (APIS) and Entry-Exit System (EES), and Happy Flow, the first 100% self-service passenger processing system allowing passengers to go from curb to boarding by simple presenting their face.

Keywords: mobile id,blockchain,border security,border management,seamless travel
Fair and Consistent Border Controls? A Critical, Multi-methodological and Interdisciplinary Study of Asylum Adjudication in Europe (ASYFAIR)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: The Social World and Its Diversity
Panel description: Sociology, social psychology, social anthropology, education sciences, communication studies
Countries involved: United Kingdom
Call: ERC Starting Grant (ERC-2015-STG, 2015)
Start date: 2016-09-01
End date: 2022-02-28
Duration (months): 66.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1252067.0
EU funding (EUR): 1252067.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

‘Consistency’ is regularly cited as a desirable attribute of border control, but it has received little critical social scientific attention. This inter-disciplinary project, at the inter-face between critical human geography, border studies and law, will scrutinise the consistency of European asylum adjudication in order to develop richer theoretical understanding of this lynchpin concept. It will move beyond the administrative legal concepts of substantive and procedural consistency by advancing a three-fold conceptualisation of consistency – as everyday practice, discursive deployment of facts and disciplinary technique. In order to generate productive intellectual tension it will also employ an explicitly antagonistic conceptualisation of the relationship between geography and law that views law as seeking to constrain and systematise lived space. The project will employ an innovative combination of methodologies that will produce unique and rich data sets including quantitative analysis, multi-sited legal ethnography, discourse analysis and interviews, and the findings are likely to be of interest both to academic communities like geographers, legal and border scholars and to policy makers and activists working in border control settings. In 2013 the Common European Asylum System (CEAS) was launched to standardise the procedures of asylum determination. But as yet no sustained multi-methodological assessment of the claims of consistency inherent to the CEAS has been carried out. This project offers not only the opportunity to assess progress towards harmonisation of asylum determination processes in Europe, but will also provide a new conceptual framework with which to approach the dilemmas and risks of inconsistency in an area of law fraught with political controversy and uncertainty around the world. Most fundamentally, the project promises to debunk the myths surrounding the possibility of fair and consistent border controls in Europe and elsewhere.

Keywords: asylum,migration,procedural consistency
Mechanisms underlying regulation and removal of G-quadruplex/R-loop transcription-replication conflicts (GLoopID)

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: United Kingdom
Call: Individual Fellowships (H2020-MSCA-IF-2019, 2019)
Start date: 2021-09-01
End date: 2024-01-04
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 224933.76
EU funding (EUR): 224933.76
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Maintenance of genome stability is challenged by obstacles that interfere with normal progression of essential DNA-associated transactions, such as DNA replication and transcription. One such obstacle is the G-quadruplex (G4) DNA secondary structure, which can form in G-rich repetitive DNA sequences. Transcribed G4-DNA loci often co-exist with stable RNA-DNA hybrids (R-loops), potentially causing deleterious transcription-replication conflicts (TRCs). Therefore, the ability of cells to mitigate TRCs formation is critical for cell and organismal fitness. While the pathways involved in repairing other DNA lesions are relatively well understood, the mechanisms by which cells respond to G4/R-loop-induced TRCs remain uncharted, largely due to a lack of efficient approaches for inducing site-specific G4s/R-loops into the genome. Several studies reported dedicated helicases capable of unwinding G4s/R-loops, yet whether additional factors exist and how different types of TRCs are resolved remains unknown. In this project, I aim to dissect the fundamental mechanisms that protect cells from TRCs at DNA loci harbouring G4s/R-loops. To do so, I will establish a novel system with site-specific G4/R-loop substrates in living cells and I will systematically investigate their protein composition to identify novel factors in G4/R-loop metabolism. I will further examine the genetic vulnerabilities of candidate G4/R-loop helicase-deficient cells and the regulatory mechanisms underlying G4/R-loop unwinding by these helicases. As mutations in several G4/R-loop helicases predispose to various cancers and genetic disorders, a detailed understanding of the basic mechanisms controlling G4/R-loop removal is of utmost importance, and will shed light on disease aetiology and the rational development of more targeted therapeutic strategies.

Keywords: transcription replication conflicts,g quadruplex,r loops,dna replication,helicases,rtel1,atrx,setx,telomeres,turboid proteomics,loss of function genetic screens,mechanistic analysis
Improving and Integrating European Ocean Observing and Forecasting Systems for Sustainable use of the Oceans (EuroSea)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Societal Challenges
Programme: Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine and maritime and inland water research and the bioeconomy
Theme: Cross-cutting marine and maritime research
Action type: Innovation actions
Countries involved: Germany,Spain,Estonia,Italy,Spain,Italy,Spain,Spain,Spain,Germany,Germany,Spain,Ireland,Italy,Italy,Italy,Italy,Belgium,Norway,Switzerland,Norway,Greece,Poland,Belgium,France,France,France,France,France,France,France,United Kingdom,Portugal,Canada,Brazil,United Kingdom,United Kingdom,Denmark,United Kingdom,United Kingdom,United Kingdom
Call: The Future of Seas and Oceans Flagship Initiative (H2020-BG-2019-1, 2019)
Start date: 2019-11-01
End date: 2023-12-31
Duration (months): 50.0
Total project cost (EUR): 12623666.37
EU funding (EUR): 12246700.13
Participants: 56
Project status: SIGNED

Although the Ocean is a fundamental part of the global system providing a wealth of resources, there are fundamental gaps in ocean observing and forecasting systems, limiting our capacity in Europe to sustainably manage the ocean and its resources. Ocean observing is “big science” and cannot be solved by individual nations; it is necessary to ensure high-level integration for coordinated observations of the ocean that can be sustained in the long term. EuroSea brings together key European actors of ocean observation and forecasting with key end users of ocean observations, responding to the Future of the Seas and Oceans Flagship Initiative. Our vision is a truly interdisciplinary ocean observing system that delivers the essential ocean information needed for the wellbeing, blue growth and sustainable management of the ocean. EuroSea will strengthen the European and Global Ocean Observing System (EOOS and GOOS) and support its partners. EuroSea will increase the technology readiness levels (TRL) of critical components of ocean observations systems and tools, and in particular the TRL of the integrated ocean observing system. EuroSea will improve: European and international coordination; design of the observing system adapted to European needs; in situ observing networks; data delivery; integration of remote and in-situ data; and forecasting capability. EuroSea will work towards integrating individual observing elements to an integrated observing system, and will connect end-users with the operators of the observing system and information providers. EuroSea will demonstrate the utility of the European Ocean Observing System through three demonstration activities focused on operational services, ocean health and climate, where a dialogue between actors in the ocean observing system will guide the development of the services, including market replication and innovation supporting the development of the blue economy.

Keywords: ocean observing,ocean information,ocean forecasting,ocean health,observing networks,operational services,aquaculture,fisheries,climate,ocean exploitation,blue economy
Modeling Prey Isocapes in the North Atlantic for Advancement in Predator Ecology (ISOMOD)

Framework: Horizon 2020 — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie-Sklodowska-Curie Actions
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Individual Fellowships (IF)-Reintegration panel
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Environment and Geosciences
Countries involved: Norway
Call: Individual Fellowships (H2020-MSCA-IF-2019, 2019)
Start date: 2020-04-01
End date: 2022-07-12
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 214158.72
EU funding (EUR): 214158.72
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

The immensity of the oceans makes it difficult to monitor them at a spatio-temporal scale that is relevant for resolving ecological processes and responses to decades of pressure from multiple anthropological stressors. With IsoMod, I aim to map the biogeochemical tracers (stable isotope (SI) composition) at the base of the food web to inform three key measures of marine ecosystem processes that might be affected by these stressors: productivity, food web structure and animal migration pathways. The isoscapes will be developed at the scale of the North Atlantic Ocean and will be based on Calanus spp. carbon and nitrogen SI values, δ13C and δ15N. Lipid rich zooplankton organisms such as C. finmarchicus fuel a large part of the higher trophic level in the North Atlantic, including many species of fish, birds and mammals. I will use a recently developed spatial statistic approach where high resolution observational data (e.g., satellite data) are applied as predictors of SI variability, and apply these models to produce isoscapes with a full coverage of the study area. The application of these isoscapes will be showcased in two case studies. The first will test the role of changes in Atlantic puffin (Fratercula arctica) winter diet in key life-history parameters (e.g., body condition, survival rate). Specifically, the isoscapes will be used to provide the trophic baseline needed to investigate changes in puffin trophic position associated with changes in diet. The second case study will use prey SI to improve forecast of Northeast Atlantic mackerel (Scomber scombrus) summer distribution. Variation in SI values can be linked to variation in secondary productivity and this will be used to identify best foraging conditions for mackerel ahead of their migration to the summer feeding grounds. This information will be investigated as a driver of mackerel summer distribution and their recent shift in distribution.

Keywords: stable isotopes,animal tracking,trophic baseline