Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Advanced Molecular ENantiodiscrimination (AMEN)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Proof of concept grants
Action type: ERC actions
Countries involved: France
Call: ERC PROOF OF CONCEPT GRANTS (ERC-2024-POC, 2024)
Start date: 2024-08-01
End date: 2026-01-31
Duration (months): 18.0
Total project cost (EUR): 150000.0
EU funding (EUR): 150000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Enantiodiscrimination is one of the major challenges in contemporary chemistry. Chiral molecules exist in two non-superimposable mirror image forms, which induce different effects in biological systems. Thus, they need to be produced in a stereoselective way, especially for pharmaceutical use. The motivation and societal relevance of this project is based on the fact that if the wrong enantiomers are present in pharmaceuticals, their effects can be toxic or even lethal, as has been exemplified by the scandal around the use of racemic mixtures of thalidomide in the 1960ies. Subsequently, it became obvious, and strongly recommended by the FDA and European legislation, that medication should contain pure enantiomers. Therefore, there is a strong and constantly increasing need to develop advanced technologies that allow a selective production of enantiomers by new synthesis strategies. This challenge is at the heart of the AMEN project. We plan to follow an unconventional concept, developed during the ERC Advanced grant ELECTRA, in order to obtain single enantiomers instead of racemic mixtures. This is achieved by directing the transformation of molecules towards one of the two possible enantiomers with the help of autonomously moving chiral microreactors. The fundamental strategy has been already validated with proof-of-principle experiments during the ERC Advanced project and showed extremely high selectivity, efficiency, and controllability, however only at the laboratory scale. Therefore, we plan as a next logic step with technology transfer character, to investigate in detail the possibility of scaling up this process and to evaluate its commercial viability and competitivity.

Keywords: enantioselective synthesis chirality microswimmers microreactors self mixing
Weakly driven quantum symmetries (DrumS)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Condensed Matter Physics
Panel description: Structure, electronic properties, fluids, nanosciences, biological physics
Countries involved: Slovenia
Call: ERC STARTING GRANTS (ERC-2022-STG, 2022)
Start date: 2023-10-01
End date: 2028-09-30
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1446893.75
EU funding (EUR): 1446893.75
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

The DrumS project will establish a new paradigm for stabilizing exotic non-thermal states by weakly driving quantum many-body systems. Present research theoretically predicts peculiar non-thermal states in fine-tuned models with additional symmetries, for example, in integrable models with macroscopically many conservation laws. However, these models and their exact symmetries cannot be accurately realized in solid-state experiments. My hypothesis is that weak driving can boost the underlying symmetries in realistic setups and have a substantial effect on quantities protected by approximate symmetries, for example, on approximately conserved operators. The basic idea can be illustrated with a greenhouse, where windows ensure approximate conservation of energy. A weak driving by sun can have a considerable effect as it only compensates for the weak losses and stabilizes a high temperature that is not proportional to the drive. The ambitious goal of DrumS is to demonstrate that a strong response to a weak drive is a generic property of setups where driving compensates for weak symmetry breaking perturbations and stabilizes large expectation values of potentially useful quantities. While state of the art studies consider detrimental effects of perturbations, DrumS will turn approximate symmetries into a resource for novel out-of-equilibrium phenomena and technological applications. The theoretical program will promote the practical significance of fascinating idealized models, such as integrable, many-body localized, and lattice gauge theories. Driving protocols will compensate unavoidable integrability and gauge breaking to realize peculiar energy, spin and particle transport or synchronize resonant states into a superconducting response. DrumS will grow a new branch of non-linear phenomena, with exciting possibilities for realization in condensed matter experiments, synthetic quantum simulators, and other areas of physics where symmetries play a fundamental role.

Keywords: out of equilibrium many body quantum systems,anomalous transport,driven dissipative systems,integrability,many body localization,lattice gauge theories,quantum scars,open systems,quantum simulators
Privacy Protection and Auditing for Foundation Models (Privacy4FMs)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Starting grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Computer Science and Informatics
Panel description: Informatics and information systems, computer science, scientific computing, intelligent systems
Countries involved: Germany
Call: ERC STARTING GRANTS (ERC-2025-STG, 2025)
Start date: 2026-01-01
End date: 2030-12-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1499973.0
EU funding (EUR): 1499973.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Novel foundation models (FMs) like GPT, LLaMA, and Stable Diffusion are achieving exceptional performance across diverse tasks, generating high-quality text, images, and audio, and driving industry innovations. This progress stems from a shift in machine learning paradigm: instead of training task-specific models on curated datasets, FMs are first pretrained on vast, uncurated data to become strong general-purpose models, then adapted on smaller, domain-specific datasets for specific tasks. However, FMs leak information from their training data. For example, recent studies reveal that they can re-create individual data points from their pretraining and adaptation datasets. This poses serious privacy risks when private data is involved. Preventing exposure requires developing methods to ensure privacy-preservation throughout FMs' lifecycle, from pretraining to deployment. To achieve this, our project will identify sources of privacy leakage, provide privacy guarantees over both pretraining and adaptation, and audit FMs to detect privacy violations. Therefore, we must overcome three major challenges: the limited understanding of privacy risks in FM pretraining, the lack of formal joint privacy guarantees for pretraining and adaptation, and the ineffectiveness of current privacy auditing methods. The solution that we propose will establish a novel theoretical framework for privacy guarantees in FMs under the pretrain-adapt paradigm. Our fundamental innovations rely on the insight that, due to complex interdependencies between pretraining and adaptation data, different data points require individual levels of protection to prevent leakage. Advancing methods for identifying, achieving, and accounting for such individual guarantees will enable us to formally bound privacy leakage over both training stages and to detect violations. These innovations will allow society to benefit from technological advancements through FMs without compromising individuals' privacy.

Keywords: privacy,differential privacy,foundation models,privacy auditing
Rapid Nanofluidics Valves for Single-Molecule Imaging (RAVASI)

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: Physics
Countries involved: Czechia
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2021 (HORIZON-MSCA-2021-PF-01, 2021)
Start date: 2022-07-01
End date: 2026-06-30
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 166278.72
EU funding (EUR): 166278.72
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

A major challenge in biomolecular research is the investigation of biomolecular interaction at single-molecule level. Biomolecules possess heterogeneities of high physiological relevance that can only be unravelled with single-molecule tools. All current single-molecule imaging methods, however, require chemical modifications, such as fluorescent labelling or immobilization onto a surface, which might alter the biomolecule’s natural behaviour. Recently, I have developed a ground-breaking optical microscopy method – Nanofluidic Scattering Microscopy (NSM) – whose unprecedented resolution enabled me to bypass those limitations and to image individual small proteins in free motion without any label. Despite these attractive attributes, in its current form, NSM does not allow for quantitative study of interaction kinetics between individual molecules. Due to the inherently fast Brownian motion, the time that a molecule spends on average in the optically probed volume – a nanofluidic channel – is substantially shorter than the time required to record a statistically relevant number of association and dissociation events. In this project, we will develop an essential nanoscopic component – a rapid nanofluidic valve – that will enable to confine and release interacting biomolecules to and from the nanofluidic volume. The nanofluidic valves will be based on the principles of thermo-responsive polymer hydrogel in combination with nanoplasmonic heating. The integration of the nanofluidic valves with NSM will enable to track evolution of individual biomolecules at single molecule level, without the need of chemical modifications and in conditions that mimic an in-vivo state. The project will deliver a unique bioanalytical tool that will make key contributions to the fundamental understanding of biomolecular interactions, which is needed in basic research as well as in the pharmaceutical industry.

Keywords: label free optical microscopy,single biomolecule imaging,nanofluidics,nanoplasmonics,optical actuators,thermo responsive polymers,biomolecular interactions
Knowledge and climate services from an African observation and Data research Infrastructure (KADI)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Research infrastructures
Theme: Research infrastructures
Destination: Development and infrastructures
Action type: Coordination and support actions
Countries involved: Finland,South Africa,Spain,France,Côte d'Ivoire,Ireland,Norway,Greece,Switzerland,Kenya
Call: Strengthen the bilateral cooperation on research infrastructures with Africa: improving the knowledge base on climate change in Africa (HORIZON-INFRA-2021-DEV-01, 2021)
Start date: 2022-09-01
End date: 2025-08-31
Duration (months): 36.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1500000.0
EU funding (EUR): 1500000.0
Participants: 17
Project status: SIGNED

The project ?Knowledge and climate services from an African observation and Data research Infrastructure? aims to provide concepts for developing the best available science and science-based services in Africa that are needed to sharpen our common action on climate change as outlined in the Paris Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals, in particular SDG 13 ?Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts?. The concepts we want to provide aim at improving the knowledge base on climate change in Africa and developing the tools to combat the negative consequences of it. This basic objective shall be achieved by a consortium that combines partners from Africa and Europe but also combines diverse experiences, backgrounds and viewpoints. The common goal is to provide a comprehensive concept that supports the important societal role of research outlined above by co-designing research capacities for climate change observation with societal demands and expectations, in our case called ?climate services? and to pave the way for their implementation. The specific objectives of the proposed project are: ? A comprehensive design for a pan-African climate observation system developed on the basis of climate services as guiding design principle. This shall be rooted in a comprehensive documentation of past and existing observing capability, contrasted with scientifically justified requirements to identify the gaps. ? A broad information network as basis for a successful and sustainable cooperation that connects infrastructure operators, scientists, data and knowledge users, a community of practice in climate services, agencies and funding bodies. This will be achieved by a dense networking and knowledge exchange approach connecting to all important players on the global, continental, national, and local level. ? A solid strategy for implementation and usage in close connection to future actors and users.

Keywords: climate services,observations,africa,europe,research infrastructures,icos
Exploring the potential of snow data assimilation in forest areas (SDA-For)

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: Environment and Geosciences
Countries involved: France,United States,Spain
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2022 (HORIZON-MSCA-2022-PF-01, 2022)
Start date: 2023-10-01
End date: 2025-09-30
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 203159.52
EU funding (EUR): 203159.52
Participants: 3
Project status: CLOSED

Despite its importance, snow water equivalent (SWE) monitoring remains an unresolved issue in modern hydrology. This is a consequence of the limitations of orbital sensors, the large spatial variability of the snowpack and the combined errors of meteorological forcings and numerical models. Snow data assimilation (SDA) of remotely sensed data into numerical models is one way to advance the estimation of SWE distribution in remote regions. However, implement SDA initiatives in forested areas is challenging, limiting the development of SDA initiatives in more than 20% of the Northern Hemisphere. The aim of this project is to train the candidate in sophisticated radiative transfer modelling and AI, to implement snow-forest interactions in data assimilation pipelines for a better understanding of snow freshwater resources. This main objective will be developed through the creation of an international network of experts, to train the researcher in different related topics. This includes Dr Jessica Lundquis (Outgoing phase host) from the University of Washington, an authority on forest-snow interactions, and Dr Simon Gascoin (returning phase host) from CESBIO (Toulouse, France), with long experience in multidisciplinary snow remote sensing. The results will be used to enhance the current capabilities of the MuSA tool, an open source and highly scalable data assimilation system developed by the researcher. The project will be the first effort to infer SWE in forest through SDA of spacial imagery, and therefore is of great interest for many stakeholders and scientists. The project is designed with an obvious focus on training the researcher in new techniques but also in soft skills thanks to the mentoring programs of both the University of Washington and CESBIO. The ultimate goal of the project is to improve the career prospects of the researcher, making him an authority in snow science and providing the scientific community with a new and sophisticated SDA tool.

Keywords: remote sensing,snow,forest,data assimilation,numerical modelling
PROgraMmable integrated photonic nEuromorphic and quanTum networks for High-speed imaging, communications and sEcUrity applicationS (PROMETHEUS)

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: Research and Innovation actions
Partnership: Photonics (co-programmed)
Countries involved: Spain,Greece,Denmark,Belgium,Italy,France,Germany,Switzerland
Call: Advanced Photonic Integrated Circuits (Photonics Partnership) (RIA) (HORIZON-CL4-2021-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01, 2021)
Start date: 2022-09-01
End date: 2026-08-31
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 3830019.75
EU funding (EUR): 3830019.0
Participants: 12
Project status: SIGNED

Bio-inspired and quantum paradigms have risen as the two main competitors aiming to address the inefficiency of “conventional” computational schemes. Up to now these two paradigms utilize non-overlapping routes towards addressing this common objective; routes that are challenging in terms of scalability and integration readiness. PROMETHEUS’ proposition aims to shatter the boundaries between neuromorphic and quantum engineering and merge them to a common disruptive photonic integrated platform, able to merge each field’s merits. The platform will be based on a dense reconfigurable silicon waveguide mesh, powered by non-volatile BaTiO3 phase-shifters offering marginal power consumption and GHz tuning speed, during mesh reconfiguration. A key “upgrade” to this “synaptic” platform will be the co-integration of ultra-fast, multi-section lasers, acting as “neurons”. Sophisticated electro-optic packaging, will provide the basis to PROMETHES’ platform so as to evolve from the proof-of-concept limbo to a standalone neuromorphic/quantum hybrid integrated engine. This versatile chip will enable the realization of neuromorphic architectures such as large-scale spiking neural networks by exploiting signal multiplexing and GHz firing rate, photonic time-based convolutional networks, liquid state machines and on-chip training. PROMETHEUS will render feasible the exploration of disruptive concepts such as quantum reservoir computing. The platform will be utilized as an integrated quantum random generator and as a physical unclonble function, adding physical layer trustworthiness and novel security features. PROMETHEUS’ chips will be benchmarked, in terms of consumption, accuracy, speed and versatility, in a set of demanding applications that extend from ultra-fast image processing for flow cytometry and machine vision, signal equalization and authentication in high-speed optical links to quantum key generation and distribution.

Keywords: neuromorphic computing,quantum computing
The role of structural variation in adaptive radiation (StrucRadiation)

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: Austria
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2021 (HORIZON-MSCA-2021-PF-01, 2021)
Start date: 2022-08-15
End date: 2024-08-14
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 183600.96
EU funding (EUR): 183600.96
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Long distance dispersal and adaptive radiation events have produced some of the most species rich ecosystems in the world. While colonizing lineages can adapt to new environments, the selective processes by which they do so is unclear given the paucity of genetic diversity in founder populations. Recent interest in the evolutionary role of transposable elements suggests they may contribute in generating genetic diversity through structural variation, doing so faster than the rate of background mutation. Despite research to date, evidence for exact mechanisms of transposable element mediated adaptive evolution is sparse. To address this, I propose to study a radiating clade of Diospyros (Ebenaceae) species on New Caledonia, a biodiversity hotspot. Following a long distance dispersal event, ca 30 species form an adaptive radiation and have larger genome sizes than congeners that arrived independently on the archipelago. Previous work has suggested that the divergence within the radiating lineage was driven largely by edaphic specialisation occurring independently multiple times. Here, I plan to investigate whether genes involved in adaptation to soil type are associated with structural variants, and whether these variants are mediated by transposable element activity. I will use three pairs of sister species, each of which is adapted to either fertile volcanic or poor ultramafic soils, enabling me to test for repeated patterns of adaptive evolution. This action will shed light on the potentially crucial but poorly understood contribution of transposable elements to adaptation, speciation, and biodiversity. Moreover, this work will provide understanding of the adaptive limits of different lineages in the face of ecological upheavals, relevant in the present context of environmental challenges.

Keywords: adaptive radiation edaphic adaptation structural variants transposable element adaptive introgression photosynthesis soil chemistry
Tuning the Tracks: Resolving the interplay between microtubule lattice conformation and kinesin-1 selectivity using cryo-EM (TuningTracks)

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: Netherlands
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2023 (HORIZON-MSCA-2023-PF-01, 2023)
Start date: 2024-04-15
End date: 2026-04-14
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 187624.32
EU funding (EUR): 187624.32
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Kinesin-1 transports cellular cargos along microtubules as part of neuronal transport. The localisation of kinesin-1 in neurons is tightly controlled to ensure the coordinated delivery of specific cargoes to the regions where they are required. One mechanism of control is through microtubule regulation, but the details of this are not well understood. It has recently been shown that microtubule lattice spacing influences kinesin-1 localisation in U2OS cells. However, the role lattice spacing plays in neuronal transport is unclear. This project aims to investigate features of kinesin-1 based neuronal transport on multiple scales. First, this project aims to use cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) to elucidate how kinesin-1 binds to specific microtubule subsets. I will resolve the high-resolution cryo-EM structure of a dimeric kinesin-1 construct (stableMARK) bound to microtubules with different lattice states. This will explain its lattice specificity and help uncover the mechanics of kinesin-1 walking. Secondly, I will map microtubule lattice spacing in neurons using in situ cryo-electron tomography to establish the lattice diversity within this complex microtubule network. Thirdly, I will use cryo-correlative light electron microscopy and stableMARK to determine if lattice spacing influences kinesin-1 localisation in neurons. This project will answer key biological questions on cytoskeletal transport, which will be applicable to other microtubule-based motors and microtubule associated proteins. Defects in kinesin-1 based transport have been implicated in multiple neuropathies, such as Alzheimer’s disease, therefore further understanding of how neuronal transport is controlled will help uncover the mechanism of these diseases.

Keywords: cytoskeleton,kinesin,microtubule,neuron,cryo em,cryo et,cryo clem,cell transport,neuropathy