Data-Gouv-ML/pcri-informations-sur-les-projets-laureats huggingface dataset:
Developing the next generation of cis-targeting macrophage-T cell cancer immunotherapies (MiTE)

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: Israel
Call: ERC PROOF OF CONCEPT GRANTS (ERC-2023-POC, 2023)
Start date: 2023-06-01
End date: 2025-05-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 150000.0
EU funding (EUR): 150000.0
Participants: 1
Project status: CLOSED

Immunotherapy holds great promise for the curative treatment of millions of cancer patients, with a market size of over 100 billion USD today, which is expected to at least double in the next decade. Cancer immunotherapies are designed either to promote anti-tumor immune activity in the tumor microenvironment (TME), via molecules such as cytokines and antibodies, or to inhibit negative T cell signals induced by cancer and antigen-presenting cells (APCs) in the TME, an approach known as immune checkpoint blockade (ICB). Yet current immunotherapies have shown significant clinical success only against a limited number of cancers, for two major reasons: insufficient anti-tumor immune activation or severe side effects and toxicity as a result of nonspecific immune activation. We propose to overcome these two challenges through the development of a novel class of molecules capable of simultaneously modulating the myeloid and lymphoid immune cell compartments in the TME and generating a highly specific and extremely potent antitumor immune response. In this PoC grant, we seek to validate the ability to construct such dual-modulatory agents, which will provide us with the proof-of-concept for these technologies.
Evolutionary dynamics of pancreatic cancer at single-cell and spatial levels (EVO-PDAC)

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: Germany
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): 173847.36
EU funding (EUR): 173847.36
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is the most common type of pancreatic cancer, a disease with a dismal prognosis. PDAC has an especially high tendency of quickly metastasizing and becoming resistant to therapy, and the mechanisms by which this occurs are largely unknown. Recent evidence suggests that saltatory or “burst-like” evolution mediated by complex genomic rearrangements (CGRs) may be especially relevant in PDAC, altering multiple cancer genes in a single event. However, quantifying CGRs requires specialized techniques (such as Strand-Seq), and therefore the relative importance of CGRs, simple structural variants, and point mutations in PDAC evolution remains unclear. In this project, we will use a genetically engineered mouse model (GEMM) that develops de novo PDAC to longitudinally track PDAC evolution by single-cell and spatial multi-omic methods, using Strand-Seq to accurately detect CGRs. Thus, we aim to create longitudinal single-cell and spatial multi-omic atlases of PDAC at three key evolutionary steps: pre-cancer, therapy-naive PDAC, and post-therapy PDAC. In addition, we will compare our atlases to human PDAC data from the Spatial And Temporal Resolution of Intratumoral Heterogeneity in 3 hard-to-treat Cancers (SATURN3) Consortium. In this way, we will model PDAC evolution at various time points, quantifying the relative importance of gradual vs saltatory evolution and determining how evolvability changes over time. Moreover, we will infer the role of selective pressures from the tumor microenvironment (e.g., immune cells and cancer-associated fibroblasts) in shaping PDAC evolution. Finally, we will explore how all these factors interact with the high intratumoral heterogeneity observed in PDAC. Overall, this project will answer long-standing questions about the evolutionary dynamics of PDAC.

Keywords: single cell multi omics spatial multi omics cancer evolution pancreatic cancer structural variation
Active Young, Healthy Mind: Strategies for psychological well-being in university students (YoungFitT)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Postdoctoral Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Life Sciences
Countries involved: Spain
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2023 (HORIZON-MSCA-2023-PF-01, 2023)
Start date: 2024-11-01
End date: 2026-10-31
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 181152.96
EU funding (EUR): 181152.96
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

In recent years, there has been an increase in mental health problems among university students. University life is socially complex and stressful, and young adults often exhibit low levels of physical activity. This poses a significant threat to the students' mental and physical health. What is urgently needed is a strategy to boost mental and physical health that can be easily accessed and integrated into a student's life. The first objective is to evaluate the effectiveness of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), Tai Chi Chuang (TCC), and High-Intensity Functional Training (HIFT) on the cognitive and mental health of university students and uncover potential mediators and moderators. This study intends to explore the effects of potential mediators on physical (physical activity and fitness status), mental (mindful thinking, sleep quality, and fatigue), and physiological stress (heart rate variability) levels. It will also examine the potential moderator effects of demographic factors (sex/gender, age, and educational level) and individual factors (cognitive reserve, intelligence quotient, personality) on intervention-induced changes in proposed outcomes. To achieve this, a three-arm randomized controlled trial will be conducted. Considering that an immersive virtual reality (VR) environment can offer additional benefits and improve training adherence, the second objective will focus on exploring the feasibility and effectiveness of mind and body interventions using VR (MBSR-VR, TCC-VR, HIFT-VR) on the cognitive and mental health among university students. To do so, another randomized controlled trial will be undertaken. The results are expected to facilitate the development of targeted well-being strategies for individual students. YoungFitT aims to contribute to NU 2030 Sustainable Development Goal 3: Good Health and Well-being through a multidisciplinary approach, combining sports science, computer science, and neuropsychology.

Keywords: mind and body interventions,physical exercise,tai chi chuan,mental health,mindfulness,vr based interventions,psychological well being,university students,stressors,well being strategy
Event-based LEarning, Vision, And conTrol for Embodied systems (ELEVATE)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Doctoral Networks
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Information Science and Engineering
Countries involved: Belgium,Netherlands,Sweden,Germany,United Kingdom,Portugal,Switzerland,France
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): 4522697.28
EU funding (EUR): 4522697.28
Participants: 21
Project status: SIGNED

Computing with neuromorphic hardware, learning with spiking neural networks, and sensing with event-based cameras are recent examples of new technologies that have the potential of revolutionizing the learning and control capabilities of digital automation and robotics. They offer a novel and unique opportunity to make machine intelligence more efficient, more embodied, and more resilient. Event-based technology will enable online learning over multiple temporal and spatial scales, sensors with embodied adaptive intelligence, and improved translation of rhythmic features of animal intelligence in machines. Yet the discipline is still in its infancy and technology lies ahead of methodology. While the potential of event-based information processing has been researched separately in neuroscience, in algorithmic science, and in electronic circuit design, the deployment of event-based machine intelligence across the broad spectrum of automation technologies requires a much higher level of integration. The sparse and asynchronous nature of event-based information impacts the design all the way from the sensing and computing hardware to the perception and decision-making functionalities of the entire system. The Doctoral network ELEVATE proposes to educate a new generation of information engineers able to address those challenges through a unique environment combining leading international recognition in complementary scientific disciplines, a diverse range of companies at the forefront of event-based technology, and a culture of machine design inspired by the challenge of further digitalizing our societies with a focus on sustainability, security, and ethics.

Keywords: neuromorphic engineering,event cameras,neuromorphic computing,event based technology
Evolution of Novel Contacts in Orthologous Regulatory Elements (ENCORE)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Postdoctoral Fellowships
Action type: Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions
Panel: Life Sciences
Countries involved: Spain
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2023 (HORIZON-MSCA-2023-PF-01, 2023)
Start date: 2025-05-01
End date: 2027-04-30
Duration (months): 24.0
Total project cost (EUR): 165312.96
EU funding (EUR): 165312.96
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Thousands of Conserved Non-coding Elements (CNEs) are shared by jawed vertebrates, some of which were shown to be important developmental enhancers. However, how these intriguing elements evolve at the functional level and why they are so conserved in sequence remain some of the biggest mysteries in the field of regulatory genomics. In this project, I build a novel view of CNE function and evolution based on my preliminary data and recent breakthroughs on enhancer pleiotropy. This working hypothesis posits that CNEs are ancient transcription factor binding hubs that act as dynamic multi-genic regulators to which new gene targets can be added/removed during evolution. Taking advantage of the exceptional conservation of CNEs, I propose the experimental framework to test this hypothesis on orthologous elements across major vertebrate clades using cutting-edge methodology combining Capture-HiC, RNA-seq and ATAC-seq in shark, chicken and mouse. This approach will provide comparative CNE-target contact maps that will reveal conserved as well as gained and lost interactions in each species, whose functional impact will be tested using CRISPR knockout and interference in mouse neuronal differentiation. In summary, this project will address long-standing questions on the evolution of the regulatory genome and offer insights into the flexibility of enhancers to acquire and lose targets in evolution, expanding our understanding on the pervasiveness and evolution of regulatory pleiotropy.

Keywords: evolution,gene regulation
The Mathematization of Nature: The Origin of Mathematical Physics in Plato and Early Pythagoreanism (MatNat)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Advanced grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Texts and Concepts
Panel description: Literary studies , literature,  philosophy
Countries involved: Norway
Call: ERC ADVANCED GRANTS (ERC-2024-ADG, 2024)
Start date: 2026-01-01
End date: 2030-12-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2499998.0
EU funding (EUR): 2499998.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

‘The Book of Nature is written in geometrical characters’, wrote Galileo in 1623. The view that mathematics provides the language of nature has been an axiom of physics since Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler. Behind the founders of modern science stood, by their own admission, ‘our genuine masters, Plato and Pythagoras’ (Kepler 1597). But how did the early Pythagoreans and Plato conceive of and justify their mathematical world view? MatNat investigates the question of the historical origin of the mathematization of nature from the point of view of a deep conceptual puzzle: How can necessary mathematical truths concerning unchanging abstract entities explain the contingent, variable and inexact happenings evident to the senses? MatNat shows that the mathematical world view was born through answering this puzzle. As MatNat will argue, the early Pythagoreans and following them Plato showed why exactly mathematics, and mathematics alone, is the appropriate way to explain nature by demonstrating how nature itself is mathematically structured. They developed the mathematics of their day specifically to the tasks of explaining change, body and perceptibility, the basic features of nature, as the ancients understood it. This mathematical model of nature appeared already in the early Pythagoreans, particularly Philolaus and Archytas, but was fully developed by Plato in his Timaeus. To establish the claim MatNat innovates methodologically by triangulating newly established evidence for early Pythagoreanism with the reports of Plato's first students in the Early Academy and detailed readings of Plato's Timaeus. The methodology enables MatNat to offer groundbreaking interpretations of Plato's natural philosophy showing for the first time how the Timaeus, the foundational text for Western mathematical science, answered the basic conceptual question of the applicability of mathematics to nature.
A nano-electromechanical quantum simulator (MechQSim)

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: Spain
Call: MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2022 (HORIZON-MSCA-2022-PF-01, 2022)
Start date: 2024-01-01
End date: 2026-02-28
Duration (months): 26.0
Total project cost (EUR): 181152.96
EU funding (EUR): 181152.96
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

Electron-phonon interactions lead to a plethora of phenomena in strongly correlated solid-state systems such as superconductivity and charge-density waves. However, the complex dynamics manifesting these phases can be beyond the reach of computational modelling, especially when taking into account electron-electron interaction. Therefore, one of the outstanding challenges in the field of correlated-electron physics is a widely tuneable model system that can mutually couple several electronic and phononic degrees of freedom. To date, no such system has been experimentally realized. While previous efforts have mostly focused on cold-atom configurations, nano-electromechanical systems are naturally suited to address this challenge. One of the most challenging requirements to engineering such a system is the achievement of ultrastrong electromechanical coupling, which has been recently demonstrated for the first time in a capacitively coupled carbon nanotube. Leveraging this capability, we propose to engineer a model system in which electronic degrees of freedom are defined within four quantum dots and coupled to vibrational modes of a carbon nanotube. If successful, the project will enable the first experimental platform for quantum simulation of electron-phonon coupling. The proposal combines techniques from different fields to create a hybrid quantum system that significantly extends the state-of-the-art in nano-electromechanics. The Quantum NanoElectronics & NanoMechanics group at ICFO is one of the two only research groups to experimentally demonstrate ultrastrong electromechanical coupling to date and is the world leader in the fabrication of ultraclean carbon nanotubes. These capabilities, combined with my strong background in both experimental and theoretical nanomechanics, place us in a unique position to realize this milestone.

Keywords: carbon nanotube quantum simulator nanomechanics
High-resolution Boron and beyond Geologic reconstructions for carbon and climate processes (HighBorG)

Framework: Horizon Europe — Excellent Science
Programme: European Research Council (ERC)
Theme: European research council
Destination: Consolidator grants
Action type: ERC actions
Panel: Earth System Science
Panel description: Physical geography, geo logy, geophysics, atmospheric sciences, oceanography, climatology, cryology, ecology, global environmental change, biogeochemical cycles, natural resources management
Countries involved: Germany
Call: ERC CONSOLIDATOR GRANTS (ERC-2023-COG, 2023)
Start date: 2024-09-01
End date: 2029-08-31
Duration (months): 60.0
Total project cost (EUR): 1999925.0
EU funding (EUR): 1999925.0
Participants: 1
Project status: SIGNED

The link between climate and CO2 is not always straightforward, particularly during periods of multiple climatic and environmental changes, but atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) plays an important part in determining climate on human and geological timescales. For example, state dependency of climate sensitivity, the response of Earth’s temperature to CO2, is a critical unknown for future climate projections and policy strategies. Another unknown is the response of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (AIS) at different CO2 thresholds for its melting and growth, “hysteresis”, despite the fact that this will ultimate determine the magnitude of future sea level rise. Existing records suggest that the ice sheet margin waxed and waned since the Eocene, ~50 million years ago (Ma), while CO2 varied within the likely range projected for year 2100 and Earth’s temperature progressively cooled. HighBorG aims to resolve climate-AIS-CO2 unknowns on three periods of the geologic past: 52-46 Ma (hot Earth, high CO2, likely ice free), largely unexplored 39-23 Ma (when AIS was established), and 17-13 Ma (cold Earth, low CO2, dynamic AIS). HighBorG focuses on reconstructing CO2-climate feedbacks at millennial/orbital timescales, a medium risk high gain opportunity necessary to resolve warming and cooling periods at different climate states. To achieve this, a new automated system for purification-analysis will be developed, accompanied by a laser ablation split-stream approach, utilising new marine archives and cutting-edge methodologies. Seasonal reconstructions from contemporaneous tropical corals will provide a novel way to constrain seawater composition, necessary to obtain accurate estimates of CO2. Earth system modelling incorporating reconstructions will provide a new understanding of the mechanisms driving state dependent interactions between Earth’s orbit, CO2, temperature, cryosphere and carbon cycling, increasing our confidence to sea level/temperature projections for the future.

Keywords: geochemistry,oceanography,atmospheric co2,ice sheets
DEaling with conflicts related to MIgration: NEgotiating social cohesion through communication (DEMINE)

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: Belgium,Denmark,Italy,Netherlands
Call: MSCA Doctoral Networks 2023 (HORIZON-MSCA-2023-DN-01, 2023)
Start date: 2024-11-01
End date: 2028-10-31
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 2471536.8
EU funding (EUR): 2471536.8
Participants: 15
Project status: SIGNED

The DEMINE (Dealing with conflicts related to Migration: Negotiating social cohesion through communication) European Joint Doctorate (DN-JD) network addresses a critical challenge facing Europe: the increasing prevalence of radicalisation and extremism, which threaten social cohesion, particularly in the context of migration. DEMINE's primary aim is to develop an interdisciplinary research and training programme that examines the complex relationships between mediated (conventional and social media) and interpersonal comThe DEMINE (Dealing with conflicts related to Migration: Negotiating social cohesion through communication) European Joint Doctorate (DN-JD) network is a collaborative initiative that spans multiple fields of study. Its main objective is to strengthen Europe's ability to confront a significant challenge: the increasing prevalence of various forms of radicalisation and extremism, which pose a threat to social unity. DEMINE accomplishes this by combining cross-sectoral mobility and a well-rounded mix of research-oriented and transferable skills development. The network aims to establish a much-needed framework for understanding the role and interaction of interpersonal and mediated communication in relations between different groups and conflicts related to migration and globalisation, ultimately contributing to social cohesion. DEMINE has designed a comprehensive research and training programme that delves into the intricate connections between various forms of communication, such as traditional media, social media, and face-to-face interactions. This programme seeks to unravel how different communication channels influence individuals' attitudes and beliefs regarding migration, as well as their impact on intergroup dynamics (social cohesion). This cross-country exploration takes place within the broader context of political and societal polarisation, as well as the processes of radicalisation, with a specific emphasis on aspects related to migration.

Keywords: polarisation,radicalisation,intergroup conflict,interpersonal and mediated communication,socially unacceptable extreme discourse,countermeasures,adolescents,news producers,political actors