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twinning for excellence in adaptive edge ai
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the main goal of aida4edge is to strengthen networking between the coordinator feeuni and the advanced partners ihp uom and unife from european institutions in order to enable feeuni to reach scientific and innovation excellence in the field of edge ai artificial intelligence fundamental and thriving research will tackle the issue of bringing complex ai algorithms to edge devices with resource constrains in terms of memory processing power energy consumption and latency to meet this challenge the synergy of expertise of all partners will be exploited and an adaptive aienabled edge computing pipeline will be developed unife will contribute with the expertise in the field of optimization and tuning hyperparameters of ann artificial neural network utilizing probabilistic logic ihp will be in charge of exploiting the advantages brought by multicore ai accelerators in terms of power consumption and reliability uom will leverage the synergies between bioinspired snns spiking neural networks and anns to maintain the accuracy of conventional anns and to exploit the input data sparsity through the asynchronous computational capabilities of bioinspired snns feeuni will bring the expertise in quantization important for ann compression and resource saving by the knowledge transfer and the exchange of the best practice networking will provide feeuni all knowledge it lacks it will enable feeuni not only to empower research capacity but also to become the center of excellence in the field of edge ai and to raise the reputation and enhance research management capacities and administrative skills this will strengthen and encourage feeuni team with a lot of women involved to apply to variety of new research calls and to boost progress in science and economy in serbia and beyond reducing the imbalance of research capabilities between developed european countries and serbia
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observational signatures of planet formation in externally irradiated discs
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star and planet formation typically occurs in star forming regions more massive than the nearby lowmass regions that have been the main focus of observational studies of protoplanetary discs in massive regions irradiation by neighbouring massive stars can heat this protoplanetary disc of dust and gas from which planets form this heating drives thermal winds that extract dust and gas reducing the mass available for planet formation in typical star and planet forming environments these winds are sufficient to drastically change the outcome of planet formation however this consideration is currently missing from models further we are yet to find observational evidence of planet formation in the strongly externally irradiated discs that are the most common these advances are essential steps in understanding the properties of exoplanets and in uncovering the key processes that govern their formation during this project i will make new calculations of the massloss rates for irradiated discs as small dust grains are processed into planets i will then use semianalytic computational modelling to investigate how the process of planet formation differs in externally irradiated environments compared to nonirradiated environments i will compare these models to state of the art observations of protoplanetary discs putting constraints on the physics of disc evolution finally i will run hydrodynamic and radiative transfer calculations to make predictions for observational searches for planets in irradiated environments these efforts are essential for understanding how planet formation proceeds in typical star formation environments in this way i will unveil how the star formation environment sculpts the observed exoplanet population
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ecoevolutionary feedback as an engine for maintaining biological diversity in heterogeneous landscapes toward landscapelevel theory of ecoevolutionary dynamics
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in the last two decades studies have revealed that evolutionary changes can occur rapidly on ecological timescales this indicates that ecological and evolutionary processes can interact and influence one another this phenomenon is called ecoevolutionary dynamics for ecoevolutionary dynamics to occur populations need to harbour sufficient standing genetic variation many factors influence genetic variation one of which is spatial population structure many populations living in heterogeneous landscapes occur as spatially subdivided populations connected by dispersal known as metapopulations habitat network structure spatial configuration of habitat patches influences not only the demography of metapopulations but also the distribution of genetic materials by mediating population size and gene flow this implies that ecoevolutionarily dynamic responses may be spatially unevenly distributed in heterogeneous landscapes the mosaic of ecoevolutionary coupling could be partly predictable from habitat network structure and the movement of organisms the goal of this project is to investigate how habitat network structure can shape the spatial structure of standing genetic variation in metapopulations and consequently how it can influence spatial ecoevolutionary dynamics this project will build a theoretical understanding of the effects of major dimensions of habitat network structure on genetic variation and local adaptation in metapopulations the model will be applied to ecologically and genetically wellcharacterised empirical metapopulations studied by the supervisor this project will combine ecoevolutionary metapopulation modelling and genomic and field population data to mechanistically understand the role of space in ecoevolutionary dynamics i will conduct research in france for the first time gain new skills in genomics and population genetics and sharpen and transfer my existing modelling and remote sensing skills at the host organisation
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lightweight high performance concrete for modular floating structures
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litefloatcon aims to build an international and intersectoral partnership for highquality research development on innovative lightweight high performance concrete lwhpc and its application on multipurpose modular floating structures for coastal space utilisation to achieve this ambition litefloatcon brings along a multidisciplinary team comprising 33 researchers from nine academic partners with complementary expertise the scientific objectives include 1 developing innovative lwhpc suitable for coastal applications 2 investigating the influence of various additives on the rheological and mechanical properties 3 assessing the durability properties 4 measuring the fatigue performance of lwhpc of various compositions developed 5 conceptual development of novel modular floating structural units with optimised shape and size 6 developing an easyfit intermodular connector 7 examining the global and local structural and hydrodynamic performances of the modular floating units and 8 generating lifecycle analysis and performancebased design guidelines and recommendations the outcomes of litefloatcon include longterm and sustainable international partnerships that enhance the quality of research towards a modular floating lwhpc system with verified system design material durability and structural safety and an analysis and assessment framework for social and environmental impacts these contribute to the development of nextgeneration coastal structures to improved scientific knowledge of material and structural behaviour in harsh marine environments to design standardisation of the offshore industry and to europes climate and sustainability goals
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hydrogen oxidizing bacteria engineered to valorize co2 for whey protein production
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milk protein plays an important role in our nutrition however classical milk production has significant environmental impacts from greenhouse gas ghg emissions to extensive land demand project hydrocow addresses these challenges through a netzero carbon dairy protein production platform the main objective of the project isto develop and demonstrate a bacterial protein secretion system where co2 and soon n2 is valorised into foodgrade protein decoupled from agriculture this system will base on the firstofakind engineered hydrogen oxidizing bacterium ehob xanthobacter sp sof1 as a first product the main milk component betalactoglobulin was chosentechnically this will be achieved by implementing a designbuildtestlearn dbtl cycle linked to a validation and scaleup phase allowing to iteratively optimize the production of secreted protein the project will deliver key technologies a an innovative ehob protein secretion system b predictive ehob metabolic models genetic engineering tools and a novel highthroughput htp screening system for dbtl cycling and c the methods for validation and scaleup with immediate and longterm impact on the production of food and nutrition materials medicines fuels and chemicals in the longterm the proposed platform has the potential to not only replace conventionally produced food proteins but also deliver proteins for materials or therapeutics important for human and animal health in comparison to current standard microbial production processes our platform does not compete with human nutrition for valuable feedstock such as glucose and therefore will contribute to a sustainable development of our society hydrocow will generate significant knowledge for a growing research and application community about autotrophic microbial production systems their physiology and sophisticated tools for genetically designing and screening them
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niche geometry as the regulator of communal metabolism and cell fate
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tissue renewal by adult stem cells is regulated by a multitude of cell intrinsic and extrinsic mechanism which jointly guide decisions between stem cell selfrenewal and differentiation change between these two cellular fates is considered to result from transcriptional events that sequentially alter the function of the whole cell including its metabolism however recent findings by us and others demonstrate that metabolism can actually actively influence cell fate moreover metabolites can be exchanged between neighbor cells in the stem cell niche raising the question on how cell fate can be accurately controlledi hypothesize that fate of tissue stem cells is controlled by metabolism running jointly within the surrounding cellular community and the geometry of the niche regulates stem cells via effects on this communal metabolism in order to first identify metabolic pathways capable of altering cell fate we will establish the exact order of metabolic and transcriptional events that distinguish the two daughters cells in the first hours after asymmetric cell division second to assess the extent and impact of metabolite sharing in the stem cell niche we will develop methods capable of detecting exchange of metabolites that are produced specifically in one cell type and used by others finally to study the impact of niche geometry we will develop artificial scaffolds instructing custom niche topology and study the communal metabolism and stem cell fate regulation on tissue mimetic and nonphysiologic niche geometriesthe work is enabled by our unique research tools allowing identification of cells with distinct fates based on the chronological age of organelles they inherit in cell division moreover we study two stem cell systems with opposing dynamics providing insights on general principles and increasing robustness of the study plan our work also has the potential to uncover metabolic tools advancing protocols for future cellular therap
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macaronight 2022 2023 the researchers night of the macaronesia
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macaronesia is a biogeographical region of five archipelagos in the atlantic ocean of which four are inhabited azores portugal canarias spain madeira portugal and cape verde cabo verde these islands share common geographical traits and similar challenges with regards to climate change environmental degradation and loss of biodiversity the canary islands madeira and the azores are part of the european union eu outermost regions the overall objective of this project is to organise a shared researchers night for the macaronesia region for the fifth and sixth consecutive year connecting the population of these remote islands under the umbrella of the universal language of science for these two new editions macaronight iv aims at further widening public awareness towards science research and innovation especially in areas where the region faces global challenges such as those identified in the horizon europe missions the aim is to reach out to the population in general yet keeping specific focus on teenagers and young parents with kids in particular the project will deploy an enhanced socialmedia strategy that aims to engage with citizens of different ages in their own words through their daily used channels activities will cover 16 islands with the main activities organised at 4 locations tenerife la laguna gran canaria las palmas madeira funchal azores ponta delgada the programmes will be organised as hybrid onlinephysical events that will attract 20 thousand participants in 2022 and 25 thousand participants in 2023
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mechanical torsional oscillations driven by the angular momentum of light
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the ability of light to carry angular momentum has been the subject of an active scientific research since the beginning of 20th century and yet the knowledge in this area still has many gaps and overlooked possibilities for technological innovation in particular a nondissipative technology enabling an optomechanical transduction of the angular momentum irrespective of its spin or orbital nature is yet to be achieved the project oscillight offers an original solution to this problem by exploiting the inherent vector nature of angular momentum during the twoyear fellowship at university of bordeaux france dr georgiy tkachenko researcher guided by dr etienne brasselet supervisor will realize proofofconcept experimental demonstrations of the universal transfer of angular momentum that will lead to the implementation of a mechanical oscillator whose size will eventually make it compatible with onchip photonic systems this work will therefore answer the key strategic orientation of the european commission towards the development of digital enabling and emerging technologies for micronanoelectronics and photonicsthe proposed research is timely as the scientific literature over the last 5 years has seen the increasing emergence of studies on integrated optomechanical devices including those driven by angular momentum of light after the last few years of the relevant preparatory work done by the supervisor his students and collaborators the stage is now set for an effective implementation of this proposal and the researcher is the perfect candidate for the leading role to be played under the supervisors guidance most importantly the successful realization of this project will be beneficial to both the host university and the researchers career path to securing a stable academic position and eventually leading his own research group
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innovative offshore wind technologies in deep waters
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the infinite project demonstrates a 48 mw floating offshore wind system at 100m water depth with two key technology innovations the first is a disruptive and environmentfriendly concrete tension leg platform anchored with an innovative tendonbased mooring system the platform is designed to work with commercially available wtgs and is scalable modular and selfinstalling showing a vast potential for industrialisation the second is an innovative aluminium dynamic cable design that is safer lighter cheaper and allows for more standardisation in om the demonstrator makes use of a cost optimised om strategy that increases accessibility and turbine availability moreover best practices for value cocreation with local stakeholders are applied leading to increased public acceptance of offshore wind developments and an improved maritime spatial planning the innovations result in an lcoe of 853 eurmwh at project end and set the path to achieve 433 eurmwh by 2030 an lca of the technology innovations developed and an industrial roadmap bringing together innovation needs supply chain readiness and policy frameworks to allow mass production and deployment complement the project activities
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progressive research to enable policy action to respond and educate on disability
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the core objective of prepared is to support the next generation of experienced disability rights researchers to develop an evidence base for disabilityinclusive policy responses since the adoption of the un convention on the rights of persons with disabilities in 2006 there has been a rapid global expansion of legislation and policy on the rights of disabled people however in developing policy to respond to the most urgent crises of our time including climate crises forced migration armed conflict and refugee crises disabled people are often left behind while the obligations on states under human rights law are clear most governments are struggling to understand how to implement these obligations in a disabilityinclusive manner prepared will recruit 6 experienced researchers to complete 36month fellowships we will run an open meritbased competition for the applicants from a wide range of disciplines including but not limited to design technology communications politics sociology economics and law founded on international peer review as a world leader in excellent and impactful disability rights scholarship the centre for disability law and policy at the university of galway is uniquely positioned to ensure prepared makes lasting contributions to policy development at the national european and global levels experienced researchers will be embedded in our global networks and working directly with civil society leaders in our nonacademic partners such as drf inclusion int cbm and edf they will also be seconded within government departments and state agencies where they are most needed to design implement and monitor progress in achieving the goals of disabilityresponsive laws and policies this will provide researchers with unique opportunities to influence policy development at the heart of progress enabling them to further their careers in academia in progressive research to enable policy action to respond educate on disability
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development integration and demonstration of advanced software tools in scada systems for combining teslas and edisons world to realize high medium and low voltage hybrid acdc grids
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the optimised connection between power system design preoperational planning and realtime monitoring and control is crucial for effective stability management of future power systems this applies to both the hvdcmtdc power system connecting renewable energies and the acdc hybrid power system realtime capable algorithms and tools play a significant role in enabling optimal operation of the hybrid acdc system ensuring the avoidance of circular flows and supporting security analyses additionally innovative ancillary services such as frequency control mitigation of periodic frequency fluctuations voltage regulation and reactive power control are essential for stability management managing and controlling hybrid acdc systems and hvdc grids is a complex task that requires a collaborative effort among the main stakeholders such as tsos dsos oems policymakers and regulatory bodies and energy producers and energy consumers the daedalos project aims to address this complex task to facilitate the transition of the current power grid towards a novel approach where such acdc hybrid systems and mvdchvdc grids are foreseen to enable the growth of intermittent renewable energy sources the daedalos project is a 48months project divided in 7 wps that sets out to develop a comprehensive framework and specific advanced software tools to support planning operation and monitoring of acdc hybrid systems and mvdchvdc grids on a stateoftheart scada system addressing and going beyond both current and future issues of these systems such as low frequency oscillations detection and mitigation rocof shortcircuit prevention inertia estimation etc daedalos novel technologies will be developed and tested at trl67 two demonstrators one in the campus facility of university of aachen and the other in the university of catalunya facility will be realised to demonstrate the performances and the overall readiness of the proposed solution
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societal constitutionalism in a hegelian perspective
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contemporary political philosophy must address the rise of autonomous social sectors economy media science that escape state regulation by expanding beyond national borders and that challenge traditional forms of politics the problem at stake is the relationship between civil society and state which hegel first outlined from the perspective of the nationstate and which has since been radically reconfiguredsocial aims to develop a new approach to this issue by investigating todays autonomisation of economic social and cultural institutions and their integration at the political level the purpose is to contribute to the debate on the specificity of a transnational subject by introducing conceptual tools in the wake of hegelian institutional theorythe research will focus on the hegelian philosopher a kojve who explored the possibility of a civil society beyond the state and the relationship between the social and the political on a postnational scale social will highlight the common ground between this neohegelian model and contemporary reflections on societal constitutionalism in particular the work of the jurist g teubner to outline a new transnational societal constitutionalism in a global perspective the research will draw on the evolution of functional systems and on institutional pluralism aspects that current majoritarian approaches such as kantian cosmopolitanism or rawlsian theory of international justice do not sufficiently take into accountsocial aims to provide a unified perspective and a new way of conceiving philosophical research in current dialogue with extraphilosophical fields and contemporary debates its originality lies in the integration of a neohegelian perspective in political philosophy with different traditions like the theory of social systems and legal pluralism which are crucial for understanding the structure of society in a world articulated by the coexistence of many parallel legal orders beyond the state
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stochastic quantisation of quantum field theories with bosons and fermions
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the mathematical foundation of euclidean quantum field theory is a very active research area which has long been a central topic at the intersection of mathematical physics and probability theory a general probabilistic framework to describe quantum fields called stochastic quantisation was proposed in the early 80s by the nobel prize giorgio parisi in collaboration with yongshi wu and consists in the description of interacting quantum fields via the solution to some stochastic differential equation the proposal aims at exploring novel directions in stochastic analysis that would allow for a fruitful continuation of the stochastic quantisation programme namely the goal of the proposal is the extension of the known stochastic analytical methods in order to be able to construct quantum field theories for fermi fields with largescale singularities and quantum field theories for fermi and scalar or gauge fields with smallscale singularities
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causal roles of intrinsic coupling modes an integrated multiscale framework for cognitive network dynamics
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functional coupling is a hallmark of brain networks and there is a wealth of studies that have observed a relation between functional connectivity and cognition or sensorimotor processing however the vast majority of studies on this topic are correlative in nature and causal evidence for the role of functional coupling is almost completely lacking this project aims to fill this gap most of the coupling is intrinsically generated and occurs at multiple spatial and temporal scales we will focus on two different types of such intrinsic coupling modes icms phase icms arising from phase coupling of oscillatory signals and envelope icms resulting from coupled fluctuations of signal envelopes the central hypothesis of this project is that both types of icms have causal relevance for cognitive processing and behavior we will systematically manipulate analyze and model the different types of icms to establish an integrated view on their functions and interrelations which currently is still lacking specifically we aim to obtain the missing causal evidence on functional roles of icms to unravel how phase and envelope icms differ in their relation to cognition and behavior to reveal differences in the underlying mechanisms and to unravel potential interactions between both types of icms we will apply a translational approach which combines meg recordings and tacs in humans with invasive electrophysiology and optogenetics in ferrets we will use targeted multisite interventions to dissect icms independently manipulate phase and envelope coupling and test the impact on cognitive processing and behavior the experiments will be complemented by informationtheoretic analyses and computational modeling of icms this cuttingedge research program will yield an integrated multiscale framework for icms that is likely to have farreaching implications for a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying cognition and the complexity of the human mind
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informal innovations insights from artisan clusters and makerspaces in india
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innovation is considered to be the engine of economic development for any nation this is why studies on innovation have gained immense scholarly attention from different disciplines giving various insights however one major limitation of the studies on innovation has been their emphasis on the formal structures of the economy like rd institutes firms and industries there is very scant literature that focuses on the innovations which emerge in informal environments in academic literature there have been no agreed frameworks that are targeted towards the innovations generated within the informal contexts the limited amount of attention it received revolves around the concepts such as frugal innovations grassroots innovations or jugaad moreover policy thinking has been to suppress the informality and transfer it into the rigid formal sector in view of the limited focus on innovations within the informal settings in india this project proposes to study innovations developed in informal settings such study will offer rich insights into the innovative activities local resources knowledge and collaborations that contribute to innovations the project proposes to take two sites showcasing the rich prevalence of informal innovations the first site will be of a traditional artisan cluster whereas the second site will focus on a more modern case of informal innovations represented by the makerspaces this study will be useful to understand and compare the innovation characteristics in two different settings both representing some form of informality my project infoinn aims to1 study the networks collaborations and modes of learning among the different actors which facilitate innovations within the informal structure and 2 theoretically advance the literature on innovations by studying the informal contexts that will pave the way to open new perspectives on how to methodologically study and measure innovations in such contexts
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wearable integrated soft haptic display for prosthetics
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in this erc proof of concept we want to develop a wearable fluidic force feedback device for upper and lower limb prostheses composed by soft silicone chambers along with their actuation and control units to exert pressures in multiple specific stump sites this solution named wearable integrated soft haptic device wish strives to achieve both good modality matching mm and somatotopic matching sm while keeping noninvasive and practicable the principle preliminarily demonstrated on a single subject and one prosthesis type to display one type of forcetactile information has the potential to generalize in several directions our goal is to transform wish into a technology platform supporting different devices for different types of prosthesis available in the market for both upper and lower limbs we will depend on user involvement team with hospitals and rehabilitation units and work with companies producing prostheses see endorsement letters to acquire domain specific knowledge and to test our devices in real use cases through this project our technology readiness level will increase from 3 to 45 and enable us to apply for an eic transition for subsequent development and validation in a larger cohort to the best of our knowledge no other haptic display technology for prosthesis users has ever reached such maturity and readiness level which makes this opportunity unique
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scalingup quantum computers with quantum memory links
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fully achieving the many promises of quantum computing will require dramatically scaling up the number of quantum bits qubits that quantum computers manipulate the only way consists of interconnecting several midsized quantum processing units qpus in clusters to effectively multiply qubit countswelinq is building the essential interconnection technology to support modular quantum architectures by combining the worlds best quantum memory and novel networking protocols to construct quantum links our unrivalled ondemand storageandretrieval of quantum light enables us to efficiently entangle separated qpus enabling larger and more powerful quantum computerssqout will ensure the adaptability and scalability of welinqs fullstack solution to drive the global market adoption of our turnkey quantum links our internationally renowned team has unsurpassed technical expertise alongside quantum business commercialization experience with eic support welinq will make the interconnection of qpus a reality and secure europes quantum industry leadership
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quantum gravity searches with neutrino telescopes
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the standard model of particle physics and general relativity are expected to merge into a new theory of quantum gravity qg at energies approaching the planck scale however none of the proposed qg approaches has been validated to date in this context several signatures of qg effects in accessible energy regimes known as windows on quantum gravity have been postulated in particular quantum decoherence qd or qginduced violation of lorentz invariance liv could cause modifications in neutrino oscillation patterns accessible to observation with neutrino telescopes with qgrant i propose a global and novel search for qg effects with the icecube antares and km3net neutrino telescopes the expected results will allow to probe qd and liv parameters regions not accessible to date moreover the phenomenon of qd will provide new possibilities to investigate the neutrino nature as a dirac or majorana particle as well as to trace possible violations of cpt symmetry in neutrino oscillations such a phenomenon represents a totally new scenario where to test the real nature of neutrinos within qgrant i will analyse the huge amount of data collected by icecube antares and km3net europes most ambitious project of a high energy neutrino telescope whose effective mass angular resolution and wide energy coverage will make it an ideal instrument to further this research area the proposed analysis will provide unprecedented sensitivity to qg effects and it will open uncharted territory for new discoveries a planned cooperation with experts on qg will reinforce the theoretical impact of qgrant in terms of qg models the erlangen centre for astroparticle physics with its globally unique situation of hosting icecube and antareskm3net groups together with the quantum gravity institute represents the perfect host institution for my proposed research and my development as an independent physicist
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understanding of the membrane connection linking the nucleus to the endoplasmic reticulum
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compartmentalization into membranebound organelles is a key feature of all eukaryotic cells and communication between organelles needs to be tightly controlled a key organelle for the interorganelle communication is the endoplasmic reticulum er which is the major site of lipid and membrane protein synthesis the er exchanges molecules by forming stable contact sites with multiple organelles such as mitochondria via specific tethering proteins and transporters in contrast to these contact sites the er is linked to the nucleus via direct fusion to the outer nuclear membrane of the nuclear envelope ne these erne junctions are essential for supplying the lipids and proteins that are synthesized in the er to the ne hence nuclear function and morphology depend on the proper communication via erne junctions however the biogenesis architecture and maintenance of erne junctions have remained elusivewe have recently found that erne junctions exhibit a narrow and constricted ultrastructure during the cell cycle in mammalian cells these observations led us to postulate that erne junctions are formed and maintained by specific membraneshaping proteins that are crucial for nuclear function here we propose to identify the molecular mechanism that governs the structure and function of erne junctions we will provide a quantitative and dynamic highresolution view of these enigmatic structures by combining timeresolved electron microscopy and quantitative live imaging with molecular perturbations using these datasets we aim to develop a mechanistic model of how erne junctions form and contribute to nuclear functionthe ne proteins supplied via erne junctions have critical roles in gene expression nuclear organization and nuclear pore biogenesis as well as in differentiation development and disease therefore our research will provide a new conceptual framework that will open lines of investigation in many fields beyond erne biology
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investigation into reasons for drinking among adolescents and young adults a gender perspective
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in europe 535 of adolescents consume alcohol in excess but what has attracted attention is the increase in consumption among girls these used to drink less than boys but now their consumption is equal and on some contexts larger than boys how this happens in europe where it can be considered a trendsetter should be a global concern thus understanding the reasons for this behavior change is essential to develop prevention program strategies that are effective in young people existing programs are not successful they do not focus on specific gender situations and also on the mechanisms involved in this process in addition studies to date do not have a quantitative assessment as there are no instruments to unravel the reasons for alcohol consumption from the perspective of gender difference current studies have only a qualitative assessment it is impossible to compare groups of people and populations making a global view of this field unfeasiblethus the proposal will unravel the determinants of alcohol consumption in adolescents and young adults from a gender perspective this will be a paradigm shift in the knowledge of alcohol consumptionohgender is highly original and innovative as it provides a new instrument for quantitative assessment and will deliver a new model of consumption of alcohol determinants by an advanced technique of statistical analysis structural equation model advancing the field of gender disparity a tool to identify the different needs between girls and boys disclosing the determinants of alcohol consumption from a gender perspective will be an advance in the state of the art filling this unexplored knowledge gap the proposal will advance in the field of alcohol consumption prevention and has the potential to be an ongoing study after pf
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support to eic accelerator by the enterprise europe network
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the objective of een2eic is to empower een network offices support potential eic applicants specifically women entrepreneurs and widening countries and seal of excellence soe holders the project aims to develop a strong cooperation mechanism between the european innovation council and een in order to support innovation and scale up companies een2eic will involve the most relevant actors in the eic and een landscape the enterprise europe network een the eic ncps network access2eic een2eic aims to focus on specific outreach and support activities increasing the number of quality proposals to eic calls with a specific focus in widening countries as well as women innovators assisting seal of excellence holders access alternative sources of funding and guarantee a strong and profitable exchange of best practice within een een2eic overall objective is to make eu innovation support more efficient by improving the capacity of smes to apply to the eic and by helping soe holders finance their projects and to avoid overlapping with ncps activities
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cybersecurity for aiaugmented systems
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with aienhanced components being deployed everywhere including the very toolchains used for secure software development the traditional security focus on software and hardware assets can no longer guarantee secure services processes and products and digital infrastructures in the eu strategic plan 20212024 sec4ai4sec wants to develop securitybydesign testing and assurance techniques for aiaugmented systems their software and ai assets aiaugment systems provide an opportunity to democratize security expertise and give access to intelligent automated secure coding and testing by enabling novel capabilities lowering development costs and increasing software quality ai4sec they are also a risk aiaugmented systems are vulnerable to new security technical threats specific to aibased software in particular where matters of fairness or explainability are important sec4ai sec4ai4sec addresses these challenges to the fullest extent ai for better security security for better aithe sec4ai4sec project will address these two facets of ai to achieve a deep scientific economic and technological impact while contributing to addressing key societal issues it will validate its approach on three key scenarios of the eu digital compass towards digital sovereignty 5g core virtualization autonomy for safety systems in aviation and security and quality for 3rd party software assessment and certificationsec4ai4sec assembled a team with 5 leading universities amsterdam cagliari hamburg lugano trento 2 innovative smes frontendart pluribus one 3 large enterprises airbus sap thales and 1 center for digital innovation cefriel the project will generate a set of innovative techniques and opensource tools new methodologies for secure design and certification of aiaugmented systems as well as reference benchmarks that can be used to standardize the assessment of research results in the secure software research community
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strengthening the critical raw material independence of the eu through thermochronology
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the rapidly increasing green technology transition efforts of the european union to combat climate change resulted in an unprecedented demand for critical raw materials like rare earth elements cobalt nickel and even base metals these materials are core components of wind turbines and electric cars however to fulfil these needs the eu heavily relies on countries with a high risk of supply chain disruption due to political instability therefore the exploration efforts to find new deposits within the eu borders are crucial to securing economic independence and realising a co2free society the swedish part of the fennoscandian shield has serious potential to discover new deposits for instance it hosts the largest rare earth element reserve in the eu the areal extension of the fennoscandian shield is over 1 million km2 and composed of complex magmatic metamorphic and metasedimentary rocks dating back to archean over time due to multiple orogenic events critical raw material deposits formed and remobilized in diverse ways understanding the formation mechanisms is crucial to locating them my project critter strengthening the critical raw material independence of the eu through thermochronology will be the first study to reconstruct the thermal history of the fennoscandian shield from a critical raw material perspective it will be achieved by the interdisciplinary combination of novel hightemperature mica insitu rbsr dating at the dept of earth sciences gothenburg and by lowtemperature zircon rutile insitu upbhe double dating at the geoscience center göttingen these are worldclass laboratories in their respective field the research will target five key critical raw material deposits in the bergslagen ore province of southwestern sweden the findings will fill a decisive knowledge gap in identifying the nature and timeline of reheating and subsequent ore remobilization and redeposition events from proterozoic to present times
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reducing the footprint of consumer products through public dialogue and innovative biobased materials
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inguma aims to foster the development of biobased materials and their acceptance by the public by relying on three main values sustainability inclusion and aesthetics the values of the new european bauhausthe value of sustainability will be tackled by developing different types of biobased materials from raw materials derived from agriculture residues and secondary raw materials from wood processing various types of materials will be developed functionalized fibers insulation material based on mycelium resinfree insulation material based on wood fibers biobased adhesive for plywood lowformaldehyde plywood board wooden sandwich panels and growth media for plants in addition these materials will be integrated into insulation panels and vegetated roofsthe sustainability and circularity of these materials and solutions will be ensured by applying environmental criteria and digital tools that will allow users to make decisions on the most sustainable solutions available additionally the materials will be tested according to european and international standards as a first step in the commercialization outside of europe canadathe value of inclusion will imply the design of cocreation laboratories that encourage collaboration among stakeholders fostering transparent communication and generating innovative ideas these labs will provide a platform for engagement and a structured process for stakeholders to contribute their insights and actively participate in the development of biobased construction materials this way the acceptance of the developed materials products and solutions by endusers and consumers will be maximizedthe value of aesthetics will be accomplished by co designing and constructing a community house prototype in the rooftop of an experimental building derio spain and as part of test houses savonlinna finland that will use extensively the materials and products developed
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analysis of biofilm solid interactions underpinning wastewater treatment
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wastewater treatment wwt processes that use biofilms as their biocatalyst have been in use for over 100 years over the past few decades a greater understanding has emerged on how biofilms can be exploited for enhanced nutrient removal and this knowledge has been translated into new technologies representing about onethird of all wwt processes in a multibillioneuro global wastewater technology marketdespite the success of these technologies there is significant need for enhanced efficiencies in these processes and the development of new technologies that are more energy efficient and are capable of better resource recovery from wastewater are needed to achieve this there is need for new mechanistic insight in particular the interaction between biofilms and particulate organic matter in the influent wastewater the knowledgegap spans three key areas i nonoxidative interactions ii hydrolysis and iii bioflocculation this research project will develop an enhanced multispecies biofilm model that better incorporates new understating of these areas we will go significantly beyond current state of the art by first building an experimental platform that exploits recent developments in advanced imaging nanosensors particletracking to probe the fundamentals of these mechanisms to achieve this the platform will be uniquely based on fluorescently tagged monospecies biofilms rather than on conventional multispecies biofilm in a first phase of the project this work will then inform the development of new mathematical model relationships which will be implemented in an extended multispecies model and validated against data from a pilot plant operating with conditions representative of a real wwt plant the transformative approach in this project will lead to a more fundamental insight into the mechanisms underpinning particlebiofilm interactions and pave the way to new application of biofilms for advanced wastewater treatment
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interactions with future reachthrough volumetric displays
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displays in the shape of televisions computer screens or phones are ever present in our education work and entertainment however they do not take full advantage of our inner spatial abilities that we have to interact with the real world true 3d displays can provide the same visual clues as the real world without forcing the users to wear devices however with state of the art soa displays the users cannot reach inside the display volume to directly interact with the virtual objects as they would do in real life we envision a volumetric display capable of projecting true 3d virtual objects in midair that can be reached by the users to enable direct interaction ie a reachthrough volumetric display rvd this vision has been presented in multiple movies and books but there is no realizationthree novel technologies will be developed and combined to create an rvd 1 fast timemultiplexed acoustic fields will create virtual force fields that give shape to microfabricated lightscaterring particles 2 tomographic illumination will shine on the particles as a more scalable alternative to phasebased holographic 3 volumetric tracking of the particle distribution will control the previous technologies in a closedloop manner applications will serve as benchmarks to test novel interaction techniques and develop a framework that fills in the knowledge gap for interactions with as yet nonexistent rvds the objectives of the project are o1 find a set of technologies that enables the realization of rvds o2 create interaction techniques for rvds and categorize them using a framework that will be applicable to future displays our current frameworks for 3dinteractions may not be applicable to rvds o3 enhance an rvd with tactile sensations spatial audio and study its effects on humans the pi is uniquely qualified with experience in designing midair interactions and using levitated particles for displays
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towards an excellence centre on quantum photonics in latvia
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the field of quantum technology is experiencing rapid development with groundbreaking advancements by establishing the quantum flagship initiative the european union has taken a proactive approach to quantum technologies this initiative aims to explore and expand the frontiers of quantum technology quantum photonics plays a critical role within this framework in light of this our project seeks to chart a roadmap for the establishment of a centre of excellence of quantum photonics in latvia this endeavor holds significant importance as quantum photonics research remains underrepresented in latvia and the other baltic states despite their untapped potential in materials synthesis and research notably the institute of solid state physics at the university of latvia issp ul stands as one of the most esteemed institutes in the baltic states renowned for its expertise in studying optical properties of materials and conducting research on photonic elements by leveraging the expertise of issp ul and fostering collaborations with scientific partners from latvia and the baltic states we envision the creation of a europeanlevel competitive quantum photonics centre centered around issp ul recognizing latvias latent potential in this field it becomes imperative to develop a comprehensive roadmap for establishing such a centre of excellence to achieve this ambitious goal and facilitate the transfer of knowledge about quantum photonics technologies we have strategically chosen two esteemed western europe universities as our partners the university of trento and the university of technology of troyes both institutions boast a rich history of involvement in quantum photonics research and possess the necessary expertise to bridge the knowledge gaps at issp ul through the organization of conferences schools and workshops our partners will lay the foundations for further research and inovation development at the institute
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differential diagnosis of autoimmune hepatitis by cfchipseq liquid biopsy
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the identification of the causative agent and mechanism of liver disorders is essential for effective treatment the diagnostic challenge is differentiating autoimmune hepatitis drug induced liver damage and other nonviral causes of liver disease current diagnostic guidelines require in many cases liver biopsy followed by monitoring response to treatment before conclusive diagnosis our objective is to replace liver biopsy in the parenchymal liver disease settings with a minimally invasive liquid biopsy from a blood samplewe have developed cfchipseq a liquid biopsy that enables detection of gene activity in the cells contributing to cellfree dna cellfree dna is mostly chromatin fragments dnaprotein complexes these carry posttranslational epigenetic marks that are closely connected to gene regulation and activity in the cell of origin by capturing fragments marked with active transcription and sequencing their dna we map genomewide activity of genes in the cells contributing to circulating cellfree dnaliver damage results in increased contribution of liver cells to circulating cellfree dna moreover our preliminary results show that we can detect differences in the cfchipseq signal from different liver pathologies and that these differences involve genes associated with the relevant liver damage mechanisms we plan to develop methods for differential diagnosis of autoimmune liver diseases such as autoimmune hepatitis and other parenchymal liver diseases this will be supplemented by a multicenter cohort of patients to train and validate these tools together these will establish a preclinical evaluation of the capabilities of the assay in differential diagnosis and enable development of a product that would change the way we diagnose these diseases this product will improve the quality of diagnosis reduce the number of liver biopsies risk to patients and costs and provide more detailed followup during treatment
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the impact of chromatin on the evolution and adaptation of eukaryotes
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main hypothesis changes in chromatin drive evolution and adaptation in eukaryotesmain objective this project aims to understand the impact of epigenetic regulation on the evolution of eukaryotes adapted to extreme environments to achieve this objective i will use two approaches involving extremophilic eukaryotes 1 identify chromatin signatures to evaluate the potential roles of chromatin in adapting to extreme environments 2 use experimental evolution to examine how chromatin affects their capacity for adaptationbackground my previous research identified genome size reduction as a broad signature of adaptation strategies in extremophilic eukaryotes in particular an unanticipated loss of several canonical epigenetic pathways took place during the evolution of extremophilic red algae i hypothesize that global changes in chromatin features have influenced the adaptation to extreme environments in eukaryotes strategies i will apply orthogonal strategies to investigate the function of chromatin in environmental adaptability i will use multiomics to reveal adaptation signatures based on the comparison of the composition and maps of chromatin features between extremophilic and mesophilic groups genetic engineering in model red algae will identify the chromatin machinery that impacts adaptation to extreme environments finally experimental evolution will be used to characterize how the specific chromatin composition of extremophilic red algae impacts adaptation capacityimpact this work will establish how chromatin influences the evolution of eukaryotes with direct experimental evidence it will demonstrate how specific chromatin components impact eukaryotic adaptations and eventually identify some macroevolutionary trends that participate in the emergence of new eukaryotic lineages
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computing strategy for dataintensive science infrastructures in europe
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the amount of data gathered shared and processed in frontier research is set to increase steeply in the coming decade leading to unprecedented data processing simulation and analysis needs in particular the research communities in high energy physics and radio astronomy are preparing to launch new instruments that require data and compute infrastructures several orders of magnitude larger than what is currently available and entering in the exascale era to meet these requirements new dataintensive architectures heterogeneous resource federation models and it frameworks will be needed including largescale compute and storage capacity to be procured and made accessible at the paneuropean level additionally the emergence of highend exascale hpc and quantum computing systems provides new opportunities for accelerating discoveries and complementing the capabilities of existing research htc and cloud facilities addressing key questions around scalability performance energy efficiency portability interoperability and cybersecurity is crucial to ensuring the successful integration of these heterogeneous systems in this context the spectrum project aims to deliver a strategic research innovation and deployment agenda srida and a technical blueprint for a european compute and data continuum with a consortium composed of leading european science organisations in high energy physics and radio astronomy and leading einfrastructure providers covering htc hpc cloud and quantum technologies the project will work with a community of practice composed of external experts the ultimate goal is to pave the way towards dataintensive scientific collaborations with access to a federated european exabytescale research data federation and compute continuum
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support to all stakeholders from the photovoltaic sector and related sectors to contribute to the setplan
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the etip pv secretariat proposal eupv is designed to restrengthen the european technology and innovation platform for photovoltaics etip pv by implementing a strong and proactive secretariat which will provide effective support to the etip pv governance structures and the working groups it will also further work to ensure that the etip pv becomes the point of reference for all stakeholders especially pv industry but also european and member state officials the project shall continue integrating national or regional pv platforms and strengthening the relations with other organizations supporting the same goals such as eera but also national pv associations and all trade bodies aiming at supporting the development of the european pv industry not forgetting the other etips
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inspace manufactured solar array providing highly costefficient power generation for smallsats and inorbit servicing enabling european nondependence and competitiveness in space technologies
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inspace manufacturing ism is the key for overcoming the tyranny of launch ie the restriction that all space subsystems are prebuilt on earth and thus must be made to withstand the extreme mechanical loads at the launch of the rocket all while fitting into tight volumetric restrictions ism will save material and circumvent the limits in dimensions and massdcubed leverages ism for making solar arrays for satellites directly in space this is especially important for small satellites smallsat such as in internetfromspace constellations to satisfy increasingly high power demands at a fraction of the cost of conventional solar arrays smallsats play a big role in the growing newspace economy and the global space market which is expected to reach 1879b by 2032with our advanced ism technology for building solar arrays inorbit we will become technology and market leader based in europe thus ensuring european competitiveness and nondependence in space technologies
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breakthrough technologies for an implantable artificial kidney
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chronic kidney disease is a worldwide and evergrowing health crisis in which endstage patients largely depend on intramural dialysis placing a heavy burden on their life and on european health care systems kidnew develops groundbreaking and modular technology to enable an implantable artificial kidney with better functional kidney replacement therapy krt than currently available without need for immunosuppressive drugs and at reduced costs it provides proof of concept on three breakthrough technologies 1 solidstate miniature ultrahigh flux silicon sibased filter with a highdensity of uniform nanopores through novel block copolymer selfassembly and with novel hemocompatible biomimetic polymer polymer brush coating connected to a photonic clotting monitoring sensor and thrombolytic cleansing tool 2 solidstate bioreactorgrown kidney tubule cell monolayers on novel biomimetic siwafer based membrane with bioimpedancebased monolayer integrity monitoring and monolayer repair functionality using growthfactors 3 solidstate integrated functional biohybrid filter and tubule exchange units stacked in parallel in a multichip to demonstrate functional implantable krt in goatsan implantable bioartificial kidney will provide more effective more physiological and economical sustainable krt than dialysis ecofriendliness of proposed technologies in line with the eu green deal has recently been highlighted by the european kidney health alliance on the short to midterm the filter andor tubule unit may enter nichemarkets for extracorporeal use in complementing rather than replacing current dialysis solutions kidnew brings together scientists from the fields of clinical and regenerative nephrology umc utrecht nl regenerative pharmacology university utrecht nl chip technology imec nl and imec be optical sensing optofluid technologies oü ee blood compatible coatings cnrs fr and membrane technology mesep pl
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new directions for deep learning in cancer research through concept explainability and virtual experimentation
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deep learning dl is rapidly transforming cancer research and oncology dl can extract subtle visual features from preclinical and clinical image data in my junior research group i have developed endtoend dl methods to predict molecular biomarkers and clinical outcomes directly from histopathology slides because histopathology slides are ubiquitously available for any patient with a solid tumor dl is a broad tool for translational studies enabling researchers to extract molecular information and make predictions about clinical outcomehowever the potential of dl in cancer research is fundamentally limited because it is purely descriptive and in many cases a blackbox system also dl is currently disjoint from the vast amount of biological mechanistic knowledge in cancer research and from the world of experimentation in nadir i will close this gap my hypothesis is that dl models can not only make predictions but can be used to verifyexisting biological knowledge and to make new mechanistic discoveries the main tools that allow me to address this are concept explainability and counterfactual virtual experimentation for both there exists a nonmedical proof of concept but no systematic biomedical application yet i approach this problem as a biomedical cancer researcher with training in programming medical image analysis and biomedical engineering as such i will develop dl systems that can extract biological concepts can elucidate biological mechanisms and can be used to create and answer mechanistic hypotheses nadirs tools will be synergistic with and can be used together with other biological highthroughput experimentation pipelines such as transgenic animal experiments or tumor organoid cultures the main use case of nadir is focused on tumorimmune interaction in colorectal and gastric cancer and through the educational and outreach program in nadir it will be made available as a general tool for cancer researchers in biomedicine
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noncorrosive polymer electrolyte with preferential al3 transport for rechargeable aluminum batteries
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rechargeable aluminum batteries rabs are extremely promising due to inherent safety high theoretical volumetric energy density 4x of li and low cost of al metal 10x cheaper than li rabs can play a crucial role in ensuring and securing an affordable and safer eu energy supply in line with the eu green deal however the development of rabs is hindered by a lack of practical electrolytes the current stateoftheart soa ionicliquid electrolytes are extremely corrosive moisture sensitive expensive and do not offer al3 cationic species relying on the synergy between the researchers background and the hosts expertise the ncpepa project introduces an innovative and beyond the soa concept to develop a noncorrosive polymer electrolyte with preferential al3 cationic transport with high ionic conductivity objectives of the project address overall issues of the soa electrolytes this project will have a significant scientific and societal impact as ncpepa electrolyte promises the development of safer affordable and highenergy density rabs that will be pivotal to clean and green energy transition additionally it contributes to the enhancement of the eus scientific excellence being the leader of the energy storage materials subgroup within the multifunctional nanocomposite group at imdea and with a proven track of contribution in the field dr pendashteh a is the most appropriate supervisor the host institute imdea is also acknowledged as one of the best research institutes in spain with proven experience in developing materials and systems for batteries and immense experience in marie curie fellows hosting and project management the project will advance the researchers professional development and career growth by providing multidisciplinary skills along with access to management and related training that will equip the researcher to achieve his longterm goal of establishing a research group focused on developing sustainable batteries
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renewable energy sources power forecasting and synchronisation for smart grid networks management
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renewable energy sources power forecasting and synchronisation for smart grid networks managementrenewable energy sources res play a major role to the eus aspiration to transform to a climateneutral economy their integration into the power grid is pivotal to the green transition and to the decarbonisation of the energy sector however as the most commonly used res solar wind and hydropower are also weatherdependent their power generation capacity varies according to the local microclimatic conditions this power production variability makes res difficult to integrate into the power grid and to provide seamless stable and secure amounts of power on the other hand power demand also affects the power grid operation since there must always be a supplydemand balance in the power grid grid power imbalances can cause frequency fluctuations and other unwanted transient phenomena which can compromise grid stability and operation for that matter advanced grid monitoring techniques have been developed employing phasor measurement units pmus to measure the electrical signals in a precise and synchronised way based on a reliable timing reference yet currently no galileobased applications on pmu timing exist in the above framework respondent comes to address the challenges of res power generation forecasting demand forecasting and smart power grid monitoring and supplydemand balancing an aiml res power generation forecasting algorithm is proposed exploiting both copernicus eo and sitespecific weather data along with renewable energy power conversion models furthermore an aiml multiphysics model for power demand of certain communities is also developed lastly respondent will build a galileoenabled pmu and develop a monitoring module in order to test and verify the advantages offered from the galileo timing and synchronization services in smart grid monitoring power balancing and overall operation
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counterfeit detection validating the artdetect approach with stakeholders in the loop
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forged paintings pose an urgent challenge to international law enforcement agencies and the art world both the quantity and the quality of the works are alarming in practice however this type of art crime is notoriously difficult to detect and combat the cog project artdetect is generating new knowledge about significant anomalies that betray forged paintings as well as into key characteristics of comparable originals and is developing thinslicing tools ie computer programs and checklists that help to quickly and effectively select potential forgeries for indepth analysis however in order to ensure the practical application of the new knowledge and tools it is crucial to engage with stakeholders at an early stage in order to 1 gain access to a wide range of current cases 2 test the validity of the preliminary conclusions and 3 identify the challenges and opportunities in this restricted part of the marketthe team has a unique opportunity to collaborate with stakeholders and gain access to a large number of potential forgeries in the styles of more than 100 modern painters we are also setting up our own lab these circumstances allow us at relatively low cost to build an extensive curated image database of real cases to carefully annotate the images and to rigorously validate our preliminary conclusions through indepth confidential research with stakeholders codes will provide an extensive test dataset and useroriented guidelines that have the potential to revolutionize counterfeit detection
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the evolution of new organs during insects conquest of the sky
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the history of life on earth has been defined by key gamechanging events in animals this has often been driven by the appearance of novel organs conferring new capabilities to explore new niches and adaptive landscapes completely changing the subsequent evolution of certain lineages this proposal will focus on one of the most fascinating and revolutionary events in animal history insects conquest of the skies first by addressing the origin of the morphological change responsible for this revolution the origin of wings second by studying one of the multiple cascading effects set off by this initial event that continued shaping flying insects anatomy and boosted their diversification the turbanate eyes of mayflies a sexspecific extra set of eyes that males use to find mates during flight we still know very little about these two events due to the lack of data from key species and the need for multilevel and quantitative approaches my lab will overcome these difficulties by using a unique experimental platform that i have built over the last five years the setup of mayflies a key group to study insect evolution as a new experimentally tractable modelwe will study the genetic basis and key factors underlying the origin of these two organs with a multidisciplinary view combining single cell omics developmental and functional approaches and in the case of new eyes their impact in physiology and diversification by comparing these two evolutionary processes we will unveil key common and specific events in the evolution of the gene regulatory networks behind the origin of these two new organs this project will generate the most comprehensive picture of two novel organs with huge impact in the evolution and ecology of winged insects and mayflies answering longstanding evolutionary questions on morphological novelties this will have a major impact in the way we study and understand the origin of new forms and their transformative nature
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development and commercialisation of a next generation sports head guard embedded with clinically validated sensors for the detection of sports induced brain injuries
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10 of all contact sport athletes in rugbyfootballbaseballboxing sustain regular concussions mild traumatic brain mtbis injuries due to linear rotational head impacts globally 4mannum mtbi incidents are reported in contact sports with 201 concussions per 1000 player hrs concussion is the most common reported match injury occurs in 81 of the matches currently concussionsmtbi managementtreatment costs eu 17bannumno existing headgear is clinically approved to provide protection against linear and rotational impacts hence fail to reduce concussion incidentscontego sports are developing worlds first clinically approved headgear for contact sports nprosend which will reduce all linear impacts by 75 rotational by 55 as compared to existing headgear nprosend will also provide early detection of concussionmtbi by processing cumulative effect of head impact data collected by embedded iot enabled triaxial sensors and processed by ai algorithms
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temporal innovative model for imitative network generation a framework to analyse temporal networks and generate surrogates
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the timing project will develop a framework to analyse temporal networks and generate realistic surrogates observation of realworld temporal networks given as input will aim at grasping their intricate structure resulting from temporal and topological causalities and correlations i will devise a methodology to mimic these dynamics using concepts of network science theory as guidelines the generated synthetic networks will reproduce the fundamental features of the original topologies this methodology will allow to obtain surrogate temporal networks to replace real data when the latter are not usable or sharable this is particularly useful for social data often subject to privacy issues moreover since collected datasets are generally too small to observe interesting effects when simulating dynamical processes a crucial problem eg in computational epidemiology it will serve as a tool for data augmentation timing will in fact allow generating temporal networks with a higher number of nodes and a longer time span based on original patterns extracted from smaller available datasets timing will also provide the possibility to merge different original data eg social interactions collected in different environments providing a more realistic synthetic portrait of a society existing methods to generate realistic temporal graphs are scarce and are mainly based on blind reproduction of an original network or they focus on specific theoretical aspects while methods permitting an overall vision are missing timing will fill this gap by combining an emulative algorithm with theoretical inductions taking into account the mesoscale interplay between time and topology i will develop the project in the team of prof alain barrat at cnrs france working at the intersection of multiple fields physics of complex systems network science and statistical physics establishing contacts with social scientists epidemiologists and neuroscientists
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core defense fortifying the resident gut microbiotas colonization resistance to combat intestinal bacterial infections
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currently we rely on antibiotics to combat potentially lifethreatening gastrointestinal gi bacterial infections however the susceptibility to infection and the severity of symptoms can vary significantly among individuals exposed to the same pathogen13 if we could unravel the factors responsible for differences in infection susceptibility we could formulate strategies to reduce the incidence of symptomatic infections ultimately saving lives and reducing the need for antibiotics traditionally researchers have approached this puzzle from two main perspectives a humancentered view delving into the intricacies of the host immune system or a pathogencentered view scrutinizing variations in bacterial strains with core defense i advocate for a paradigm shift by adopting a microbiotacentered perspective this approach is grounded in the concept of colonization resistance the mechanism whereby the intestinal microbiota protects itself against incursion by new microorganisms despite their tremendous potential to prevent and treat bacterial infections microbial alternatives to antibiotics are still spread thin as we currently lack adequate methods to select potential candidates my aim is to develop a method for the selection of personalized bacterial consortia capable of preventing campylobacteriosis i will do so by investigating its ecological niche and competitors through metabolic modelling screen for growth reducing bacterial strains or consortia using a newly developed in vitro coculturing platform and test colonization resistance predictions of a simple model based on these in silico and in vitro results in humanmicrobiome associated mice by investigating the protective function of the microbiota i will generate groundbreaking findings that will transform our understanding on factors governing bacterial infection susceptibility it will usher in an era where we view bacteria not only as the problem but also as part of the solution
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the plants internal cellular sensing and response measures to mechanical breach
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plantparasitic nematodes are microscopic organisms with exceptionally broad host range that pose major challenge to global agriculture generate a predicted loss of 123 percent equivalent to 157 billion each year the losses caused by nematodes are further enhanced when they form diseasecomplexes with other microbes endoparasitic cyst nematodes are one of two most devastating groups infecting the roots of economically important plants the nematodes are a persistent problem because they have evolved an ability to secrete specific proteins to exploit the host plants development and suppress defense responses triggered by the plant they begin feeding only after developing a specialized feeding structure syncytium inside the host root by selecting a single cell near the innermost nutrientrich vascular tissues causing cellular injury by passing through multiple layers of different cell files the majority of previous research has been on syncytium formation as infection proceeds however it is unknown how plants respond at the cellular level to the mechanical damage caused by nematodes which prevents the creation of resistant plants to minimize crop losses in the proposed study cells from two internal consecutive cell layers surrounding the vascular tissues will be studied for their molecular responses to mechanical injury the control of lignin and suberin production which function as physical barriers against invading pathogens will be studied in particular advanced microscopic technology will be utilized to accurately produce mechanical damage in selected internal root cells using a cuttingedge method called laser ablation it will offer a strong platform for the creation of resistance agricultural plants against plant parasitic nematodes in the long run the project will use a variety of hightech multidisciplinary approaches to provide a framework for researching plant physical barrier measures against invasive plant diseases
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scarbo next step space carbon observatorys solution to improve monitoring of ghg emissions and help establishing reliable data for emission trends forecasts
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scarbon space carbon observatory next step is the continuation of the horizon 2020 scarbo project this multidisciplinary project is carried out by a genderdiverse team through a consortium including the space industry smes and scientific institutes it is led from toulouse france by airbus defence and space the scarbon system is based on a constellation of small greenhouse gases ghg monitoring satellites flying an innovative miniaturised co2ch4 instrument nanocarb together with a coregistered compact aerosol sensor spexone together they will deliver twicedaily accurate global measurements to monitor the diurnal variations of fossil co2 emissionthe objective of the scarbon project is to mature the technical and industrial definition of the nanocarb instrument and of the scarbon constellation targeting an operational system availability before the end of the decade the design of the nanocarb instrument will be upgraded and refined following the outcomes of the previous scarbo study and its performances will be carefully modelled an instrument breadboard will provide valuable data during an airborne campaign which will be used together with modelled data to verify the instrument design this will allow raising the instrument trl to at least 5 targeting 6 by the end of the project data processing at levels l1 to l4 will validate the concept capability to monitor ghg plumes from space the constellation concept will also be refined in view of a possible shortterm industrial implementationscarbons daily co2 and ch4 anthropogenic emissions monitoring data based on novel european breakthrough technologies will be a valuable contributor to the european commissions endeavour to fight climate change as an upside the monitoring data will foster the development of addedvalue services and will represent a stateoftheart european alternative to the burgeoning noneuropean commercial initiatives
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elucidating the phenotypic convergence of proliferation reduction under growthinduced pressure
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growthinduced pressure necessarily emerges when a cell population whichever the organism proliferates in a 3d spatiallylimited environment growthinduced pressure imposes physical constraints on cell physiology a reduction of growth and division is observed in evolutionarily distant organisms such as bacteria fungi plants or mammals however some cells are more capable of coping with these physical limitations and proliferate than others this is in particular the case of cancer cells for which growthinduced pressure participates in tumorigenesis and chemoresistance despite its importance we are still at a loss to identify the basic sensing mechanisms associated with 3d proliferation under pressureit is notably unclear if the mechanical control of proliferation stems from specific signaling or is a consequence of associated changes in the physical properties of cells the goal of underpressure is to elucidate the phenotypic convergence of the mechanicalcontrol of cell proliferation we hypothesize that a large part of proliferation reduction comes from the physical limits imposed by the obligatory increase of macromolecular crowding under 3d confinement crowding relates to the high fraction of macromolecules in the cell and has the potential to kinetically alter biochemical reactions we expect crowding to limit key processes associated with growth and division and to elicit specific signaling essential to circumvent these limitations using unique microfluidic devices we will investigate in bacteria fungi and mammalian cells how compressive forces physically limit growth and division and unravel the signaling pathways associated with the control of cell proliferation we will mainly focus on crowding investigate its consequences and its link with other physical properties such as membrane tension we will use this knowledge to control cell proliferation in 3d compressed tumors with the hope to notably reduce chemoresistance
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better bioprinting by lightsheet lithography
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bioprinting is considered the most promising method to produce functional engineered tissues with physiological properties successful tissue engineering will open research avenues for drug testing and therapeutic and will therefore raise much interest not only in the academia but also pharma and clinical sectors current bioprinting methods are limited by combinations of insufficient speed spatial resolution and cell viability since these technologies often suffer from poor spatial resolution and inability to control biomechanical properties they fail to mimic the heterogeneous nature of native tissues bbrighter aims to develop a novel bioprinting technology able to produce engineered tissues with high spatial resolution at high printing speed using an original topdown lithography approach in contrast with current bottom up layerbylayer bioprinting methods bbrighter aims at ultra highspeed digital lightsheet illumination strategy to selectively photocrosslink cellladen hydrogels mimicking specific tissues in confined voxels and produce threedimensional complex geometries previous advances from the brighter project will be extended by building complex bioengineered skin cornea and gut tissue models all of which represent pioneering examples for bioengineering and its application for cell therapy drug discovery and toxicology together with the work on patterning technology bioink and application a basis will be established for formulating a valid business case for a bioprinting product the work on exploitation activities will ultimately result in a gono go decision for the industrialisation of a bioprinting product and a commercial path forward ultimately the goal of the bbrighter project is to provide a radically new bioprinting technology to boost the performance of various engineered tissues which in turn will promote improved healthcare opportunities as well as business and employment advances in the european union and beyond
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integrated approach to assess the levels and impact of contaminants of emerging concern on blue health and biodiversity modulated by climate change drivers
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oneblue will provide an integrated assessment of contaminants of emerging concern cecs and their impacts will develop new monitoring tools and will provide an advanced understanding of the combined effects of cecs and climate change cc on the different marine ecosystems and their biodiversity the following objectives are defined improve the current knowledge of the concentrations profiles fate behaviour and effects of cecs in the different marine compartments and ecosystems through three case studies atlantic and arctic oceans and the mediterranean sea and develop safety guidelines and protocols for future cecs monitoring in marine ecosystemsprovide an advanced understanding of possible interaction between cc and cecs in marine ecosystems with studies under controlled conditions in marine mesocosmsdevelop a database db the cecsmarinedb following fair principles with a database management system dbms to collect the data generated in oneblue and capitalize data from other projects and existing dbs a graphical user interface gui will be developed and used for data exploration and demonstration of the fate and behaviour of cecs in a changing environmentprovide new solutions in support of the implementation of relevant eu policies i a series of new approach methodologies nams to improve the ecotoxicity assessment of cecs in marine ecosystems ii a tiered effectdirected approaches eda combining toxicological assessment and chemical analysis iii an advanced ultrasonic system for sampling and enrichment micronanoplastics from seawater iv a remote autonomous sensor to assess cecs in marine waters in quasirealtime a decision support system dss based on machine and deep learning strategies to assess and forecast combined effects of cc and cecs in marine ecosystems disseminate the project results and establish the exploitation plan for the developed technologies
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radiometer based on nonlinear microwave to optical conversion in a resonator
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the atesca ambient temperature extremely sensitive radiometer for cubesat applications project seeks to advance radiometer technology by achieving highly sensitive microwave detection for spacebased applications such as radio astronomy and earth observation without the need for cryogenic cooling of the detector this project is particularly focused on improving the detection of microwave radiation from the ozone of earths atmosphere and from the cosmic microwave background cmbatesca radiometers utilize a nonlinear optical upconversion process to transfer weak microwave signals into the optical domain this process is intrinsically noiseless and it has been shown theoretically that a good signal to noise ratio can be achieved even when the whole setup is sitting at room temperature opposed to direct detection of the microwave radiationthe nonlinear upconversion process is intrinsically weak hence the team plans to employ whispering gallery mode resonators which support resonances in both optical and microwave domains to significantly improve conversion efficiency it has been shown theoretically that with the planned implementation a photon conversion efficiency from the microwave 100ghz to the optical domain of 1 can be achieved this will enable the proposed radiometer with high sensitivity but would also be interesting for future quantum technologythis is a planned collaboration between a group in madrid spain uc3m and dunedin new zealand uoo the researcher will demonstrate the proposed conversion efficiency and hence sensitivity on a benchtop experiment and afterwards will implement the system into two actual payloads for cubesat missions to demonstrate the radiometer
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mesoscale dissection of neuronal populations underlying cognition
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the brain is responsible for cognition broadly defined as thinking by combining mental processes such as sensory integration perception and working memory one of neurosciences major challenges is understanding how the brain encodes cognition as a whole the biggest obstacle to this goal is the complex nature of the brain which contains billions of entangled neurons that form a dynamic everchanging network we propose to use the mouse model to study cognitive processing streams across the brain by applying a zoomoutzoomin approach we first study cognition at the mesoscale level ie the population level across many areas and then zoom in and dissect a specific subpopulation importantly we focus on the dynamic brainwide networks of different cognitive functions that are modulated within single trials and in each individual mouse we hypothesize that cognitive functions are encoded at the mesoscale level in which information flexibly flows across many brain areas but with certain motifs and rules each objective targets one processing stream and one cognitive function streams within one cortical hemisphere during sensory integration streams across cortical hemispheres transferring working memory and streams between cortex and subcortex during perception in each work package we will train mice in cognitive behavioral paradigms and perform a zoomoutzoomin protocol with the same mouse first we will implement a mesoscale approach eg widefield imaging andor multifiber photometry to outline the processing stream within the cognitive network second we will zoom in to dissect a specific node or edge using multiarea twophoton microscopy labeling techniques and optogenetics importantly these work packages are modulatory and with substantial overlaps enabling us to obtain a brainwide cognitive map that will aid in understanding cognition as a whole in both the healthy and the diseased brain
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stop spread bad bugs novel antimicrobial approaches to combat multidrug resistance in bacteria
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stop spread bad bugs is a new multidisciplinary researchtraining consortium built to combat the alarming problem of global antimicrobial resistance multidrug resistance mdr in bacteria is becoming increasingly common thus urgently calling for alternative approaches to develop and implement novel antibiotics we envision a definitive solution that will require a paradigm shift its foundation shall be the training of a new generation of future 15 early stage researchers esrs by worldrenowned experts in the field of drug development infectiology immunology and pharmacology a unique stateof theart teachingtraining pipeline shall be developed across 7 academic and 5 sme partners with complementary expertise in the development and testing of novel approaches to antimicrobial therapy in humans we shall establish knowledge and expertise on carbohydrate and protein chemistry for the discovery of new drug candidates while characterizing the underlying mechanism of existing compounds for treatment of microbial infections computational modelling shall optimize the interactions of the novel entities with selected pathogens a range of infection models allows partners to simultaneously determine compound efficacy in preclinical settings and investigate the potential effects of the novel antimicrobials on host tissues stateoftheart imaging tools will be applied to track the bacteria and novel compounds in these test systems uniquely the pipeline will also determine the pharmacokinetics and the effects of compounds on host microbiota and host immunity understanding the mechanisms of action of the novel antimicrobials shall provide insights into new antimicrobial mechanisms which may be further exploited in spinoff projects this approach means that the stop spread bad bugs consortium will deliver uniquely trained multi and interdisciplinary esrs that will take the continuing fight against global mdr safely into the future
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plasmonmediated onsurface synthesis
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photochemistry on solid surfaces is a promising candidate for overcoming the current limitations of onsurface synthesis oss including the constraints of metallic substrates poor spatiotemporal control and demand for high temperatures however this nascent approach has evidenced to date relatively modest efficiencies compared to thermally induced reactions concomitantly the field of plasmonmediated chemical reactions pmcrs has experienced pronounced growth pmcrs rely on the ability of plasmonic nanostructures to harness the advantages of milder visible light and efficiently transforming it into chemical energy the rapid progress in pmcrs can be attributed to the development of novel methodologies for engineering the nanooptical properties of the localized surface plasmon resonance lspr in this context achieving precise atomiclevel control over how reactants interact with plasmonic catalytic substrates holds the potential to drastically increase the chemoselectivity efficacy and sustainability of reactionsthe scientific objective of this proposal is to combine my expertise on scanning probe microscopy spm and plasmonic nanocavities with the large experience of the host in oss targeting to direct pmcrs on surfaces at the atomic scale specifically this proposal seeks to investigate three model photodimerization reactions exploring the conditions under which the spmcontrolled optical hotspot used for tipenhanced raman spectromicroscopy can be transformed into a chemical hotspot with improved selectivity and efficiency furthermore the goal is to elucidate the mechanisms governing tipinduced pmcrs with the ultimate aim of controlling the fabrication of lowdimensional extended polymers with molecular precision using visible light the synergistic integration of these innovative methodologies will decisively contribute to the successful realization of the project remarkably enhancing my career trajectory and personal development
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twinning for rechargeable sodiumion battery research
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the twinbat project plans to make gebze technical university gtu a center of attraction in the field of battery research in türkiye especially in the field of sodiumion batteries nibs through the joint efforts of the twinning partners with mutual benefit at the forefront the lack of capacity innovation in the field of rechargeable batteries in türkiye will be addressed through three main efforts research training and networkthis goal will be achieved by building collaboration with prominent european institutions including cnrs from france an internationally recognized laboratory lrcs focused on rechargeable batteries hub from germany an excellent research university that delivers toplevel achievements in a wide variety of fields in both national and international comparisons and in collaboration with industry partners of tia founded in 2017 for the development and commercialization of nibs indeed we are witnessing the rapid development of nibs nowadays recently both the first electric vehicle powered by sodiumion cells and the commercial application of firstgeneration gen1 sodiumion cells in a cordless drill were reported however despite these wonderful developments in the nibs field a new generation of nib still needs to be developed to reach the energy density of liion batteries twinbat target to develop gen2 nibs to be closer to liion lfp cellswhile the research topic is timely and of immediate relevance emerging economies like türkiye must augment their capacity and competitiveness to match the eus technological competence on this domain thus increasing gtus visibility and research capacity enhancing the research profile of academics working in nibs and improving the proposal development project management and ipr skills of administrative staff will be achieved by investing in individuals and research in this context twinbat is a perfect fit
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politics and practices of listening in mao era peoples republic of china
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this research drawing on state archives private memoirs and literary materials provides the first dedicated history ofauditory cultures of the peoples republic of china prc by focusing on the act of listening across three pivotal andtransitional moments of prc history and at three levels of state locality and individual it explores the role of sound fromthree perspectives as a tool of nationbuilding deployed by the state as a medium through which the chinese revolutionwas experienced at an individual level and in the contestation between these two domains as the soundscape became asite of contention and negotiation between the state and the citizen the researchers background in social cultural andpolitical history of the mao era along with the supervisors expertise on chinese modern history and experience researchingthe history of sound and broadcasting in the republican era 19111949 will be deployed to provide the ideal backgroundfor this innovative but delimited project the key questions asked will be threefold 1 how and under what understanding ofthe act of listening did the state deploy sound as a political and social tool in the peoples republic of china 2 how weresuch state initiatives deployed at the local level and with what results 3 how was the act of listening among individualstransformed in response to state initiatives the resulting interdisciplinary research will expand the field of global soundstudiesbeyond its current eurocentrism apply soundstudies to china for the first indepth and long term empirical studyand enhance european knowledge of modern china
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tracking impacts of climate change in the arctic marine ecosystems through cephalopod diversity and life histories
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climate change is impacting global ecosystems especially in the polar areas of the earth countering climate change effects is stated as one of the key goals of both global development in the 2030 agenda for sustainable development and of regional development eg eu strategy of managing the arctic cephalopoda phylum mollusca are pivotal components in marine food webs and have life history and physiological characteristics that make them potential winners of climate change this group due to their ecology and biology features such as high abundance coupled with low taxonomic diversity high degree of opportunism ecological adaptability single reproductive cycle and typically a short lifespan cab ve used to assess and predict climate changeinduced shifts of arctic ecosystems thus the main objective of the action is to assess biodiversity life histories and ecological role of cephalopods in the arctic and their ontogenetic and temporary changes using both wellestablished and innovative methodologies in the climate change context the project addresses this matter via 3 scientific work packages that focus on the following research hypotheses hypothesis 1 diversity and distribution of current arctic cephalopod populations shifts due to climate changes hypothesis 2 environmental conditions experienced during the life of individual cephalopods can be documented and used to assess the climate change impact on life histories where comparing historical with new specimens will highlight climate change impact and hypothesis 3 the role of cephalopods in the arctic food web is even more pivotal then we currently understand and this would be tested with innovative food web modelling methods the results achieved will increase the quality of ecological monitoring in the arctic leading to more rational management of the arctic marine ecosystems in order to possibly counter climate change impact
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substitution of rareearths for advanced novel magnets in energy and transport applications
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modern technologies required for the transition to a climateresilient sustainable green and digital future wind generators electric motors heavily rely on rareearth ree permanent magnets however with china covering 98 of the supply to europe in 2022 the continent is left in an extremely vulnerable position with respect to these critical raw materials in this framework beethoven seeks to address the challenge brought forward in the topic description to reduce the amount of ree employed in the new energy sectorthe main goal of the project is to develop innovative and sustainable advanced magnetic materials that substitute ree in the energy and transportation sectors we will work on developing and upscaling 3 types of magnetic phases highentropy alloys ferritebased composites and wtype ferrites that could be deployed at large scale in the permanent magnets market substitution will be demonstrated in final applications by developing reebonded magnets for automotive components and by designing and building prototypes for a reelean wind generator a reefree flywheel and a reefreelean emotor for electric vehicles with a total budget of 75 million balanced between the parallel technological developments and across the projects value chain beethoven will address the 6 activities specified in the topic description to do so a team of experts from 14 partners and 10 countries with demonstrated experience working collaboratively at the frontier of knowledge in the permanent magnet sector has been assembled the successful implementation of the project is expected to put beethoven in the position to contribute to the expected outcomes and wider impacts of the call by reducing europes ree magnets imports by an estimated 22004900 tons by 2033 the key technologies skills and materials to achieve this impact will be developed within eu borders contributing to a more resilient autonomous and industrially competitive europe
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empowering climatesmart circular and zerowaste use of underutilized wood from the forest and building stock in the construction sector to support the new european bauhaus
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woodstock is a multifaceted project dedicated to advancing climatesmart wood construction practices in alignment with the new european bauhaus neb initiative a primary focus is the quantification and mapping of wood resources including underutilized streams using a novel tier 3 level harvested wood products methodology and dynamic material flow analysis modelling to gain insights into wood utilization potential climate mitigation impacts and resource availability this also entails a robust dynamic life cycle assessment lca methodology for the assessment of environmental social and economic impacts associated with various resource streams and scenarios woodstock will tap into collective expertise to develop zerowaste and circular building designs harnessing the power of digital twins assessing human health and wellbeing aspects by cocreation activities with a multitude of actors following the neb principles and values in 6 living labs lls in 6 different european regions through systemic circular solutions for zerowaste and communitybased wood construction aligning novel business strategies with policy recommendations and dedicated demo training and educational activities the project endeavours to incentivize climatesmart and increased sustainable wood use in construction an inspirational climatesmart guideline document for circular use of wood streams a woodbook with building blueprints based on the neb values beautiful together and sustainable and an euroadmap for the future are some of the key exploitable results kers that will be available on the european wood construction observatory ewco this observatory will be a central aipowered hub for best practices guidelines and innovative solutions facilitating knowledge exchange and collaboration among stakeholders and ensuring the longevity and impact beyond the projects lifetime in alignment with the neb academy
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arrhythmogenesis in dilated cardiomyopathy role of mechanoelectric coupling
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heart failure is a major cause of death in the western world with an estimated prevalence of 23 of the population a subgroup of heart failure patients is characterised by dilated cardiomyopathy dcm which results in substantial morbidity and mortality due to progressive mechanical pump failure 70 or sudden cardiac death from illpredictable electrical disturbances 30 dcm is commonly linked to mutations encoding cytoskeletal proteins but our understanding of why a loss of cardiac myocyte cytoskeletal integrity in inherited dcm phenotypes results in detrimental changes to calcium handling and how this causes arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death remains limited human studies have associated genetic mutations and loss in the cytoskeletal protein filamin c flnc with arrhythmogenic dcm and sudden death to explore the biomechanical and mechanoelectric mechanisms by which flnc deficiency leads to mechanical and electrical dysfunction i will use experimental and mathematical models that span multiple spatial and temporal scales from the protein level up to the whole heart i hypothesise that flnc regulates myofilament lattice spacing and that loss of this structure leads to impaired contractile force development by the sarcomere i postulate that these perturbations in mechanics may contribute to the generation of substrate for the induction and maintenance of lethal ventricular arrhythmias via a variety of mechanoelectric coupling mechanisms particularly stretchinduced alterations may affect cardiomyocyte electrophysiology which may contribute to both the trigger and the substrate for arrhythmias thus altered myocardial mechanics in the flncnull mouse model of dcm may contribute to the triggering or maintenance of lifethreatening reentrant ventricular arrhythmias via a variety of mechanoelectric coupling mechanisms
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single item identification for forest production protection and management
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the core objective of sintetic is to set up and demonstrate a traceability system for trees logs and boards based on ict through a central geodatabase covering all the forestbased value chainthis faces the 3 main drawbacks of the icts in the forestry sectordeployed only in areas with mature timber market northcentral eu vs south eucurrently cannot be used during the whole value chain causing several lossesa reliable tool for tracing the origin of forest product is missing still allowing illegal practicesalong with the core objective the sintetic proposal will pursuitsobj1 to achieve a higher value recovery of timber assortments 10 sobj2 to increase the overall efficiency of the timber supply chainsobj3 to provide a greater competitive advantage of the eu forest industry yield of high value sawnwood products from 20 to 22 sobj4 to increase of the eu forested area under active management aggregation of 12000 ha fragmented properties sobj5 to increase both the timber value the resilience and the ecosystem services provided sobj6 to tackle illegal logging and the related timber trade 15 sobj7 to facilitate a homogeneous and widespread uptake of the icts in the forest sector the main expected results areres1 manual marking and quality assessment traceability system res2 smartphone app for motormanual operations res3 processor head prototype res4 harvester lidar res5 sawmill sensors and traceability of sawnwood res6 earth observation illegal logging alert service res7 forest ownership aggregation platform to make all this possible sintetic will develop a geodatabase with a set of data providers interconnected by the traceability system itll provide1 multiplatform data acquisition for the whole supply chain2 data transmission with sesecured digital tools and physical ids on timber products3 data storage analysis and distribution for the generation of further services
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comparative signature of marburg virus cell activation as a blueprint for the identification of antiviral targets against newly emerging viruses
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identifying cellular attachment factors and functional receptors plays a critical part in developing an understanding of a newly emerging virus however the identification and therapeutic targeting of plasma membrane proteins critical for virus infection is often difficult due to the transient nature of viruscell binding and the overall kinetics of the infection process our goal is to interrogate virushost cell interaction and cellular uptake of marburg virus marv a highly pathogenic and clinically relevant member of the filovirus family to specifically target virusplasma membrane interaction we will use a unifying inverted infection platform that allows us to halt and synchronize virus infection at the cell binding stage our approach is compatible with bsl4 environment and multiomics technologies it will allow us to identify the signature of virushost cell activation ie proteins involved in viruscell entry in a tissuespecific manner this screen will be complemented by an innovative combination of proteomics virushost cell interaction analysis and imaging approaches to pinpoint and characterize the involved cellular and viral proteins their posttranslational modifications and how they mechanistically concert in viral uptake our unique combination of different technologies will lead to the identification of viral and cellular interaction partners which will in parallel be specifically targeted by highthroughput compound screening to identify small molecules that inhibit virusreceptor interaction moreover we will use our gained knowledge of tissuespecific posttranslational modifications to develop improved vaccine candidates as additional prophylactic countermeasures against marv our project will further deliver a blueprint experimental pipeline for the streamlined identification and antiviral targeting of proteins involved in the virus attachment process a critical cornerstone of pandemic preparedness
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development of a novel highly efficient energy supply system for energy autonomous multifamily buildings based on biomass gasification coupled with an sofc and a pv system
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the project aims at the development of an innovative resbased system for heat and electricity supply in order to achieve an almost energy autonomous multifamily building with regard to heating and electricity consumption as well as electromobility this shall be achieved by integrating a novel highly efficient biomass microchp technology based on an updraft gasifier a new gas cleaning system and a solid oxide fuel cell sofc a stateoftheart pv system and appropriate innovative energy storage solutions this system shall be economically highly attractive for future users and it shall also distinguish itself by virtually zero emissions of co ogc and dust as well as 55 to 65 reduced nox emissions compared to other biomass chp technologies consequently it shall increase the penetration of res on the multifamily house level and has the potential to significantly contribute to reaching the eu climate and clean air goalsthe key innovations of the project are related to the novel microscale biomass chp system they comprise a flexible partitioning of product gas supplied to the sofc and to a gas burner in order to cover the overall heat demand and to maximise sofc operation at the same time a novel combined thermal and catalytic tar reformer new highly efficient and durable stack units and a novel compact sofc system with integrated hcl and h2s removal reactor based on a 25 kwel sofc with an electric efficiency of 44 which is flexibly coupled with a 14 kw gasifier overall efficiencies of more than 90 shall be gained a trl of 5 shall be achieved at the end of the projectthe methodology applied to reach these goals relies on technology development tasks based on process simulations cfd aided design of the single units test plant construction performance and evaluation of test runs a technology assessment part covering risk technoeconomic environmental and overall impact assessments as well as targeted dissemination activities
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leveraging crisprcas for fast and accurate pointofcare diagnostics
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in the healthcare sector rapid and precise pointofcare diagnostics is indispensable for enhancing patient outcomes particularly in critical scenarios such as sepsis and organ transplantations present in vitro diagnostic technologies often strike a compromise between accuracy speed portability and costeffectiveness immunoassays offer rapidity but sacrifice accuracy while molecular diagnostics like pcr deliver accuracy at the expense of time and ease of use isothermal molecular tests on the other hand are swift but lack specificity hence a pressing need persists for pointofcare diagnostic tools that embody userfriendliness costefficiency high accuracy and adaptability to diverse applications at scope biosciences a spinoff from wageningen university we have developed and patented a crisprcas diagnostic technology scopedx that harnesses the precision of pcr and the speed of isothermal amplification delivering rapid results within approximately 30 minutes at the point of care futhermore the scopedx platform can be rapidly adapted to new applicationsour objective is to complete the preclinical validation of our solution to offer userfriendliness robustness portability and costeffectiveness providing swift results directly at the pointofcare besides we aim to prove the versatility of our platform which can be extended to the detection of various pathogenic microbes viruses bacteria fungi and genomic applications stemcell tissue transplantationsin essence scopedx constitutes a modular platform technology with the potential to revolutionize the pointofcare diagnostics market comprehensively
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personalized medicine in chronic kidney disease
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in 2017 on a world scale the total number of individuals with chronic kidney disease acute kidney injury and those on renal replacement therapy exceeded 850 million a truly concerning figure that is twice the estimated number of people with diabetes worldwide and 20 times higher than the number of individuals affected by aidshiv worldwide the socioeconomic impact of kidney disease is huge and is anticipated to even further grow in the coming years awareness of the magnitude and the risks of this condition have remained low at the population level therefore kidney disease has been until recently largely overlooked by health authorities and governments in most countries with as the result accumulation of major unmet needs in personalized medicine in kidney disease the aim of picked personalized medicine in chronic kidney disease is to equip a generation of 10 doctoral candidates dc with interdisciplinary skills for the development of pathways to implement personalized medicine in chronic kidney disease and their complications on the level of its detection progression and treatment we anticipate that these dcs will significantly contribute to the increasing possibilities to stratify patients with kidney disease and the development of successful intervention procedures with potential to substantially impact the lives of over 10 of the european population picked will realize this aim by coordinating the efforts of 10 beneficiaries and 8 associated partners across 7 european countries and 3 sectors with lead supervisors covering a large range of disciplines ranging from biomarkerresearch to research into the legal ethical and quality of life aspects for the implementation of personalized medicine in kidney disease
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modelbased estimation of railroad wheeltorail profile change and contact forces
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the eu wants to encourage train travel due to the current climate crisis and innovations to the railway system are necessary because trains run around the clock in 23minute intervals it is difficult to monitor the status or the conditions of a railway equipment efficiently without interrupting railway operation and it only reduces the likelihood of its failure detect4we will offer a novel solution to help keep infrastructure safe in this project the condition of the tracks and the inservice trains are continuously monitored by smart sensors and the collected measurement data and safety analysis of trains are processed in real time therefore a highly detailed forecast is ensured this approach promises cost savings for vehicle manufacturers because of relatively inexpensive instrumentation techniques and shared computer analysis systems and because more timely and accurate accident prevention will be available train travel will become safer leading to zero fatalitiesthe detect4we project will be carried out by the experienced researcher who worked during her phd thesis on the pure computational analysis of railway vehicle multibody dynamics and wanted to practice her research into applied railway engineering using experimental methods and make connections within railway industry she will collaborate with prof jos l escalona at university of seville prof zili li at delft university of technology both supervisors have strong background in computational and experimental dynamics of railway vehicles and tracks in the end a final sixmonths nonacademic placement will be carried out at the company prorail ltd under the supervision of prof rolf dollevoet the academic and nonacademic stay will give her the unique opportunity of modelling experimentally testing and validating innovative methods in the field of railway engineering importantly extending her professional training towards becoming a selfsupporting scientist
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functional characterization of the colorectal cancer metastasis microbiome
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host cells and microbial inhabitants form an intricate ecosystem in the human body extensively influencing host phenotypes in health and disease despite much progress in sequencingbased cancer microbiome research elucidating functional roles of bacteria in metastasis formation remains an important unsolved challenge in the metabac project we will explore such bacterial roles as drivers of colorectal cancer metastasis we will investigate new concepts on whether bacteria can equip cancer cells with malignant features migrate within the host and potentially represent targets for cancer therapyin aim 1 my group will characterize the microbial inhabitants of colon tumors and metastases we will uncover bacterial species and their genetic features in metastases by using sequencing imaging and culturingbased approaches in aim 2 we will mechanistically dissect functional impacts of metastasisderived bacteria on distinct stages of the metastatic process for this we will use specialized organoid organ chip and orthotopic organoidbacteria coengraftment platforms that we have pioneeredin aim 3 uncovering the tropism timing and routes of bacterial migration to different metastasis sites takes center stage bacterial strains and organoids derived from different metastasis sites will be coengrafted into mice and traced to lymph node liver and lung metastasesthe metabac project will provide an unprecedented characterization of microbial roles in metastasis our combination of metastasisderived bacterial strains with novel organoid organ chip and in vivo platforms puts us in a unique position to close the gap between cancer microbiome sequencing and mechanistic studies and promises groundbreaking functional insights into hostmicrobe interactions in cancer and beyond
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multisensory usercentred shared cultural experiences through interactive technologies
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advancements in digital transformation have enriched the interactive experience of cultural heritage the adoption of digital technologies has benefited the development of virtual museum tours preservation of cultural assets digitised archives enabling broader and engaging means of access to cultural heritage despite critical advances structural deficiencies remain lack of accessibility for all limited opportunities for all members of society to participate in cultural and creative industries on equal basis and limited interoperable digital repositories for archiving accessible multisensory cultural assets and related archival structures with one billion people experiencing some form of disability and onefifth of these experiencing significant disabilities access or opportunities to engage with cultural assets is not equally available to allmuseit aims to codesign develop and coevaluate a multisensory usercentred platform for enriched engagement with cultural assets with inclusion and equal opportunity for all as core principles the museit innovation is rooted in multisensory representations of cultural heritage which extend beyond the visual and auditory senses more specifically museit will a codesign and develop multisensory representations and rendering of cultural assets b develop services for inclusive remote cocreation of multimodal borndigital cultural assets and c develop formal specifications and strategies for inclusive archival preservation of cultural heritage participatory codesign activities will be integral to enable users with disabilities to be involved in decisions and designs that will affect their lives enriched experiences of cultural assets created by museit will not be limited to this group and is likely to enhance the level of participation and enjoyment for all people impacts are likely to include the democratization of cultural asset experiences and tangible growth in creative and cultural industries
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novel brain health solutions across four focus areas prevention and care methods and data innovation and society and ethics and wellbeing
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the novel postdoctoral programme pioneers in merging diverse sociocultural and scientific expertise to forge new brain health solutions energizing regional national and global development it integrates neuroscience data science innovation management and social and legal studies across four synergetic research areas prevention and care methods and data innovation and society ethics and wellbeing this initiative thrives on cooperation with companies health organizations patient groups and universities offering a rich training blend through compulsory nonacademic secondments mentoring and dynamic summer schools targeting underrepresented and minority scientists across different disciplines novel encourages applicants to work on their research projects within an inclusive communitybased platform ensuring equal opportunities the meritbased selection process is transparent conducted by external international assessors novels training goals are multifaceted nurturing research excellence and inclusivity fostering broad intersectoral networks embracing open science and aspiring to be a global benchmark in brain health research training the training is structured into three pillars enhancing disciplinary skills developing transferable competencies in innovation management leadership and ethics and boosting active parnerships and stakeholder engagement mandatory and optional secondments with novel partners underscore its comprehensive intersectoral approach the programme promises attractive employment conditions including 36month contracts competitive compensation strong local support systems and an inspiring environment for research and collaboration each fellow receives guidance from multiple supervisors and a mentor facilitating both conventional and innovative career trajectories positioning novel at the forefront of research training in brain health
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community formation in activematter systems
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population genetics has undergone a major revolution over the past thirty years thanks to the development of controlled microbial experiments to test the respective roles of randomness selection and ecological processes in evolution for instance it was shown that when cell division drives the growth of dense bacterial colonies fluctuations at the colonys edge generally lead to the emergence of spatial genetic segregation most organisms however do not spread out because of cell division but instead follow complex nonequilibrium dynamics characterized by selfpropulsion and motilityinduced collective behaviors although such nonequilibrium dynamics have been extensively studied within the new field of physics called active matter their role in shaping microbial evolution remains largely unknown the aim of this proposal is to address this issue and investigate the interplay between active matter physics and spatial population genetics to do so i will put forward an interdisciplinary theoretical framework that integrates coarsegrained descriptions of activematter systems with evolutionary and ecological processes by combining stochastic calculus fieldtheoretical methods and numerical simulations i will then characterize the emergent phenomenology of such systems to this aim the project delves into four consecutive objectives 1 understand the fate of genetic segregation in motile cellular colony 2 study the interplay of motilityinduced pattern formation and genetic segregation 3 incorporate ecological interactions in the framework developed in previous stages 4 generalize our findings to address highly heterogeneous communities by achieving these tasks i aim to unravel the complex dynamics of motile cell colonies setting the stage for a theory of spatial ecoevolutionary changes in active populations
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marine renewable energy distributed research infrastructure preparatory phase
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the marinergi distributed research infrastructure dri unites and consolidates the eu offshore renewable energy ore testing facilities to accelerate development and realise potential of this sector the world is current undergoing a significant shift in all aspects of energy supply and the vast potential of ore is being realised and is an intrinsic part of future plans through the acceleration of technology development marinergi will provide significant support to achieving the eu green deal targets this will strengthen european scientific and engineering expertise as well as foster innovation in ore technologies by consolidating investment in infrastructure and expertise across europe marinergi will offer the best quality service and will act as a magnet to attract further fundingfollowing a successful application marinergi is one of 11 new research infrastructures to be added to the esfri 2021 roadmap the esfri european roadmap for research infrastructures stimulates the implementation of these facilities and arguably contains the best european science facilities based on a thorough evaluation and selection procedure with ireland as the lead country marinergi is currently also supported by belgium portugal spain and the united kingdom with considerable support from institutions within france the netherlands italy norway and germany the team are now embarking on a preparatory phase establishing the legal governance scientific and business components required to implement the marinergi dri
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using human rights to change abortion law involvement patterns and argumentative architectures in the global figuration of human rights
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abortion laws are the crux of human rights diversity today abortion laws evidence best how differently human rights meanings are construed in various local settings however we know very little about how this diversity is generated in practice this project will scrutinize the communication processes that use human rights as arguments to change abortion laws we will contrast abortion debates from the last ten years in pairs of countries that represent three regional human rights systems mozambique and senegal the african union poland and ireland the council of europe and argentina and honduras the organization of american states these debates show the ambivalence of human rights they were used successfully to argue both for more liberal and more restrictive abortion laws to explain this ambivalence we will apply concepts of argumentative architecture and involvement patterns coined by the pi as part of her figurational sociology of law based on norbert eliass theory of the process of civilization using a mixedmethods approach that combines qualitative sociology legal analysis and corpus linguistics we will offer a multidimensional model for a globally comparative interdisciplinary sociolegal study of human rights we will study the structure composition and embedding of arguments along with group perspectives emotions and circles of identification of arguing actors so as to arrive at a heat map that will show the distribution of involvement in argumentative architectures by constructing a global metatypology of argumentative architectures and involvement patterns in abortion debates we will explore the integrative civilizing potential of human rights and identify the centrifugal forces in human rights figuration that comprise the local regional and global levels finally we will revisit the role of human rights as a universal toolbox for ideologies in order to plead their conditional rehabilitation
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visitor monitoring and management in protected and recreational areas new challenges novel solutions for the anthropocene
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visitor management of protected and recreational areas in the anthropoceneloved by many practised by even more recreation in the outdoors provides large benefits to individuals and societies but with increased participation also follows challenges with sustainable management of nature areas vimas primary objective is to develop more efficient governance of nature areas for tourism and recreation in the best way possible for biodiversity peoples quality of life and business development this will be achieved through research about smarter monitoring methods improved visitor management and more inclusive governance recreation in the outdoors has transformed in several ways besides the increase in volume of visitors the behaviour of visitors has diversified visitors partake in a wider set of activities visit more remote places take more diversified trips in nature have different motivations for visitation as well as levels of experience and skills new monitoring and management tools honed for the anthropocene must address the cumulative social and ecological impacts from increased tourism and recreation while striking a balance with ethics privacy and equal opportunities to do this successfully vimas focuses on novel monitoring techniques based on digital data developed and tested in the nordicbaltic region to address the contemporary challenges of increased demand socioeconomic inequality and uncertain climate futures the innovations of vimas are to realise potential from new knowledge developed in the intersection between quantitative and qualitative social sciences ecology and geoinformatics technology based on inclusive approaches for nonagency stakeholders and citizens through this vimas will develop new effective evidencebased tools towards smart governance and planning for recreational and protected natural areas for the next generation optimising the delivery of public health community wellbeing business success as well as other ecosystem services while protecting environmental values
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towards a transdisciplinary demographic theory of birth and death trajectories
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fertility and mortality fuel population renewal fertility theory struggles with a multitude of underlying entangled dimensions whereas mortality theory can build on strong regularities intriguingly strong regularities analogous to death begin to emerge for birth shown with my novel born oncedie once approach the gompertz law of death appears to apply to birth as well the linear rise in record life expectancy seems to be mirrored by a linear rise in record birth expectancy over decades thus encouraged i propose to harness the power of mortality modeling to 1 add an unexplored innovative dimension to fertility modeling and 2 develop a shared theoretical framework of birth and death trajectories that applies across the social sciences by conceptualizing different types of individuals that are born and die i strive to achieve ambition 1 by investigating birth with eight established regularities of death modeling emerging patterns and extending existing models of population renewal broadening the scope ambition 2 applies the approach of ambition 1 to case studies of couples families and households which i consider social individuals i will define types of social individuals along shared dimensions and components rooted in crossdisciplinary perspectives of what defines an individual much will be learned from feasible empirical analysis in 1 and 2 about new relationships that can support and invigorate existing formal and empirical demographic research if i master the conceptual challenges of this proposal a shared and mirrored theoretical framework of birth and death will contribute a new and powerful toolbox for formal demographic analysis together with a generic concept of individuality it would pioneer a new transdisciplinary field of research that synergistically investigates the basic principles of formation dissolution and renewal strengthening the theoretical foundation of population sciences
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the physical cultural and biogenetic landscape of the last neanderthals
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our closest relatives the neanderthals abruptly disappeared 40 thousand years ago ka after having endured for 350 thousand years in a territory ranging from the iberian peninsula to southern siberia decadeslong research attempted to address the cultural aspects and the demographic and environmental factors that triggered their demise yet there are no widely accepted scenarios that satisfactorily explain the extinction of the neanderthal these shortcomings are in part because the data available originated from a limited number of sites mainly in western and central europe which we now know were peripheral to the range of the last neanderthals to compellingly reconstruct the chain of events that led to neanderthals extinction the scientific community needs new extensive archaeological data possibly from the core regions of the last neanderthals range areas of western and central asia and eastern and southeastern europe were at the core of this range served as gateways to marginal areas and witnessed neanderthals biocultural interactions with sapiens and denisovans for the first time three pis with vast expertise on neanderthals culture biology and paleoenvironments will synergistically attempt to bridge the knowledge gap between the core and the periphery of their range at the time of their decline between 6040ka project last neanderthals will 1 accurately collect date integrate and model new highresolution cultural biogenetic and environmental data from understudied areas in western and central asia and eastern and southeastern europe 2 provide an unprecedented perspective on the last neanderthals population dynamics 3 offer a comprehensive and compelling explanation of the mechanisms that led to their extinction by integrating data from their entire range and formulating and testing nuanced hypotheses using new models and simulations 4 serve as a proxy for the fate shared by all archaic human groups
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dual antibacterial hydrogel adhesives
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nowadays available surgical skin closure techniques still remain painful and are prone to infections to assess these challenges dahad aims to develop new hydrogels with a dual action biological tissues adhesion and antibacterial activity the hydrogels will be prepared by the gelation of biomimetic dendrimerpolymer hybrids in aqueous solutions these hybrids will be composed of a central linear polymer namely pluronic f127 decorated at its extremities with multiple biomimetic catechol moieties to confer biological adhesive properties to the gels the hydrogels will be loaded with diverse hydrophilic and lipophilic antibiotics to locally deliver them into the surgical site and prevent infections dahad contemplates i the organic synthesis of the dendrimerpolymer hybrids ii the hydrogels preparation and the study of their adhesiveness physicochemical characterization and thermoresponsiveness iii the drug delivery of hydrophilic and lipophilic antibiotics throughout the hydrogels by direct diffusion or assisted by micellar nanoparticles and their skin biocompatibility iv and the back loop enhancement of the gelation abilities adhesion and drug delivery results using hydrogen bonding hbonding supramolecular chemistrydahad is built as a multidisciplinary and international project along which the purdue university usa the universidad de zaragoza spain and the instituto de nanociencia y materiales de aragn spain will combine their efforts and expertise to pursue the planned ri objectives as well as the dissemination of the results to scientific industrial and public audiences it aims to boost the applicants career to complement the expertise of inma in biomaterials for medical applications and be the kickstarter of a solid international and successful collaborative network
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performance study of innovative corrosion and mechanically resistant coated materials against molten salts for nextgeneration concentrated solar power plants and thermal energy storage systems
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cometes is intended to meet eu environmental concerns with the objective of spreading greener power generation systems by making concentrated solar power csp technology economically viable and more secure with a high global generating potential csp has emerged as a promising solution effectively utilizing intermittent sunlight with the help of thermal energy storage systems however the current solartoelectric conversion is too low due to the commonly used molten nitrates as heat transfer fluids having limited operating temperature of 580 c an alternative would be to use new carbonate mixtures able to operate at temperatures over 700 c thereby increasing the thermodynamic efficiency however this would require the use of materials resistant to these conditions without increased costs therefore this is cometes challenge developing lowcost and hightemperature ht corrosion resistant slurry aluminide coatings considering new deposition processes and focusing on hitherto unreported mechanical and stress corrosion cracking aspects the aim is to increase the trl of the coating solution from 3 to 5 the project will take place at inta a spanish public research organization during 24 months with a 4months secondment in france at edf the main french electric utility company which has shown profound interest in cometes related to their upcoming csp plants projects the applicant is adept in various technical skills in materials science including ht oxidation corrosion mechanics and their synergetic effects which forms the core of cometes combined with the coating expertise at inta it will enable an efficient twoway transfer of knowledge and to get significant research outcomes cometes will expand the candidates experience in coating development and molten salt corrosion as well as largescale project management which along with the development of his international professional network will help him to become a distinguished researcher
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noncanonical modification of viral rna
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viruses cause significant disease exemplified by the covid19 pandemic most studies of virushost interactions focused on proteins however rna holds great promise for basic and therapeutic exploration viruses evolved elaborate strategies for rna protection including 5 capping and internal modification the goal of this proposal is to discover and characterize viral rna modifications installed by viral enzymes including their role in innate immune evasion this could uncover novel rnabased mechanisms of viral replication and host modulation and lead to therapeutic targetsmany viruses encode methyltransferases mtases for canonical rna 5 capping curiously no cap was identified for hepatitis c virus hcv an important human pathogen we recently found that the cellular metabolite flavin adenine dinucleotide fad is used as noncanonical initiating nucleotide by the hcv polymerase at high frequency resulting in a 5fad cap on hcv rna this is the first description of a virus using this cap type for protecting its rna and remarkably the first robust description of fad capping across any kingdom of life in aim 1 we will investigate the functional role of the hcv 5fad cap including viral evasion of innate immune sensing and rna stability we will also explore the evolutionary conservation of metabolite capping across rna viruses and explore its potential as antiviral target viral mtases further perform 2omethylation 2ome of internal rna residues a modification that also may protect from innate recognition in aim 2 the extent of 2ome on viral rna will be mapped and the individual contribution of 5 and internal modification to innate immune evasion will be dissectedin aggregate these aims will uncover how viral enzymes modify the termini and internal viral rna residues and associated evasion of innate immunity the outcome could reshape understanding of viral rna biology open novel research directions and lead to antiviral targets
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international cooperation for digital standardisation
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instar promotes europes position as a forerunner in global standardssetting in advanced ict technologies eg ai 5g and 6g internet protocols iot cybersecurity data eid quantum or dlts with strategic international partners the 30month project shapes the definition uptake of standards in target countries delivers studies analyses on ict standards and monitors international standards in trade cooperation agreementsinstars active and experienced ict standardisation experts will manage a set of technology domain workstreams to build highlevel standardisation frameworks engaging key stakeholders map standards onto a standards dashboard activate highlevel task forces to provide inputs organise webinars and workshops deliver monthly and biannual reports on agreements on common standards and roadmaps monitor international standards implementation in trade and cooperation agreementsimpact ahighlevel standardisation frameworks bstandards dashboard with a common vision in international forasdos c6 highlevel task forces tf to manage technology domain workstreams dbiannual reports on agreements on common standards and roadmaps e monitoring implementation of intl standards in trade cooperation agreementsthe strong consortium of 10 partners 8 countries with complimentary skills 4 specialist consultancy smes 4 rtos an industry association a university active well regarded in the standardisation community eu internationally partners are embedded in existing sdos and standardisation initiatives in committees centred on the key technologies while retaining independence have trusted relationships with stakeholders in target countries and are experienced in supporting the development of effective standardisation policiesengagement includes 6 task forces 6 joint committees 6 workshops 6 webinars 1 impact event 2 coordination board meetings 10 signed mous 24 3rd party events 1000 engaged community members
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transforming european taxonomy through training research and innovations
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accurate taxonomic knowledge and tools are needed to understand the drivers and impact of biodiversity decline however the field of taxonomy is severely hampered by a continuous decrease in capacity with tettris we envision a transformative change in the field of taxonomy to build and sustain taxonomic research capacity through increasing knowledge and developing systems tettris will achieve this aim by creating joint knowledge in reference collections training frameworks and with innovative tools as well as by developing centralized resources providing access to an expertise marketplace the taxonomic knowledge platform and career paths the core methodology for reaching these objectives includes cocreation with citizen scientists and professionals in biodiversity hotspots the openaccess knowledge and systems built into tettris together with citizen scientists will accelerate the integration and expansion of taxonomy in education governance and multidisciplinary research this will ensure the longterm relevance of taxonomy as an instrumental science necessary to halt european and global biodiversity loss and ensuring ecosystems and their services are preserved and sustainably restored on land inland water and at seatettris builds taxonomic research capacity near biodiversity hotspots by networking natural history museums and other taxonomic facilities through bottomup cocreation between 17 partners the consortium includes the european citizen science association and several of europes leading natural history museums botanic gardens and universities unified under cetaf the leading european voice for taxonomy and systematic biology impact throughout the eu and beyond is secured through involvement of associated initiatives such as dissco and dest partners in third party projects and key tettris dissemination activities towards a new generation of taxonomists citizen scientists users in need of taxonomic knowledge and decision makers
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a machine learning conservation approach to evaluate extinction risk in freshwater biodiversity
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accurate assessments of species contemporaneous extinction risk cer are vital to quantifying the current biodiversity crisis and prioritising conservation efforts however the most comprehensive global dataset of cer the iucn red list of threatened species is taxonomically biased due to the lengthy assessment process leaving understudied taxa such as those in freshwaters under no formal protection predictionbased models based on novel machine learning methods enable largescale automated assessments of cer reducing data deficits rapidly the main goal of this project is to identify predictors of cer in freshwater habitats focusing on the largest family of freshwater gastropods the hydrobiidae first we will use a deeplearning approach to automatically predict the red list status of hundreds of hydrobiid species from multiple regions and ecosystems that have not been evaluated yet basing the predictions on ecological and macroevolutionary data second highthroughput sequencing methods will be conducted for the first time in this taxon to compare microevolutionary diversity with population trends derived from longterm field surveys last by establishing a multifactorial predictionbased method the project will identify which features ecological macro microevolutionary or all are meaningful to inferring cer in freshwater organisms the implications of this proposal are threefold and relevant to scientific technological and societal concerns our findings may provide a basis for comparing predictors of cer across taxa they will also open up a more integrative framework for conservation actions moving beyond speciesbyspecies categorisation focussing on the natural resources agriculture environment area from horizon 20212027 this project addresses knowledge gaps in species threats and safeguards freshwater resources illustrating this with understudied taxa
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contribution of lipid droplets to the pathogenesis and chemoresistance of acute myeloid leukemia
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acute myeloid leukemia aml results from the uncontrolled expansion of differentiationdefective hematopoietic stemprogenitor cells or immature myeloid cells blasts in the bone marrow bm aml remains a highrisk disease mainly due to treatment refractoriness which is dependent on leukemiabm stroma interactions unfortunately treatments have only experienced minor developments over the last decades on the other hand emerging evidence in cancer metabolism has identified lipid droplets lds cytosolic fat storage organelles as key regulators of lipid metabolism and signalling in cells exposed to stress such as hypoxia chemotherapy and nutrient deprivation however the precise role of lds in the pathogenesis and chemoresistance of aml remains poorly investigated here we aim to i characterize the accumulation and role of lds in aml ii assess the functional impact of blasts and bm stromalds on aml pathogenesis and chemoresistance and iii investigate the involvement of lds in the progression and refractoriness of aml cuttingedge in vitro aml primary cells bmstroma cells and in vivo assays patientderived xenografts will be used to provide evidence of lds as a key player in leukemogenesis our project is based on solid preliminary single cellrna sequencing data indicating that lds are highly accumulated in aml blasts and that inhibition of lds is more effective than the standardofcare chemotherapy in impairing aml cell proliferation our proposal represents an innovative approach achievable thanks to the complementary knowledge and expertise of two topnotch laboratories in acute leukemia supervisor and lds collaborator results from this study will open new avenues to explore the therapeutic opportunity of ld inhibitors as antileukemic coadjuvant this fellowship will enable me to acquire transformational knowledge in leukemia metabolism and will constitute a major first step towards initiating my independent academic career
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prediction error computation in visual perception
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prior knowledge plays a central role in shaping our perception and interactions with the world predictive coding theories represent an influential framework formalizing the neural computations that underlie the integration of prior knowledge into perception one central tenet of predictive coding is the computation of prediction errors which signify the discrepancy between predictions derived from our prior knowledge and incoming sensory input despite ample empirical evidence supporting the existence of prediction errors such as heightened sensory responses to unexpected compared to expected stimuli several unresolved questions persistone pivotal question pertains to the nature of the surprise encoded in sensory prediction errors across the visual cortical hierarchy does the computation of prediction errors reflect local surprise specific to each level in the visual hierarchy eg surprising orientations in primary visual cortex alternatively is the coding of surprise inherited topdown aligning with the notion of predictive coding that predictions are relayed from higher to lower areas furthermore it remains unclear whether the computation of surprise dynamically adapts to our goals or remains a static feature of cortical tuning lastly the networks and temporal dynamics that underlie prediction and prediction error computations are poorly understoodwithin the scope of the prevision project my objective is to address these critical knowledge gaps through the integration of advanced neuroimaging techniques and artificial intelligence methodologies thereby shedding light on the fundamental neurocomputational mechanisms that drive perception consequently this project represents an excellent opportunity for me to engage in innovative and pioneering research investigating pressing questions within contemporary cognitive neuroscience and significantly advance my scientific career
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naming the world semantic associations and formmeaning mappings in the mental lexicon across sign languages
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words in sign languages are rich in visual meaning they contain shapes movements relations in space etc that depict objects and actions as symbolic metaphors eg the action of pulling words out of the head in one language means to ponder yet signs are also encoded into units of form that are articulated in simultaneous constructions unlike sequences of consonants and vowels in spoken words how then do signers store richly symbolic words that occur in highly simultaneous forms in their mental lexicons at present insight into these mental mappings remains highly occluded not only at the level of behavioral and neural phenomena but in terms of linguistic analysis as well what indeed is morphology in sign languages when even the smallest units of formlike hooked fingers or a location at the throatcan carry meaning what is the nature of these units do they vary across sign languages or are the iconic roots of formmeaning mappings so powerful that the same ones reoccur across unrelated sign languages answering these questions is urgently needed to create better sign language resources for teaching and learning and to advance language technologies the semasign project proposes a groundbreaking approach to these questions by locating formmeaning correspondences in sign languages through computational means while creating new empiricallyrobust datasets to reveal how signs are organized in the mental lexicon semantic networks are created for sign languages from germany kenya and guinea bissau on the basis of word association responses in which a signer sees a sign from their language and responds with the first three signs that come to mind this will establish an objective measure of semantic relatedness enabling computational means to locate clusters of signs unusually close in both form and meaning as the language in guinea bissau was formed only 15 years ago we will also discover how lexicons emerge and grow at a very early stage
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quantifying the landscape of fear collaborative camera trap networks to assess wildlife responses to activities of humans and freeranging domestic species across europe
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standardized largescale monitoring programs are critical to track progress toward the biodiversity and sustainable goals identified by several international initiatives including the european green deal yet these programs are hard to establish often because of limited resources international collaborations centered on data and knowledge sharing can fill this gap the future fellow will gather and collate camera trap data collected across europe in the past decade to quantify the impact on wildlife of the presence of humans and their domestic species in natural environments at a fine temporal scale and for the first time across europe the mere presence of human and freeranging dogs cats and livestock in natural environments might be detrimental to wildlife populations with relatively unknown consequences on species persistence this action aims at 1 quantifying the effects of human presence on mammals occupancy and activity 2 assessing distribution and cooccurrence of freeranging domestic animals and wildlife populations 3 quantifying the effects of freeranging domestic cats on urban and suburban mammal and bird communities along with leveraging publicly shared datasets this action will build on and cement emerging european camera trap collaborations and thus help establish the longterm largescale monitoring program that is paramount to tracking the status of terrestrial communities across europe and informing european conservation policies the future fellow will be hosted at the max planck institute of animal behavior a leading actor in the study of animal behavior and a strong promotor of european largescale camera trap efforts the future supervisor prof martin wikelski is a pioneer in leveraging international collaborations and technology to advance our understanding of animal decisionmaking processes across large scales this action will greatly advance the fellows expertise and establish her as an independent researcher
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data aware efficient models of the urban microclimate
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the share of the worlds population living in cities is rapidly increasing and it is expected to rise to 80 by 2050 it is therefore crucial to develop new efficient and reliable methods to model the urban microclimate in fact these models can support urban planners and policymakers to create more comfortable and sustainable cities high computational requirements limit existing numerical methodologies and dante fits in this context and aims to create a new paradigm for fast and reliable numerical simulations bridging the fields of model order reduction machine learning and data assimilation the idea is to create a research team to answer many unresolved questions in model order reduction for complex and reallife urban microclimate simulations particular emphasis will be given to advanced machine learning tools which incorporate physics knowledge aiming to improve the accuracy interpretability and reliability of predictive models the identified tasks cover a wide range of different topics dimensionality reduction of the solution manifold in problems governed by complex physical principles uncertainty quantification data assimilation and inverse modeling the new tools will have the agility of datadriven methods in complex nonlinear settings and the physical rigor of projectionbased methods with quantified errors the developed methods will significantly impact digital transformation enabling digital twins of urban environments possible applications include but are not limited to urban air pollution heat island modeling wind loads on buildings and inverse modeling approaches
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millimetrewave superconducting quantum circuits
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i propose an experimental program to investigate quantumcoherent properties of superconducting circuits at frequencies one order of magnitude larger than those demonstrated until now my idea is to develop a new generation of superconducting qubits with significantly increased energy level separation between their ground and the first excited states pushing the operation frequency of superconducting qubits up offers a number of potential technological advantages due to the increased level separation such novel millimetrewave quantum processors could be operated at much higher temperatures than their present counterparts even at millikelvin temperatures the higher qubit resonance frequency will offer better protection from nonthermal noise furthermore qubit logic gates can be performed faster at higher frequencies quantum circuit components can be reduced in size due to smaller wavelength at higher frequencies thus allowing for a smaller footprint denser packaging and better integration these numerous potential advantages face nevertheless a number of challenges and pose open questions that will be addressed and are aimed to be answered in the proposed project the goal is to develop prototype qubits for the 100 ghz frequency range and to demonstrate their manipulation and quantum state tomography this challenging project will unearth fundamental knowledge about decoherence in this yet unexplored frequency range we will study dielectric loss and other decoherence sources as functions of frequency and temperature once successful this approach will open a new way of building a superconducting quantum computer
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revolutionizing remote care of chronic disease patients an interoperable and smart monitoring platform
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the growing demand for proper monitoring and treatment of chronic disease patients is unsustainable for european healthcare systems despite the recent advancements remote patient monitoring rpm systems have not achieved their potential due their inability to integrate accurate data from any given medical device to the electronic health records ehrs to cater to the urgent need of innovative monitoring systems we deliver the humanitcare platform an aipowered platform which can collect data from any given device adapt itself for the needs of the patients and enables integration into the ehrs humanitcare reduces 40 of total visits and generates smart alarms and reports to inform patients and caregivers hence contributing significantly to clinical and selfcare with our innovative software architecture we enable security interoperability sustainability and scalability the superior features of our platform will enable us to be the leaders of the industry in europe
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business intelligence engine for things in motion
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navalgo is building a business intelligence engine for things in motion tailored for transport logistics it allows users to extract valuable insights from the growing amounts of spatiotemporal data that is being generated from iot devices but not only to improve operations reduce costs meet the challenges of the digital sustainability transitionsthe solution a horizontal b2b cloudnative application enables companies to face the data deluge they experience to make a strategic use of their data with a very short timetomarket by turning raw unqueriable often inconsistent data on assets movement transport parameters into a reliable vision of their processfocus their attention on actionable insights related to their supply chain processes covering anomaly detection forecasts and risks of delay or damage the solution responds to the growing business intelligence needs of companies working with sources of complex data with a special focus on data originating from moving assets including their location it is a complete technology stack which upon deployment is meant to be accessible to users without technical skills eg sales business teams the solution allows clients to retain full control of their data its main societal and economic impact lies in helping to achieve more resilient optimized and environmentally friendly supply chains navalgo is a womenled company both the ceo and coo identify as women a deeptech project whose development started in early 2020 this application aims to reinforce aspects of gotomarket including ip strategy customer validation for the primary vertical transport logistics market analysis for further verticals as well as input to the funding strategy
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high resolution dual comb spectroscopy and ranging
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spectroscopy and metrology are amongst the most important applications of electromagnetic fieldsthe very fast oscillations of light up to 200 thz in the infrared permit very precise distance measurements as well as broadband analysis of radiations emitted and absorbed by matterthe technologies have evolved tremendously over the years and at the turn of the century a groundbreaking technology was proposed by using two sources of optical pulse trains corresponding to optical frequency combs in the spectral domain no moving parts would be required and much faster measurements could be performed socalled dual comb spectroscopy and ranging have had a very significant impact on their respective fields and have established capabilities in terms of speed and accuracy that are still relevant todayyet some important limitations remain most importantly there is a tradeoff between resolution an acquisition time which is currently treated as a fundamental limit of dual comb systems it prevents these systems from being used for high resolution spectroscopy or longdistance ranging which are critical for some applications such as gas sensing or largescale metrologyin highres i propose a novel technique which permits overcoming this fundamental limit i expect it will improve the current state of the art by as much as three orders of magnitude in terms of resolution or distancewe will start by a theoretical analysis of the general principle we propose we will then build a dual comb source with unprecedented characteristics based on soliton formation in driven fiber resonators finally using this novel source we will experimentally demonstrate two proof of principle applications which would greatly benefit from this novel technique namely thz spectroscopy and very longdistance ranging
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magnetoionic devices based on oxygenion solid state intercalation
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the digitalization of the world and the rise of the bigdata era continuously push towards improved computing capabilities able to sustain new and complex functionalities traditional computer architectures based on the von neumann model present limitations when dealing with rapidly growing technologies such artificial intelligence since to low access speed between the separated memory and cpu inevitably leads to low processing capabilities and high energy consumptions a possible solution to overcome these limitations is the development of nonvolatile memories nvms as element with both storage and logic capabilities enabling the computation of tasks directly on the memory unit inmemory computing magnoxy aims at developing a novel solid state batterylike nvm based on the control of magnetic properties of functional oxide thin films through a fast deintercalation of oxygen ions the control of magnetism through the reversible deintercalation of ions into a target material mediated by the application of an electrical bias through an ionic electrolyte ie magnetoionics mi is the most recent approach for controlling magnetism by voltage mibased magnetoelectric randomaccess memories meram have the potential to deliver robust fast and energy efficient nvms for inmemory computing however mi control is still at an early stage of the rd process and many aspects still needs to be improved to deliver a competitive device in essence magnoxy will provide i a solid state thin film device based on the electrochemical insertion of oxygen ions at rt ii a large and analogically tuneable magnetic response of the cell ii a fast 100 ms magnetic switching capabilities through the implementation of nanoionics concept for boosting ionic motion iii an improved understanding of the oxygenion intercalation mechanisms in oxide perovskite thin films iv device scalability and miniaturization
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targeted respiratory drug delivery by tribo charged sprays
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the main purpose of this proposal is to develop a radically new technology for very precisely delivering medicine to the human body targeted deposition of drug formulations to the lungs exhibits great promise in several treatments eg sirna treatment against lung cancer or mrna vaccination against covid19 this requires oral and nasal inhalation for which spray pumps and nebulizers are widely used to transform an aqueous formulation into a soft mist spray however producing the necessary drop size is hampered by droplet coalescence making drops too large and polydisperse because of this they deposit in the wrong places large droplets between 10 and 50 micrometers deposit mostly in the upper respiratory tract mouth throat or nasal cavity through ballistic impact on the mucosal tissue whereas small droplets between 5 and 10 micrometers can be lifted by the airstreams and deposit mostly inthe lower respiratory tract bronchi and lungs our innovation relies on the charging of drops through the friction with the nozzle material the charged drops repel and do not coalesce allowing precise control of their size to target eg the lungs this allows to achieve safe and effective targeted deposition of drugs and or vaccines with hitherto unequaled precision
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unlocking the potential of dredged sediments towards sustainable geopolymers for green construction
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climate change poses a global challenge and the production of cement contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions ghg by 58 this project is therefore poised to revolutionize the industry by developing an innovative ecofriendly cement using dredged materials dms as precursors to produce greener geopolymers the latter are synthesized by mixing materials rich in aluminosilicates with an alkaline solution the ghg of geopolymer concrete is 73 and 46 less than ordinary portland cement opc concrete respectively geopolymers exhibit noticeably improved mechanical properties compared to opc concrete and have been shown to have better resistance to acid attacks high temperatures and fire however the production of large quantities of geopolymer concrete is limited due to the declining availability of fly ash worldwide dredged sediments have been identified as a potential source of silica and alumina this project sets out to establish the foundational science needed to transform dms into materials suitable for structural applications thus pioneering a sustainable path to co2 reduction this study will foster the adoption of these byproducts in sustainable infrastructure development and create a roadmap for producing dmbased geopolymers the research led by me dr amine el mahdi safhi under the mentorship of dr mahdi kioumarsi and dr shima pilehvar at stfold university college hi in norway will bolster my skills in materials and structural engineering preparing me for an expansive academic career the project is an international endeavor with the collaboration of dr ahmed soliman from concordia university canada and industrial partner netics netherlands our vision is to turn an environmental challenge into an opportunity for sustainable development by harnessing dms we will not only transform the cement industry but also positively impact society and the environment
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smart gridefficient interactive buildings
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evelixia brings together 36 high profile organizations from 12 eu countries envisioning to realize buildings as active utility nodes bauns rendering the eu building stock as a energy efficient b connected by facilitating a twoway communication between the grid and the occupants capitalizing on flexible technologies c smart by utilizing analytics supported by sensors and controls to cooptimize efficiency flexibility and occupant preferences and d flexible reducing shifting or modulating energy use according to occupant needs while considering utility signals evelixia structures the advancement of its solutions along five innovation pathways ip1 buildingtogrid b2g services ip2 gridtobuilding g2b services ip3 humantobuilding interfaces interactivity ip 4 systems interoperability and ip5 innovative hw as flexibility enablers which will be integrated deployed and validated at 7 largescale reallife pilots gr ro fr fi es at dk during the evelixia platform deployment and validation different actors ie dsos dnos escos aggregators from various sectors electricity heatingcooling mobility will exchange data for providing b2g and g2b services and they will participate in the development of business models showcasing the economic viability of the solutions proposed evelixia puts a large focus on social engagement empowering citizens as not only adopters of solutions but also as their cocreators applying methodologies for citizen and consumer engagement and advanced human to building interfaces key expected outcomes include 14 scalable b2gg2b services demonstrated including dsf implicit explicit shifting etc p2p energy trading portfolio management day aheadintraday tsodsodho and system planning services ghg emissions reduced by 17 increase of flexibility by up to 25 increase of selfconsumption up to 100 reduce energy consumption by 135 and increase re generation by 11
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oils4cure finding an effective drug to alleviate refractory epilepsy one of the most severe symptoms in the pathology of tuberous sclerosis
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oils4cure is a spanish biotech company dedicated to the research development production and commercialisation of medicinal products based on a medicinal cannabis extract it is developing a drug to manage refractory epilepsy associated with tuberous sclerosis ycj01 and another for leukodystrophies ycj02 both are paediatric rare diseases this project only deals with the development of our first and most advanced therapy directed at tuberous sclerosis ts
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corpora in greater gandhra tracing the development of buddhist textuality and gilgitbamiyan manuscript networks in the first millennium of the common era
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the foundation of the academic study of the development of buddhism lies in the research of surviving textual material first composed in indic languages over centuries before and into the first millennium in the last several years fantastic manuscript finds have surfaced opening new windows into the scholarly study of the development of buddhist literature i am one of the few scholars to have access to such material this project represents a multifaceted holistic approach to the study of an important and voluminous genre of manuscript witnesses from an early era of buddhist textual transmission composed in sanskrit in the gilgitbamiyan type scripts from the historic region of greater gandhra covering modern day afghanistan pakistan and parts of northern india this project centers the study of two large recently discovered caches of highly important early buddhist gilgitbamiyan type stra manuscripts and their place in the body of works from greater gandhra the first cache was excavated from the mes aynak archeological site in afghanistan and the second is a collection of newly identified manuscripts held in a private collection in thailand the philological paleographical codicological and critical research conducted in this project will examine textual and material production transmission and relationship networks in the buddhist manuscript cultures of greater gandhra and beyond in the first millennium of the common era these results will be made permanently available through the development of a digital archive allowing for the creation of an akara database of individual syllables representing unique scribal identifiers which will identify individual scribes across manuscripts and scriptorium networks digital preservation of the manuscripts their editions and translations study of their textual paleographical and codicological features and the direct comparison of the content of these texts with parallels in multiple languages
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mapping genetic suppression interaction networks in dna break repair disorders
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dna doublestrand breaks dsbs occur frequently during a cells lifetime and constitute the most cytotoxic dna lesion dsbs compromise genetic integrity and have the potential to trigger cell death and generate pathological mutations to counteract such threat cells possess a complex protein network termed dsb response dsbr which senses signals and repairs dsbs two predominant mechanisms repair dsbs homologous recombination hr and nonhomologous end joining nhej while loss of dsbr factors such as ku and xrcc4 ie nhej proteins or brca1 and brca2 ie hr proteins leads to early embryonic lethality and cell death inactivating somatic mutations in these very same genes are associated with certain immunological and neurological disorders premature ageing and cancer this implies the existence of a suppressive epigenetic background that enables diseased cells to tolerate the otherwise lethal loss of essential dsbr factorsthis project aims to systematically identify suppressor mutations which rescue viability upon loss of essential hr brca1 and brca2 and nhej ku80 and xrcc4 effectors to reach such goal i propose to a genetically sensitize wildtype healthy mouse embryonic stem cells and b lymphoid cells by introducing mutations using a genomewide crispr ko library in such diversely sensitized background i will then b trigger the acute degradation of ku80 xrcc4 brca1 and brca2 proteins using the auxininducible degron aid system suppressor mutations will be directly identified by sequencing sgrna retrieved from survivor cells c the resulting suppression network maps will be integrated to clinical datasets to identify the relevance of these mutations in diseasetogether this project will unravel the dsbr protein networks that permit cell survival under different dna repairdeficient conditions encountered notably in cancer paving way for personalized disease prevention and treatment strategies
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galaxy mergers in the era of large surveys
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as galaxies are formed to a large extent by merging of smaller galaxies knowing the merger history of the observed galaxies is crucial to understand their evolution as well as the evolution of the whole universe galaxy mergers are slow processes happening over millions of years and so the information about the merger history of any individual galaxy must be indirectly derived from its presentday state luckily a significant portion of elliptical and lenticular galaxies show a unique type of fine structure known as stellar shells which are created in mergers and can be used to date the last significant merger that the galaxy has undergone we have already developed methods to extract such information from individual galaxies now we will expand the applicability of such methods to vastly larger samples to this end we will develop a set of selfcontained tools to identify and analyze shell galaxies in images of large sky surveys so that the estimates of merger times can be automatically obtained we will apply those tools on existing data from current surveys and prepare for their application to the unprecedentedly large data set that will be produced by the large survey of space and time lsst at the vera c rubin observatory which will become operational around the time when the project concludes this will transform shell galaxies from a position of curiosity to that of utility allowing statistical applications using the merger data on the hundreds of shell galaxies that will be identified in the existing data and later on the thousands of galaxies eventually observed by the lsst project a huge qualitative leap from the handful of galaxies with known merger histories available today we will pioneer the use of this data by applying it for the benefit of lsst itself where it will help optimize the observation time in search of transients by exploring the correlation of their occurrence with the merger histories of the host galaxies
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evolutionary and molecular determinants of a nutritional polyphenism
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environmental fluctuations are a general challenge for organisms exacerbated in the context of global change many animals evolve phenotypically plastic responses to adjust to new conditions polyphenism is an original mechanism that produces specialized morphs to track environmental changes whether the molecular mechanisms underlying polyphenism evolve from the acquisition of novel genes or the rewiring of conserved environmentsensing pathways is an unresolved and challenging question as it requires wellcharacterized regulatory networks including the involvement of hostmicrobiota molecular interactions and relevant phylogenetic frameworks to root the evolutionary steps through which polyphenism emergedalterevo aims to understand how a nutrientsensitive polyphenism evolves and is regulated it uses aphids and their symbionts to characterize the molecular regulation of nutritional polyphenism which induces alternative morphs adapted to distinct host plants and to elucidate how this polyphenism machinery became genetically encoded it also addresses for the first time the role of symbionts on the evolution and regulation of animal polyphenisms to fulfil these objectives alterevo proposes an original approach linking the evolutionary molecular and ecological components of polyphenism and incorporating the involvement of symbionts it relies on metabolomics to identify plant compounds inducing alternative phenotypes largescale gene expression and epigenetic analyses to reveal the molecular cascade regulating morph determination functional characterization of candidate genes and phylogenomics to elucidate nutritional polyphenism evolution this project will lead major progress on the mechanisms allowing rapid phenotypic adjustments to environment fluctuations and on the role of phenotypic plasticity in evolution in a holobiont context these advances are of fundamental importance for assessing the resilience of populations to humaninduced changes
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spectroscopic investigation of the electrochemical interface for sustainable electrocatalysis
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the structure of the double layer at the electrodeelectrolyte interface dictates the electrocatalytic performance a better understanding of the double layer is thus necessary for the optimization of key reactions such as the electrocatalytic hydrogen production and the co2 electroconversion to valueadded products both of which are central to transitioning to carbonfree fuel alternatives however there is currently a significant lack of appropriate characterization methods to resolve this interfacial region meanwhile recent results demonstrate that the models so far employed to predict the physical behavior at the double layer are incomplete therefore for the field of electrocatalysis to reach its performance targets it is critical we develop new techniques to fill this gap in our understanding of the catalystelectrolyte interface in this work we propose to leverage the unique properties of xray photoelectron spectroscopy xps and total electron yield xray absorption spectroscopy teyxas in a dipanpull geometry to resolve the concentration and configuration of the ions and water molecules present in the double layer using single crystal electrodes that are welldefined surfaces we propose to use these spectroscopic insights to verify the nature of nonspecific ionwaterelectrode interactions suggested by previous electrochemical and computational investigations once optimized we propose to expand the application of this spectroscopic approach to electrocatalytically relevant conditions for the hydrogen evolution reaction on pt111 and for the co2 reduction reaction on au111 the asdescribed methodology will not only provide unprecedented insights into the elusive contribution of the double layer during electrocatalysis but it will also enable the standardization of a powerful characterization tool that will greatly benefit the field of surface chemistry and catalysis
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infectious disease outbreaks as contributors to sociocultural transformations in the 2nd millennium bce
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in recent years rapid developments in the field of ancient metagenomics enabled through advances in genomic sequencing and ancient dna retrieval have provided temporal transects of microbial diversity and have paved the way for studying humanpathogen interactions on the biological and cultural dimensions far earlier than the written historical record with these tools at hand protopest will utilise a timely opportunity for investigating the impact of infectious disease epidemics on prehistoric human societies the project will be centred on the 2nd millennium bce a period of largescale sociocultural transformations witnessed differentially across the archaeological records of europe near east and asia until now studies have focused on environmental changes economic shifts warfare and human migration to explain these phenomena crucially the 2nd millennium bears the earliest textual evidence of infectious disease epidemics ever identified yet their possible contribution to observed transformations as well as their transregional impact beyond textual descriptions remain largely unexplored protopest will produce extensive ancient metagenomic pathogen genomic and human genomic datasets generated from human and animal remains across key regions of europe the near east and central asia coanalysed alongside cultural isotopic paleodemographic and palaeopathological information these data will be used to expose the unknown landscape of middlelate bronze age epidemics across a large geographical expanse our unique multidisciplinary framework will define indicators of prehistoric community responses to infectious disease outbreaks and reveal how pathogens emerged and disseminated within and across human populations in this capacity protopest will provide a deep evolutionary and cultural framework for empirically examining the diachronic challenges that pathogens have posed on human societies to gain a more holistic view on human prehistory
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developing piloting biodiversity footprinting natural capital accounting via a beehive of sectoral hubs for sustainable transition to a circular eu bioeconomy
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biodiversity is the true driving force of a sustainable circular bioeconomy cbe while the cbe needs advanced technology and innovation to succeed biodiversity determines the capacity of biological systems to adapt and evolve for this reason biodiversity considerations need to be reflected in economic practices and valuation circhive will measure and integrate the value of nature into public and business decision making by 1 improving data availability accessibility and harmonisation 2 developing a standardised method for biodiversity footprinting bf and integrating it with natural capital accounting nca 3 mainstreaming the use of bf and nca in public and private decision making incl improving disclosure risk management and investment practice 4 testing and improving the developed methods and models and 5 building a wider community beehive for peer support and exploitation of results a strong emphasis is put developing scientifically robust and standardised methods that bridge bf life cycle analyses and nca bookkeeping given their multiple overlaps but also divergences that hinder operationalisation and uptake an equally strong emphasis is placed on practicetesting to understand current practices and opportunities for further mainstreaming of biodiversity and natural capital into disclosure ecolabelling and investment decisions transitioning theory to practice is put to the test via a case study network who will apply different biodiversitycentric approaches in real life this is carried out in sectoral case study hubs industry retailers investors cities for peer learning and capacity building in circhives approach cbe and biodiversity reinforce each other as a basis for resources and inspiration for sustainable business practices the integration of the value of nature into public and business decisions will benefit both the protection of ecosystems and their services and the profitability of sustainable businesses
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terahertz excitons in monolithically integrated carbon nanostructures
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at present mobile networks and emerging wireless technologies internet of things etc require broadband channels to exchange rapidly a huge amount of data the usage of frequencies from 01 to 10 thz has potential to increase the stateoftheart high speeds by 2 orders of magnitude however despite the latest advancements in thz technology we still lack proper materials to realize suitable thz photonic components this project aims to understand principles of designing thz devices based on carbon nanostructures integrated into a monolithic flexible and durable substrate the route to harnessing thz radiation for compact devices is seen in the usage of carbon nanostructures as building blocks for detectors emitters etc such carbon nanostructures as nanotubes and graphene nanoribbons exhibit unique electronic and optical properties that make them very promising candidates for thz components however carbon nanotube and nanoribbon monolithic onchip integration is challenging because it may results in significant change of their intrinsic properties after an embedment into a substrate we propose to investigate with first principles and theoretical methods the successful routes of such integration and calculate electronic and optical properties of the integrated structures we shall model such systems with 2d graphene superlattices in these structures quasimetallic and dielectric regions can be alternated for instance either by selective hydrogenation of graphene or by embedment of boron nitride regions the project will focus on i spinorbit interactions and the topological edge states at interfaces ii topological singularities in optical matrix element and iii excitonic effects this project has a significant impact in thz technology and wireless communications its success can lead to the realization of ultrafast wireless networks for multiuser environment the potential benefits can ensure eu leadership in the global telecom market
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photonic laser integration for metrology and quantum systems
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in lasiq i will develop for the first time an onchip titaniumsapphire modelocked laser capable of generating lownoise optical frequency combs in the 6501100 nm wavelength range optical frequency comb generators are light sources capable of generating a spectrum of millions of equally spaced laser lines such light sources allow to downconvert optical frequencies thz to the microwave domain ghz enabling precision laser spectroscopy and the construction of optical atomic clocks theodor hnsch and john hall were awarded the nobel prize in physics of 2005 for developing the optical frequency comb in recognition of its impact on quantum metrology timekeeping and fundamental physics since their initial development they have revolutionized several other fields such as lidar light detection and ranging molecular spectroscopy astronomic spectroscopy for exoplanet identification and ultralownoise microwave generationhowever highperformance optical frequency combs are mostly based on expensive 100 keur and bulky 900 cm3 freespace or fiberbased modelocked laser systems which strongly limits their use in realworld applications this has spurred an enormous research effort towards developing onchip optical frequency comb generators currently a large variety of integrated optical comb generators have been demonstrated ranging from soliton microcombs to semiconductor modelocked lasers however so far integrated optical comb generators cannot rival the performance of their tabletop counterparts severely limiting their application in lasiq i will address this need by demonstrating titaniumsapphire modelocked lasers on a millimetersized chip with a performance similar to that of the incumbent freespace solutionthe realization of an onchip titaniumsapphire modelocked laser will enable chipscale supercontinuum sources integrated optical coherence tomography systems onchip optical atomic clocks and dualcomb metrology
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