Projets

Materials under high pressure exhibit exciting topics such as the superconductivity (SC) of hydrogen-rich molecular compounds (super-hydrides) in the long standing search of room-temperature SC. While pressures above 100 GPa can be routinely created in a diamond anvil cell (DAC), the tiny sample volume almost precludes the use of non-optical detection schemes to probe the sample properties. The project idea is to integrate nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers in the DAC and use the optically detected magnetic resonance (ODMR) of the NV electronic spin to image the Meissner effect. The project relies on our first results where we engineered NV centers on the tip of a diamond anvil and adapted quantum sensing methods to detect pressure-induced magnetic and SC transitions under tens of GPa. By controlling the stress distribution to achieve hydrostatic conditions that preserve the NV symmetry, we have extended this method above 100 GPa, reaching the pressure range of existence of SC in super-hydrides. These materials need to be synthetized at high pressure by laser heating which induces strong inhomogeneities with micron scale. We will use of widefield NV magnetometry to locally image the Meissner effect and the flux trapping in the SC grains whereas the conventional measurements average over the entire DAC geometry and therefore discard all local information. By operating NV sensing on a synchrotron beamline, we will determine the crystal structure of the super-hydrides after the synthesis in the DAC. We will finally couple the spatial detection with noise spectroscopy to measure the temporal current fluctuations in the SC. These methods will be implemented in parallel on Hg-doped cuprates as testbed systems. In a complementary task we will investigate the implementation of NV-based microscale nuclear magnetic resonance in the DAC. Our goal will be to exploit the sensitivity of a dense ensemble of NV centers to detect the chemical shift of the nuclear spins in the sample.

Speckle patterns are distinct features of disordered materials. While often regarded as mere noise, the intricate and responsive speckle patterns to minor fluctuations in external factors render them an ideal candidate for applications in hyperspectral imaging and sensing. The MetaSpectrometer harnesses the high information capacity of the speckle pattern of resonant disordered metasurfaces for compact, machine learning-assisted, non-invasive, and efficient near-infrared spectroscopy. An ultra-compact footprint, portability, cost-efficiency, minimal losses, machine-learning assisted recognition, angle-insensitivity, suppressed specular scatterance, significant memory effect, and ability to accommodate low coherence fields are the main features that cannot be currently obtained with any technology proposed so far and would represent a huge step forward in the state of the art. MetaSpectrometer brings together the complementary expertise of the postdoctoral researcher (PR) in metasurface engineering; the incoming host (CNRS-C2N, France) in silicon photonics, optoelectronics and nanofabrication; the associated the outgoing host (MIT, USA) in spectroscopy and machine learning, the secondment host (Rice, USA) in lensless imaging and the industrial partner (ZEISS, Germany) in spectroscopy and market analysis. The project allows PR to acquire expertise in silicon photonics technology's design, fabrication, characterization, and commercialization while giving back his expertise in metasurface design. The developed NIR spectrometers will find direct potential applications in wearable health monitoring systems, food screening, agriculture, and environmental screening that a remarkable global market size. The distribution of the work packages with distinct and clearly defined milestones and deliverables makes sure that the progress of the project will be monitored and matched with the work plan.

This proposal is primarily interested in algebraic geometry, a field that underpins geometric intuition with the precision brought about by calculation from algebra. The algebraic information of an algebraic variety - the set of common zeros of polynomial equations – is packaged in sheaves and organized in categories, which makes it possible to study these objects by importing the tools of homological and (non-)commutative algebra. This categorical approach is natural for many of the current leading questions in mirror symmetry, birational geometry, representation theory, and theoretical physics because it serves as a bridge between the geometric and algebraic language. It is also fundamental, as many properties and even classification results are not possible without it. The proposal is deeply interdisciplinary, and it connects broad areas of algebra and geometry. It naturally splits into three parts. The first aims to investigate one of the most fundamental properties of curves, namely contractibility, with non-commutative deformation theory. It will generalize classical results using modern language, at the same time producing many new explicit examples of rational curves in threefolds. Linking contractibility and non-commutative algebra will bring deep consequences for the birational and enumerative geometry of Calabi-Yau varieties, advancing areas of string theory. The second part studies surfaces with mild positive curvature (Fano, but with ineffective anticanonical bundle). The main objective is to prove a mirror theorem, packaging physical information with tools of homological algebra. The new heuristics, definitions, and techniques will open up an avenue to investigate higher dimensional settings. The third part involves reconstructing varieties from associated categorical data. I will tackle some hard open cases, developing new tools and combining them with classical methods.

The SiCyMBSIA (Silicon Cycle in the Mediterranean and Black Seas: An isotopic approach) project will be carried out by Dr. Diksha Sharma, an experienced researcher at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in France under the supervision of Prof. Damien Cardinal. This project aims to unravel the intricate biogeochemical silicon (Si) cycling in the Mediterranean Sea (MS) and the Black Sea (BS). These two distinct marine environments offer unique opportunities for scientific exploration. The MS, with its unique oceanic characteristics, diverse ecosystems, and trophic regimes, provides an excellent opportunity for climate change research. Diatoms, an important phytoplankton group, play a crucial role in primary production and carbon export in this region. However, our understanding of their Si sources and limitations remains incomplete. By employing stable silicon isotopes (δ30Si) to analyze dissolved silicic acid and biogenic silica in the deep biogenic silica maxima and deep chlorophyll-a maxima layers, this project will quantify the role of diatoms and Si as nutrients and investigate processes governing dissolved silicic acid concentrations and biogenic silica dissolution in the intermediate and deeper layers of the MS. Along with this, understanding the seasonal pattern of exported biogenic silica from sediment traps will also be a novel aspect of this project. In contrast, the BS, characterized by its anoxic conditions and complex stratification, presents a unique challenge. This project will delve into the Si uptake by diatoms, sub-surface remineralization, and biogenic silica release through δ30Si analyses, shedding light on nutrient-driven diatom growth and biogenic silica production through hypoxic, anoxic, and H2S rich deep environments of the BS. Ultimately, this project promises to make a significant contribution to the international GEOTRACES programme and enhance our comprehension of Si cycling in these critical marine ecosystems.

HPV-FASTER-Implement aims to improve cervical cancer (CC) prevention. Although human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination and CC screening programmes have significantly reduced mortality, they have reached a plateau because they remain largely inaccessible and underused by vulnerable populations, creating inequalities in the European healthcare system. This adds to the difficulties already faced by vulnerable populations in their efforts to maintain their mental and physical health. HPV-FASTER-Implement will create a Europe-wide knowledge framework on vulnerabilities and the health challenges they pose, as well as the tools to monitor their evolution. HPV-FASTER-Implement will work with stakeholder representatives, primarily from vulnerable populations, to identify context-specific strategies to deliver combined HPV vaccines and HPV-based CC screening to eligible vulnerable populations, thereby reducing the burden of CC in Europe. HPV-FASTER-Implement will develop health education interventions, communication activities and other services to meet the need of vulnerable population with high risk of CC and inadequate access to health services. Through stakeholder engagement, health literacy promotion, mathematical modelling, implementation research, and vulnerability mapping, we will collect, analyse and share knowledge on gaps and opportunities to improve CC prevention in Europe, and progress FASTER towards CC elimination. We will work to ensure that the data we produce are translated into policy recommendations aimed at strengthening national prevention programmes with interventions tailored to vulnerable populations. In this way, we can leverage limited resources to rapidly reduce CC mortality. We aim to reduce health inequalities by offering an innovative prevention intervention to women at risk, with the hope that 50% of those offered the intervention will take it. HPV-FASTER-Implement will make the necessary improvements to European CC prevention policies.

Over the past 5 years, antibody drug conjugates (ADCs) have shown impressive improvements in survival outcomes of solid tumors and hematological malignancies. With 14 ADCs already approved across different countries and more than 140 that entered the clinical development, they are intended to replace standard chemotherapies across multiple tumor types over the next decade. Although ADCs show great clinical efficacy, resistance eventually occurs, and it becomes critical to understand resistance mechanisms to guide the choice of the following lines of therapy for patients who progress on a given ADC. Given the complex nature of ADCs, immunocompromised mouse models (nude mice, NOD-SCID or NOG mice) and currently used clinical assays (standard radiology, IHC, WES etc) are not the optimal preclinical and clinical tools, to identify the multiple causes of resistance. The OASIS project aims to generate a biobank of different patient-derived organoids (PDOs), which better recapitulate ADCs resistance and integrate different assays, spanning from whole-body molecular imaging (Ab-radiolabeled PET scan or immunoPET), circulating tumor cells (CTC), plasma proteomics, to multiplex immunofluorescence (MIF) and machine-learning enhanced digital pathology (AI-digital pathology) to capture most of the parallel mechanisms of resistance to ADCs. Such tools will enable to define biomarkers of ADC resistance that can inform further therapeutic decisions.

Worldwide, ~7 million women live with or beyond Breast Cancer (BC), as 10-year survival rates exceeding 80% for early-stage (I-III) BC. Premenopausal BC accounts for 25% in the EU and 55% in low/middle income countries. Most premenopausal women with BC have high risk of recurrence, therefore standard treatment includes adjuvant chemo- (CT) and endocrine therapy (ET). However, treatment has substantial physical, emotional and social burden, which is often more pressing for younger compared to older patients. Gene-expression assays are used for post-menopausal patients to identify women who can safely forego CT without detriment on clinical outcomes, preserving Quality of Life (QOL). However, a definitive study has yet to be conducted among premenopausal women with high-risk HR+HER2-BC. The primary objective of PATH-FOR-YOUNG is to conduct a pragmatic randomized controlled trial (RCT) with 5000 patients validating the use of a gene-expression assay to drive adjuvant treatment decisions in this target population. PATH-FOR-YOUNG aims to achieve its objective in 7 years. The project (i) builds on and complements an ongoing twin RCT to ensure timely recruitment, (ii) leverages on a large international consortium of oncologists, pathologists, patient representatives, psychologists, sociologists, ethics and communication experts, biostatisticians, health economists, and technology providers, to assure complementary and multidisciplinary expertise, and (iii) highlights patient-engagement, participatory care, and early involvement of end users. PATH-FOR-YOUNG will also study implementation of digital self-management to support patients throughout the cancer journey and particularly while on ET to improve QOL and medication adherence. A full HTA will ensure a path towards cross-country implementation. PATH-FOR-YOUNG has the ambition to improve BC care, fully integrating the predictive, personalized, preventive, and participatory principles of health management.

Chronic pain is a major societal and economic European burden, affects one in five adults, and its inadequate relief indicates a major unmet need for effective and mechanism-based non-pharmacological treatments. In FRESCO4NoPain, we propose that maladaptive brain oscillatory activity is associated with persistent pain, and that non-invasive brain neuromodulation may provide a novel treatment strategy. For this, mechanistic insight is needed. We see this as the perfect opportunity to unite world-leading experts in pain neuroscience to train 17 uniquely skilled Doctoral Candidates (DCs) who will become the future generation of pain scientists, fully equipped to address unmet challenges within chronic pain. The DCs will be integrated in a one-of-a-kind network-wide training infrastructure conducting frontline research on non-invasive brain stimulation that targets persistent pain based on i) preclinical studies of the relevant brain circuitries, ii) human studies of the involved mechanisms, and iii) clinical studies. Through FRESCO4NoPain, DCs will access a unique set of basic, experimental, and clinical disciplines in both academic and non-academic settings, tied together by synergistic collaborations across the network. An application-based and patient-oriented mindset will permeate the consortium via the active involvement of cutting-edge MedTech companies, knowledge actors and end-users. Only such a truly interdisciplinary and intersectoral approach can provide the necessary ecosystem to go beyond the state-of-the-art, promote disruptive thinking while developing new methods that overcome current technological barriers in the complex field of interdisciplinary pain neuroscience. FRESCO4NoPain will deliver on urgently needed non-pharmacological therapeutic concepts for chronic pain and build on fundamental scientific insights regarding the role of neuronal oscillations in the brain processing of pain, thereby potentially helping millions of people with chronic pain.

The EFFecT Doctoral Training (DN) Network responds to the evolving landscape of RNA-based therapeutics and in particular antisense oligonucleotides (ASO). Over the last 25 years, only 21 antisense nucleic acid-based molecules have been approved by the FDA or/and EMA. However, the field is now at the tipping point of maturity to achieve regular translation from bench to bed side, provided that certain obstacles are successfully addressed. Our consortium involves experts from academia, industry, and non-profit organizations across nine European countries with first-hand experience in the successful translation of this new technology and in-depth knowledge of the remaining hurdles for its success. With leading scientists at different career stages, EFFecT’s core is form by nine academic and three industrial partners. EFFecT's objectives include addressing tissue-specific delivery challenges, imparting knowledge on diverse ASO modalities, and creating a roadmap for ASO therapeutics in Europe. The network's composition leverages over 20 years of experience in nucleic acid drug development, and was born from the successful COST Action "Delivery of Antisense RNA ThERapeutics" (DARTER). The EFFecT training network ensures a comprehensive education for Doctoral Candidates through knowledge exchange, secondments, research workshops and dissemination. This network is expanded with the collaborations of experts in communication, intellectual property, and open science that will train the DCs in good scientific practices. By addressing training gaps and fostering collaborations, EFFecT is poised to deliver the next generation of experts in this up-and coming field, elevating Europe's visibility and competitiveness in antisense RNA therapeutics.

Effective (organic) waste management and renewable energy supply are essential in our present society, such as meeting targets of the European Green Deal and the Renewable Energy Directive. Anaerobic digestion can tackle both challenges simultaneously, and has been commonly applied for renewable energy recovery in the form of biogas from organic waste. The complex and sensitive microbial interactions to environmental stressors can cause the failure of anaerobic digestion, imposing challenges for innovation. In LeAD, we introduce the microbial niche nexus concept (tuning microbial communities and their metabolic pathways to achieve multidimensional microbial networks) to achieve more resistant/resilient anaerobic digestion systems, thus improving resource recovery from waste sources under stressed conditions. Hence, LeAD aims to train the next generation environmental biotechnologists in order to address key knowledge gaps and develop models and technologies in anaerobic digestion responding to stressed environmental conditions, which will revolutionize resource recovery from waste towards circular bioeconomy and sustainable development. The 14 tailored projects are tailored based on the design-build-test-learn cycle to train the doctoral candidates with systems knowledge to deal with challenges for transiting waste removal towards resource recovery through anaerobic digestion. To train the 14 doctoral candidates via an international, intersectoral, and interdisciplinary program, LeAD brings together experts from several disciplines, forming a consortium of eight beneficiaries and five associated partners (including three industries). Through both local and network-wide activities and events, LeAD will educate next-generation talents with competitive transversal skills and capacities both to the academic and non-academic sectors, further profoundly influencing the future bio-economy and society.

Cancer immunotherapies have been established in a growing number of clinical indications and the pace of development is massively accelerating. Currently over 6.000 clinical trials are investigating immune-related treatments in oncology especially in combinations. It includes both adoptive cellular therapies and immune modulating treatments like immune check point blockade. In contrast, the understanding of how such therapies mediate their mode of action is still mostly poorly understood. In particular, the role of distribution and relocation of immune cells after therapeutic interventions remains unknown. This is surprising, as immune cell interactions are a hallmark of therapeutic immune responses. T-RAFIC will enhance understanding of immune cell trafficking under therapeutic influence. It will open new paths and avenues to treatments, boost their efficacy and help prioritizing the plethora of immune therapeutic combinations. In the past, detailed analysis of cellular distributions was facing technical barriers. Advances in technologies, now permit tracking and visualization of cells in vitro and in vivo at an unprecedented resolution, allowing for the first time studies on immune cells under therapeutic influence. This emerging field of research has enormous potential and key importance for next generation of researchers in oncology and beyond. However, experts in this field are missing and this threats European research, development and medicine. Therefore, T-RAFIC joins forces of 19 academic and three industrial partners from nine European countries to conduct an innovative and interdisciplinary approach combining cell imaging with bioinformatics, cell engineering and clinician expertise. The network bundles recognised expertise in cancer immunotherapies, empowering European research and innovation and ensuring a sustainable cooperation in science and training.

The European Union has been challenged to contribute to the global aim of providing sustainable solutions to the current and future needs on synthetic compounds and materials in the coming years. In this sense, the development of sustainable chemical processes is one of the most important features in modern chemistry. It has become a key research area worldwide, providing solutions to important societal demands by optimizing the use of natural resources and minimizing waste and environmental impact. Among the relevant methods for achieving this goal, catalysis represents a key and central approach. Both Organocatalysis and Metal Catalysis have emerged as solutions to the problems in this context. Despite the enormous advances made towards both types of catalysis, the development of more efficient and general catalysts, as well as synthetic methods is still a challenge. A very similar research-road has occurred in the Photocatalysis area, using visible-light as mild and sustainable energy source. In this context, the pharmaceutical industry has a great impact in our society. Well-stablished organo- and, especially, metal-catalysis have been largely implemented in the chemical industry, both on a micro and ton scale. However, there are only few timid academic applications of novel photocatalytic visible light methodologies into industrial goals. Therefore, the development of cheaper and straightforward methodologies to the incorporation of key photochemical processes is an important field and has a tremendous impact in the industry field. Therefore, greater blending of academia and industry would be desirable for the implementation of photocatalysis in the chemical industry world. Students who can access this doctoral network will have the opportunity to work in European Funded academic researchers and in three Big Pharma companies in a hot field such as photocatalysis with the aim to develop new real industrial solutions.

Future networks will support several applications that require extending fiber-optic quality of experience to wireless links. This means connectivity at extremely high data rates with deterministic performance (guaranteed requirements in terms of reliability and time response). Virtual avatar presence, traffic control, autonomous driving, remote health monitoring, cyber physical systems for intelligent transportation, industrial automation are only a few examples of anticipated use cases. Owing to the large amount of available bandwidth, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute has identified terahertz (THz) as a key technology for future wireless networks. TeraWireless is the first EU training-through-research industrial doctoral network of doctoral candidates and senior supervisors fully committed to lay the theoretical, algorithmic, and architectural foundations for enabling THz systems at optical speed with deterministic performance. TeraWireless will 1) put forth the innovative ultra-MIMO (multiple-input multiple-output) technology for increasing the data rate and link reliability through spatial multiplexing and superdirective beamforming, and will pioneer the development of electromagnetic and communication models for evaluating its performance in low-scattering THz channels, where multipath propagation cannot be exploited, by integrating sensing, localization, communication capabilities; 2) leverage the emerging concept of semantic and goal-oriented communications by folding message semantics and goals of communication within communication layers; 3) develop innovative physics-based ML solutions for energy-efficient, robust, reliable, and explainable-by-design implementations; 4) make available to the research community the EU’s and world’s first open-access and open-source simulation environment - integrating ray tracing, link-level, and system-level features - for evaluating and optimizing THz large-scale deterministic networks at optical speed.

In the context of climate change, Europe is facing new challenges that are threatening food security. There is thus an urgent need for the development of innovative strategies to improve plant tolerance to stress. Notably, recent years have already shown an unusual frequency of heat waves during the summer, a stress condition particularly threatening for yield as it cannot be mitigated in the field. Like many other kinds of stress, heat stress has a detrimental effect on growth due to reduction of the cell division activity in meristems. There is accumulating evidence that this growth reduction depends at least partly on the activation of the plant DNA Damage Response (DDR). The HeatDDR proposal aims at building on the acquired knowledge to decipher the links between the DDR and plant heat stress responses, and to fine-tune these cellular responses in order to allow plant survival without impairing growth. By bringing together groups with complementary expertise and private companies interested in this topic, HeatDDR will combine multiscale approaches including biochemistry, molecular biology, cell biology, genetics, computational biology and plant phenotyping to tackle this question and to train a new generation of scientists specializing in this emerging field. Trainees will work on both Arabidopsis and crops and will thus be aware of different plant models, and on specific challenges associated with breeding. Through the HeatDDR programme, ESRs will receive hands-on training on advanced laboratory techniques and develop transferable skills, thereby ensuring their successful integration on the job market either in the academic or in the non-academic sector, and setting the ground for the construction of European network of collaboration in this field.

New technologies of compact accelerators, in particular plasma accelerators, and laser-based x-ray sources, are on the verge of reaching maturity in this decade, making today the perfect time to steer them towards a broader scope of applications in academia, medicine and the industry. Training the next generation of entrepreneur-minded early-stage researchers on such a disruptive technology will enable them to start successful careers with significant societal impact. This is the goal we pursue with the Marie Skłodowska Curie Action Doctoral Network EPACE (European compact accelerators, their applications, and entrepreneurship). EPACE fosters a culture of excellence, innovation and critical thinking to help the next generation explore opportunities and guide it towards significant contributions in line with the EU missions. Emphasis is put on applications in industry (muon tomography), medicine (FLASH effect with particle beams from plasma accelerators), and impactful progress (reduced energy consumption of particle accelerators). An extensive curriculum from a world-class European business school will help the students identify and transfer the most promising innovations into commercial products. Coordinated by DESY, EPACE gathers 31 industrial and academic partners in Europe, to provide 15 PhD students with great scientific expertise, a thorough awareness of EU values and a drive towards entrepreneurship.

The future economic growth in Europe requires engineers and researchers capable to design, develop and implement new information technologies to support explosive data-driven transformation of economy, public and government activities. The analysis of this data demands a massive increase in processing power and communication bandwidth. Current information, computing and processing technologies strongly rely on the classical digital approaches and architectures developed by von Neumann. However, technological progress rates of digital technologies are flattening out and are about to hit their ultimate, physical ceilings (“end of Moore’s law”). This growing gap between what is demanded and what can be delivered becomes exacerbated by the increasingly inacceptable energy consumption of the global ICT infrastructure, whose relevance is amplified by the pressing and approaching climate crisis. In this situation, both academic and industrial ICT research has started to investigate and invest in so-called “unconventional”, nature-inspired approaches to computing which radically depart from the classical digital paradigm. European Doctoral Network on POSTDIGITAL Plus brings together internationally leading teams from academia, research centres and leaders of industry, including IBM, Thales, Hewlett Packard Enterprise Belgium and three regarded start-ups NcodiN, Akhetronics and VLC Photonics in the field of optical computing to train a cohort of 15 doctoral candidates in the inter-disciplinary fields of emerging disruptive neuromorphic computational technologies and their applications. POST-DIGITAL Plus has the ambition and the vision to create a new generation of scientific and industrial leaders that will greatly contribute to strengthening Europe’s human resources and industry competitiveness in future digital and post digital economy and technology.

The future energy mix will include a variety of fuels. E-fuels allow to store the excess renewable energy into high energy-density chemical compounds representing the ideal candidates for energy transition in Energy Intensive Industries (EIIs). The DESIRE network will train the next generation of specialists in exploring the use of e-fuels, in existing combustion devices, to better guide the energy transition and to help the decarbonization of EIIs in Europe. The academic and industrial partners of DESIRE will work synergistically to generate a cohort of 15 well-trained young scientists with inter-disciplinary skills in combustion science, mechanical and chemical engineering, computer science and modelling that will be ready to propel and advance future engines towards pollution control, fuel-flexibility and higher efficiencies. Such a broad spectrum of training is currently lacking due to the fragmentation of the emerging field of sustainable combustion across Europe. Perhaps more importantly, the need, nature and magnitude of these new skills is only now emerging. The DESIRE network will equip its Doctoral Candidates with a unique combination of skills essential to become future research leaders or entrepreneurs in the sustainable energy sector. They will drive this research field forward and accelerate the energy transition. The main scientific goal of DESIRE is to develop predictive tools including mathematical-numerical models and experimental measurement techniques able to describe the combustion of e-fuels that can then assist engineers in designing new technologies and/or modifying/adapting existing combustion equipment and technologies to be suitable to use these powerful fuels. The program is heavily supported by key-companies in the transport sector (Rolls-Royce, Safran), fuel and chemicals production/ distribution (Air Liquide), and electrical/mechanical power technology (Condevo, ENGIE, MITIS).

NeuroNanotech will train eleven researchers to tackle one of the major challenges in Europe’s ageing population - neurological diseases. The ability to monitor and modulate neural activity using interfaces has enabled a better understanding of brain function and has led to therapeutic solutions for some neurological disorders. Yet, fundamental technological challenges, such as ensuring proper brain tissue interfacing and reliable long-term recording/stimulation after implantation, impede widespread clinical use. New approaches to provide effective treatments are urgently needed. NeuroNanotech will develop novel nanostructured flexible neural interfaces with highly improved tissue integration, minimizing foreign-body reactions and tissue scarring and allowing stable stimulation treatments. As main innovation, we will develop minimally invasive, ultra-sensitive spintronic magnetic sensors able to record stably without interfering with stimulation signals and avoiding electrode degradation. Connecting both interfaces, we will construct a low-invasive, closed-loop neurostimulation system that integrates feedback signals from the neural activity and provides real-time stimulation of the target structures according to the patient´s needs. To achieve these goals, NeuroNanotech brings together experts in nanotechnology, device engineering, neuroscience and clinical neurology. The individual research projects are highly interconnected, ensuring interdisciplinary training. Researchers will benefit from training in advanced research and relevant complementary skills, imparted by an international and intersectoral consortium of research institutes, universities, companies, hospitals and social organisations from 9 different countries. We will provide researchers a unique environment focused on innovation and collaboration, with a view to commercial applications of the research results. This framework will open researchers avenues in both academia and health-related industry.

LIGHTinPARIS is a MSCA COFUND Doctoral Programme in the field of Sciences of Light aiming at promoting interdisciplinary, international and intersectoral research projects at University Paris-Saclay (UPSaclay). The Sciences of Light cover a very broad field, from fundamental physics to technological applications in photonics, quantum mechanics and biomedicine and open up an increasing number of technological applications. Among these sciences, photonics is one of the key enabling technologies identified in the Horizon Europe strategic plan. The Paris-Saclay region has been hosting numerous prestigious research laboratories for several decades. To gather its strengths, UPSaclay has been created in 2020 by grouping several academic and research institutions located in Saclay area. It joins 8,100 researchers working in 275 laboratories. UPSaclay was ranked 15th in the 2023 Shanghai University ranking, and 3rd in physics (1st in Europe) in the Global Ranking of Academic Subjects. Regarding Sciences of Light, UPSaclay gathers 700 researchers working in 28 laboratories across 5 graduate schools. UPSaclay graduates every year 150 engineers and 70 PhDs specialized in optics. In addition, UPSaclay hosts many world class research facilities. The Institute for the Sciences of Light (ISL) has been created in 2020 to foster interdisciplinary synergies among the graduate schools of physics, chemistry, engineering, geosciences and life sciences and promote international and intersectoral relations. The LIGHTinPARIS programme through ISL will recruit 30 PhD fellows (2 cohorts of 36 months each). Industrial and international secondments will also be implemented to allow PhD fellows to shape their careers by acquiring technical skills and networking relationships. Numerous trainings will also be offered to ensure that doctoral students have both technical skills and soft skills by the end of their PhD.

Located in Ljubljana, Slovenia, the Jožef Stefan Institute is the national leader in quantum research. Supported by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the SQUASH project – Slovenian Quantum Science Hub – will employ 40 foreign postdoctoral researchers. The fellowships are designed to advance their research skills in four multidisciplinary fields: quantum theory, quantum materials, quantum technology, and quantum computing & information. With a broad range of international and intersectoral secondments, as well as career-developing training programs, fellows will gain a blend of additional versatile skills, significantly boosting their career-growth opportunities. The project aims at developing skilled and innovative quantum workforce across research, technology, and academia to tackle the upcoming challenges of the second quantum revolution.

SEANERGYS creates an integrated European software solution that optimises the operation of supercomputers. In doing so, it addresses four different objectives: reducing the amount of energy used for real-world workload mixes as the primary objective, optimising resource utilisation, enhancing system throughput and reducing response time as secondary objectives. Since these objectives can conflict with each other, site-specific policies define the weights attached to each, and the SEANERGYS SW suite will tailor system operation towards the combined optimum. Possible scenarios include improving the throughput of HPC systems, generating more R&D results for a given energy budget, or produce a fixed set of R&D results with less energy, while striving to keep response times constant. The solution consists of a comprehensive monitoring infrastructure (CMI), an Artificial Intelligence data analytics system (AIDAS), and a dynamic scheduling and resource management system (DSRM). The CMI gathers data from hardware and software sensors, and correlates it with scheduler information to identify jobs that do not fully utilize allocated resources. Users receive automatic feedback on energy and resource use for each run, plus information on how to optimize these. The DAIS leverages AI models trained with a vast set of operational data of the participating HPC sites. It fingerprints resource usage patterns, predicts future job behaviour, and identifies complementary job profiles for potential co-scheduling. Finally, the DSRM utilizes these insights to develop scheduling policies that maximize resource utilization and energy efficiency, and supports jobs/applications with dynamic and adaptable resource profiles. The SEANERGYS solution will be ready for deployment up to Exascale level. To ensure production-quality, the project builds on results from European projects, the competency of well-established research groups and companies, and widely used open-source codes. These are input for an integrated software system that achieves the functionality, performance and stability needed by European HPC centres, defined by KPIs and acceptance criteria and processes established at the project start. An agile, professional software development method will leverage a modern DevOps framework and strive to provide end-to-end traceability by linking and tracking requirements, interface, functional and performance specifications, code design and development steps, and validation/verification throughout the development lifecycle. Validation/verification measures will include code reviews, automated SW quality analysis, unit and integration tests and a verification suite. The project will implement a staged testing and validation process, with functionality tests on single-nodes, scaling tests on mid-sized platforms, and finally acceptance tests on production supercomputers.

EUAqua.Org is aimed at boosting organic fish production in Europe by developing highly innovative solutions to fill key knowledge gaps and overcome the most relevant factors limiting the competitiveness for organic farming of Atlantic salmon, European sea bass, gilthead sea bream, and rainbow trout. Key technological advancements in phenotyping, genotyping, and genomic prediction methods will be developed by EUAqua.Org through the integration of different disciplines and approaches. This will provide essential tools for cost-effective, welfare- and environment-friendly organic aquaculture. The implementation of these tools at the industry level will be ensured by a comprehensive scientific, public, and industrial communication and dissemination programme, with exploitation of the project objectives and key results to create impact, including a multi-module open-access online training course that will be co-developed with key stakeholders (breeding companies, fish farmers, feed producers). In parallel, a tailored set of intervention strategies will be designed to promote awareness and acceptance of OA products in European consumers, through a behavioural economics approach. The project will build upon outputs of completed and ongoing national and EU projects, fully exploiting existing knowledge and leveraging the direct involvement of EUAqua.Org partners in multi-disciplinary research on advanced fish genomics, fish nutrition, fish health and welfare, consumer studies.

BUTTERFLY aims to significantly enhance society’s capacity to appraise, foresee, and respond to the threats posed by cascading impacts of pollinator decline. To reach that goal it will establish a test system of geographically well spread multi-actor communities across sectors for co-creating proactive pollinator restoration solutions and: (1) collect, integrate, manage and share ecological and spatial information on a wide range of known and lesser known pollinators and pollination services provided for wild and cultivated plants, across Europe and selected overseas territories; (2) advance the monetary and non-monetary valuation of marketed and not marketed direct and indirect ecosystem functions and services provided by pollinators, and advance ecosystem accounting; (3) comprehensively model and quantify the macro-economic implications of pollinator decline and country-specific economic butterfly effects of dependencies on pollinators, and assess policy options and scenarios; (4) assess how five key biomass supply chains (food/micronutrients, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, biomaterials, biomass energy) depend on pollination and co-create pollinator restoration options that increase resilience of these supply chains; (5) devise, co-create, test and implement transferable tools, interactive atlases and guidelines that enable systematic mainstreaming of proactive pollinator stewardship in vulnerable sectors; (6) conceive indicators for human dimensions and assess and exploit the socio-cultural capacity of the concepts: ‘pollinator stewardship’, ‘eco-literacy’, ‘historical agency’ and ‘slow hope’ in reversing pollinator decline. It will inform EU policy processes and build strategic alliances for high-level impact. The BUTTERFLY network of Living Labs will accelerate knowledge transfer and uptake of new business models and serve as breeding place for multi-actor co-creation of knowledge and sustainable solutions, paving the way to pollinator stewardship in all sectors.

The Cir4Fun Project endeavours to transform the furniture industry by championing circular economy principles across the product life cycle. Through innovative strategies, DPP and digital solutions supporting mechanisms, it aims to enhance furniture sustainability, eco-labelling, and consumer engagement while aligning with relevant regulations and initiatives. Cir4Fun's approach involves creating a comprehensive circular economy roadmap, defining content for a Furniture DPP, developing circular business models and eco-design guidelines, and establishing new assessment methodologies for maintenance, reparability, refurbishment, remanufacturing and recyclability. All this knowledge will be integrated in a holistic Furniture Assessment System (FAS) including a Sustainable Index System, d-LCA, LCC, SLCA. FAS will support the furniture eco-scoring system and DPP. Additionally, it focuses on interoperability, data sharing and data management with reliable approaches to enable simulation testing to inform supply chain strategies and extend product lifespan. Social engagement with stakeholders is emphasized to promote sustainable behaviours and circular practices, ultimately supporting new regulations and standardization in the furniture industry. The project outcomes will be implemented and validated in 3 use cases addressing different value chains across Europe and the findings will be widely circulated across the furniture ecosystem in Europe.

PROTEIN4IMPACT aims at evaluating the nutritional, health, safety and quality aspects together with the environmental and socio-economic impacts of protein novel foods (NFs) obtained from unconventional sources. In order to close the project loop by maximizing the positive impact on the transition towards healthier, protein NFs, the overall approach to alternative protein production in PROTEIN4IMPACT is based on utilization of selected agri-food and fisheries & acquaculture by-products as primary feedstock as well as on the utilization of natural protein producers, i.e. fungi, bacteria, insects micro- and macroalgae. The secondary by-products formed along the value chain will be up-cycled for their use in the food production cycle or for the production of process energy. The obtained proteins will undergo modification and functionalization followed by a sensory evaluation and testing in food human trials and in aquaculture as feed ingredients. The project will also test the feasibility of producing NF products by simulating realistic industrial scale, using different methods and tools such as LCA, LCC, RA, and TEA as well as Digital Twins and real time AI-driven monitoring and DSS tools. The optimization of parameters affecting the protein NF production will be evaluated at the end to increase protein content and the impact assessment evaluated on each single stage (extraction, characterization, modification/functionalization of protein rich fraction, production of NFs) and on the integrated processes. PROTEIN4IMPACT NF acceptance and social relevance –also through sensory evaluation actions- will be assessed in four markets (Europe, USA, Africa and Asia) to benchmark the European scenario with the rest of the world. Only by using an integrated approach like the one proposed in PROTEIN4IMPACT will it be possible to evaluate the correct feasibility in the use of alternative proteins in the food sector with a realistic sustainable approach.

New emerging applications demand performance requirements that exceed the capabilities of 5G networks, requiring a rapid evolution towards 6G networks. 6G is expected to offer data rates of the order of Tbps, time responses of the order of sub-milliseconds, and localization accuracies of the order of sub-centimeter, while meeting united nations’ sustainable development goals. This calls for the deployment of paradigm shifting technologies and design methods, and the use of new frequency bands, including the deployment of reconfigurable metamaterial transceivers, the integration of communication and sensing functionalities, and the migration towards the sub-terahertz spectrum. This will make 6G an extremely complex system to model and optimize. Digital twins (DTs) and machine learning (ML) are two vital technologies to tackle the modeling and optimization complexity of 6G. A DT is a virtual replica of the 6G physical network. DTs are essential to model complex systems in real time, providing valuable insights into their behavior and performance, as well as for generating enormous amounts of training data. ML provides advanced analytics and decision-making capabilities, enabling 6G communication systems to self-optimize, self-configure, and self-heal. The integration of DTs and ML offers a powerful approach for modeling, simulating, and optimizing 6G communication networks. It is expected to lead to the creation of a highly intelligent and dynamic network environment, where physical and virtual objects interact seamlessly, and where decisions are made and executed in real time. TWIN6G is the first-of-its-kind staff exchange research and transfer-of-knowledge program whose aim is to build the world’s first open-access and open-source digital twin emulator to design 6G networks, integrating accurate physical models for emerging technologies and physics-based ML designs for dynamic and real-time network optimization.

The project “The Activist, the Archivist, and the Researcher: Novel Collaborative Strategies of Transnational Research, Archiving and Exhibiting Social and Political Dissent in Europe (19th-21st centuries)” (ACTIVATE) fosters inter-sectorial and interdisciplinary collaboration through the international research cooperation of 16 academic and non-academic institutions from 7 countries across Western, Central and Eastern Europe. ACTIVATE’s objective is to develop innovative methodologies and new knowledge as well as share best practice based on the principles of diversity, inclusiveness and open science between researchers, archivists, curators and public educators through a reflective approach on social and political dissent in a long-term and comparative perspective. By focusing on the transnational circulation of people, ideas, discourse, practice and archives, ACTIVATE aims first to contribute to a new narrative on European protest and its relations with non-European spaces. Secondly, the project engages reflective archival, research and exhibiting practices to explore the role and impact of archives on different space and time scales, approaching them as an ecosystem of active agents of memory and change. Through secondments and networking, ACTIVATE partners will share their expertise and best practice on material, audiovisual and born-digital documents and data. They will organise thematic seminars, workshops, training and public programmes to increase institutional outreach that will serve as a model for future endeavours, ensuring cooperative relationships and impact on the wider community beyond the life of the project. ACTIVATE strives for new synergies between academic research and heritage institutions, fostering better knowledge, integration and promotion of dispersed cultural heritage, which European democracies need to preserve with care.

The main objective of GreenEO is to provide improved satellite-based environmental information to support sustainable nature protection practices across four competing land-use areas: cities, agricultural areas, forests, and ecosystems. Through combined exploitation of new Earth Observation products, digital infrastructure, and atmospheric and land surface models using machine learning and data assimilation, GreenEO will provide environmental information and stakeholder engagement practices to support the implementation of the Zero Pollution (ZP) and Biodiversity aspects of the European Green Deal (EGD). The project will serve as a proof-of-concept to enhance specific services provided by Copernicus and EUMETSAT in support of the EGD implementation. GreenEO aims to support the transition towards more sustainable land use practices in Europe and proposes a transformative governance system, relying on a data value chain enhanced with active stakeholder engagement and co-creation. The value chain proposes the uptake of satellite data, integrated in a modelling development chain and followed by value creation modelling applications. In cities, GreenEO will develop three satellite-based approaches of high-resolution urban-scale air quality maps to engage relevant stakeholders to support the ZP strategies. For agriculture, GreenEO will address impacts on nitrogen emissions, deposition, and biodiversity. It will create satellite-based high-resolution emission inventories, deposition, critical load exceedance maps, and identify areas with high recovery potential. GreenEO will develop a forest fire service that will revolutionize the monitoring of wildfires over Europe. GreenEO will create novel ecosystem monitoring indicators such as city greening indicators, ecosystem area and condition indicators. GreenEO will advance seamless climate-weather and environmental services in Europe, by proactive links to EUMETSAT, WMO, the Copernicus Services, EEA and EU Missions.

JENNIFER3 aims to continue, further develop and finalize the research and communication activities started in 2015 within the JENNIFER project and currently being carried on by the JENNIFER2 MSCA-RISE project, which will conclude in may 2025. The community forming the JENNIFER3 consortium is putting together three research programs at experimental facilities located in Japan where very rare processes can be observed: accelerator produced neutrinos (T2K and HyperK collaborations), cosmic neutrinos detection (HyperK collaboration) and a high luminosity electron-positron collider (Belle II experiment at SUPERKEKB). Such programs use different approaches, are sensitive to different “messengers” of the new physics world and are essential to complement the so called “energy frontier” investigation which is carried on at the LHC. Sinergy and knowledge sharing among them is the drive force of the JENNIFER3 project, which on one hand fosters the collaboration of European scientists with the Japanese research community, while on the other hand promotes close collaboration among different European research groups around key technologies, such as cloud computing and data network developments, machine learning applications for data filtering and reconstruction, photon detection, solid state detectors, particle beam monitors. Collaboration with private sector technology providers is also essential to reach the scientific objectives of the project. All project members are also committed to disseminate and communicate their work to the scientific community and to the European society through various initiatives aiming to different targets. Cross fertilization between different research communities and approaches is the real added value to boost the project impact, both in terms of scientific results and of researchers’ careers.

We propose a conceptual design study for a 12-metre wide-field spectroscopic survey telescope (WST) with simultaneous operation of a large field-of-view (3 sq. degree), high-multiplex (20,000) multi-object spectrograph (MOS) and a giant 3x3 arcmin integral field spectrograph (IFS). In scientific capability these specifications place WST far ahead of existing and planned facilities. In only 5 years of operation, the MOS would target 250 million galaxies and 25 million stars at low spectral resolution plus 2 million stars at high resolution. Without need for pre-imaged targets, the IFS would deliver 4 billion spectra offering many serendipitous discoveries. Given the current investment in deep imaging surveys and noting the diagnostic power of spectroscopy, WST will fill a crucial gap in astronomical capability and work in synergy with future ground and space-based facilities. We show how it can address outstanding scientific questions in the areas of cosmology; galaxy assembly, evolution, and enrichment, including our own Milky Way; the origin of stars and planets; and time domain and multi-messenger astrophysics. WST’s uniquely rich dataset may yield unforeseen discoveries in many of these areas. The study will deliver telescope and instrument designs, cost estimates, an updated science white paper and survey plan, concept studies for data management, and a facility operation concept. The telescope and instruments will be designed as an integrated system and will mostly use existing technology, with the aim to minimise the carbon footprint and environmental impact. We will propose WST as the next ESO project after completion of the 39-metre ELT. Our consortium includes institutes from Australia, which has a strategic partnership with ESO and aims to apply shortly for full membership. Together with ESO and institutes in 9 European countries, our team has the necessary technical and scientific expertise, and brings 70 years of in-kind effort to the proposed study.

The IM4CA proposal unites leading European methane experts in a concerted effort to establish the scientific fundament needed to bring the climate forcing of methane under control. Specific objectives are to: 1) Strengthen methane mitigation policy world-wide with actionable information on local methane emissions and key driving processes, 2) Provide the EU with the measurement and modeling capacity needed to monitor its methane emissions and assess its progress towards the 30% emission reduction target of the European methane strategy and the global methane pledge, 3) Explore and understand climate feedbacks on natural methane sources and sinks, and 4) Improve the accuracy of climate scenarios by resolving the controversy about the causes for the recent growth rate variations in global methane. To achieve these objectives we address a selection of key uncertainties that have thus far limited the progress towards these goals by: i) building up critical new infrastructure for monitoring methane emissions in Europe and Tropical Africa, ii) developing methodology for efficient use of existing and upcoming satellites for measuring methane and the land surface properties needed for characterizing and attributing its emissions, and iii) translating the knowledge obtained into reliable projections of future methane and efficient emission mitigation scenarios. In doing so, the IM4CA project will enable a breakthrough in meeting the work program challenge of enhancing the quantification and understanding of natural and anthropogenic methane emissions and sinks. It will provide enhanced European assessment capacity of short- and long-term changes in methane sources and sinks integrating information from multi platforms and novel observations and transfer that capacity into actionable information needed to combat climate change.

The explosive growth of available information requires a disruptive shift in the development of high-bandwidth and energy-efficient communication technology. At the same time, space-communication is critical with the acceleration of human activities in space. Laser-based space-light communication is attracting great interest due to the increasing demand for inter-satellite and ground-to-satellite communication. However, as the light intensity diminishes over long-distance, the development of a new light-coding method is crucial for reliable high-speed information transmission. It is questionable if future bandwidth requirements for earth and space communications will be met by conventional lasers, while keeping the overall power consumption manageable. SpinDataCom will overcome these limitations and revolutionize space and earth communications combining the advances in spintronics and semiconductor lasers with injected unequal number of spin up/down electrons. The electron spin imbalance in spin-lasers is transferred to the circular polarization of light which enables ultrafast polarization modulation, low-power consumption and highly-efficient information coding, implemented even on a single photon. Our approach can be transferred to existing fiberoptic networks, exceeding conventional transmitters in data rates and power efficiency. Gathering experts from 4 EU countries, SpinDataCom will build a disruptive proof-of-concept (TRL4) for spin-lasers, enabling ultrafast modulation via full electrical spin and magnetization control, to enable groundbreaking technologies for space and Earth data communication. This ambitious approach has potentially transformative impacts on society, economy, and environment due to its many applications on Earth and for space. With our Industrial Advisory Board, a strong communication, dissemination and exploitation plan, global visibility on SpinDataCom’s results will be ensured while enabling the transfer towards commercialization.

The ability to evaluate EU's climate and sustainability targets is currently limited by challenges in monitoring ecosystem greenhouse gas (GHG) exchanges and other services in an accurate and timely manner. Important knowledge gaps concerning processes and drivers of GHG exchanges persist, that further hamper our predictive capabilities. The absence of coherent approaches to collect, interpret and integrate data on terrestrial GHG stocks and processes into predictive models limits the EU’s ability to monitor ecosystem services and thus to reach its climate ambitions, including the Paris Agreement of Climate Convention and European Green Deal. NextGenCarbon aims to develop a novel framework for advancing our understanding of the European GHG budget. To reach this goal, we will: 1) improve and enrich existing measurements on ecosystems; 2) assimilate these data into state-of-the-art modelling frameworks; 3) create seamless scenario prediction systems; and 4) provide guidance to policymakers on the magnitude, evolution of and future risks to GHG fluxes. Our exceptional multidisciplinary consortium links leading experts developing the next generation of ground and EO-driven observations, with several groups at the cutting edge of carbon cycle and land surface modelling, plus teams pushing the boundaries of data assimilation, complex system modelling, forest management and disturbance monitoring, land-use and GHG inventories, and communications. It also involves active engagement with diverse stakeholders, including landowners and managers, GHG exchange modelling community, international community related to environmental monitoring, climate policy support and GHG inventory experts, and policymakers. In doing so, NextGenCarbon will pave the way for high-accuracy and seamless estimates of national to continental and global GHG budgets from the recent past into the coming decades, making a vital contribution to EU's climate mitigation strategies.

The ELEQUANT project proposes a paradigm shift in quantum technology by exploiting flying qubits, presenting a transformative alternative to mainstream approaches such a superconducting or semiconducting qubits. While photon-based flying qubits face challenges in real-time manipulation and interaction due to their fast propagation speed and weak photon-photon interaction, ELEQUANT aims to harness the potential of electronic charges for superior scalability and connectivity. Through pioneering research in the manipulation of electronic wavepackets in semiconductor nanostructures, the project strives to achieve the ambitious goal of realizing high-fidelity flying charge qubits and demonstrating entanglement between them. Key objectives include the development of novel quantum materials platforms based on strained Ge and multi-layered graphene. By establishing a comprehensive roadmap for solid-state flying qubit technology, ELEQUANT seeks to accelerate innovation in quantum technology and foster collaborative partnerships with industry stakeholders on a European scale. With a focus on scalability, connectivity, and coherence, ELEQUANT aims to propel quantum technology into a new era of unprecedented capabilities and applications.

Half of the protein directed towards animal feeding is wasted due to incomplete protein digestibility, and the distinct amino acid profiles found in both plants and animals. This generates serious pollution problems for our soils, aquifers, and atmosphere (e.g. livestock contribute to 87% of total ammonia emissions in agriculture). Moreover, EU faces significant challenges in providing adequate protein sources for animal feed (97% of soybean meal is imported; €1.5 billion/year). Hence, it is imperative to identify a sustainable solution for animal protein supply. SYNFEED will demonstrate that by developing a new interdisciplinary technological approach, it is possible to generate proteins that can produce a radical paradigm change in the way animals are fed, highly reducing both the environmental impact and external dependence on raw materials of the EU. Using the broiler chicken as a model, SYNFEED will i) generate new precision nutrition knowledge (proportion of amino acids to fulfil the requirements and dynamics of protein hydrolysis in the targeted species); ii) design several candidate sequences using this nutritional information by protein engineering techniques (combining AI and molecular modelling); iii) generate these candidates in cell-free systems adapted to the final host and evaluate them in a new iterative procedure maximizing expression and digestibility potential; iv) optimize the sustainable biosynthesis of the selected protein with sustainable hydrogen-oxidizing bacteria strains; v) evaluate the effectiveness of the protein in broilers (productive performance, animal health and welfare and reduction of nitrogen losses), and the sustainability of SYNFEED solution with a life cycle assessment. This ground-breaking approach will replace conventional animal feeding, positioning the EU as a leader in biosynthetic protein generation, promoting the emergence of biotech companies and reducing livestock environmental impact.

From violinists to metal welders, finely tuned hand and arm movements are the foundation of craft, while all of us rely on proficient use of hands for the activities of daily life. Yet, more than 25 million people worldwide lost functional movements to subcortical stroke. Subcortical stroke often interrupts the communication between the cortex and the cervical spinal cord circuits, which leads to permanent hand and arm paralysis. The result is a vastly reduced quality of life and enormous socioeconomic burden for the affected, their families, and the society. A treatment that can effectively restore functional movements after subcortical stroke does not yet exist. Still, the motor cortex, which orchestrates movements, and the spinal cord motor circuits that directly control muscles remain largely intact. We aim to reverse the hand and arm paralysis of people with subcortical stroke by developing a digital bridge that reconnects the motor cortex with the cervical spinal motor circuits. This brain-spine interface consists of fully-implantable recording and stimulation systems that link cortical signals to spatiotemporal sequences of epidural electrical stimulation targeting spinal cord regions involved in the production of hand and arm movements. Our preliminary results in people with spinal cord injury strongly indicate that the brain-spine interface can restore natural control of movement and promote neurological recovery. Therefore, we are confident that a cervical brain-spine interface can reverse hand and arm paralysis incurred by stroke and, therefore, become the first viable treatment option for subcortical stroke survivors. Beyond the development and validation of the cervical brain-spine interface for stroke survivors, this project will build the intellectual property necessary to secure funding that will bring this treatment into widespread clinical use.

Innovation in the genomics field is extremely intense and requires high up-front investments. The toolbox of sequencing platforms with unique features that require specialized training and leverage extensive cross-functional expertise, is rapidly expanding. The EASIGEN-DS project evolves from two EU infrastructure projects that have proven to be very successful in providing access to cutting-edge DNA sequencing technologies to hundreds of researchers. Here, we propose to carry out a design study for establishing a new European Research Infrastructure on Advanced Genomics Technologies, EASIGEN. In order to develop an excellent scientific, technological and operational design, we will conduct landscape studies, stakeholder consultations, and community surveying. In parallel, we will seek for the support and commitment of several national and EU stakeholders and user communities through a multi‐faceted dissemination plan. We envision that EASIGEN will encompass: 1) a Technology Platform that will offer state-of-the-art genomic analysis methods, such as single-cell genomics, spatial genomics and long-read sequencing, as well as population-scale genomics capacity; and 2) a Support Platform that will provide standardization tools, training, co-innovation with industry, and consulting for smaller facilities, including those in widening countries. Both platforms will serve a vast community of users from the health, biomedical and life science fields. The consortium brings together 1) a network of eleven genomics facilities with distinct application specialities. and an aggregated sequencing capacity of >450,000 human genomes per year; 2) four partners with specific and crucial expertise: data stewardship, ethical, legal and social implications, socio-economic impact and innovation. The new infrastructure will strengthen the European Research Area, promote interconnections within the ESFRI landscape, and boost an innovative biotechnology-based industry.

AIOLIA gives a robust 3-tier response to the complex challenges posed by the need to operationally interpret the EU AI Act and global AI regulation. (1) Recognizing the gap between ethical values and their practical application in engineering, AIOLIA pioneers a bottom-up approach to operationalize AI ethics with regard to human condition and behaviour. Following a selection of real-world use cases, AIOLIA translates high-level principles into actionable and contextual guidelines co-created by leading academic, policy, and ethics-aware industrial partners who represent diverse professional and geographic European and international contexts. (2) AIOLIA's commitment to context-sensitivity is deepened by crafting modular, inclusive training materials following the ADDIE methodology designed to cater to diverse learning needs. Hosted on the Embassy of Good Science, AIOLIA materials will range from lectures, videos, and mock reviews to such innovative formats as podcasts, Tiktoks, and a chatbot teaching AI ethics. (3) AIOLIA's outreach is amplified by encompassing 7 research ethics and integrity networks and 3 prominent computer science networks. This strategic alignment enables us to effectively recruit training participants and disseminate human-centric ethics guidelines to a wide spectrum of stakeholders, from ethics experts to early-stage researchers and policymakers worldwide. Resolutely European, AIOLIA's vision propagates beyond EU, embracing global cooperation with leading universities and think tanks in China, South Korea, Japan, and Canada. Utilizing UNESCO platform with its reach to Africa and South Asia, AIOLIA’s guidelines evolve into an analytic toolbox for key international AI dialogues and processes. This global perspective ensures that AIOLIA's impact is not only significant but also sustainable, contributing to fair scientific cooperation and providing concrete and culturally informed ethics instruments to shape the next generation of AI systems.

Plasma accelerators driven by advanced laser sources and/or compact electron linacs are key components for the next generation of green and sustainable research infrastructures. We propose a project on the development of "Plasma Accelerator systems for Compact Research Infrastructures" (PACRI), which will develop highly important and ground-breaking plasma accelerator technologies for Europe's future research infrastructures (RI). The specific objectives of PACRI are: - The development of high repetition rate plasma modules, as required for the EuPRAXIA ESFRI project, capable of extending its scientific scope from high average brightness radiation sources to high energy physics. - Improving the performance of normal conducting accelerator technology for X-band linacs, paving the way for high repetition rate operation (up to kHz) with a focus on efficiency and power consumption. - The development of key laser components required to scale up high power, high repetition rate laser technology as required by the EuPRAXIA and ELI ESFRI research infrastructures. The achievement of the PACRI objectives will enable the production of unique particle and photon beams with a wide range of applications in ultrafast science, high precision medical imaging, materials diagnostics, medical treatment and, in the longer term, the development of future compact colliders. These developments will be used for future resource-efficient upgrades of existing RIs at INFN, Elettra, CERN, CNR, CNRS, DESY, ELI, GSI/FAIR and UKRI. In addition, PACRI will support the implementation of ESFRI's EuPRAXIA distributed research facility by consolidating its sites and centres of excellence being developed under the ongoing EuPRAXIA_PP project. It will fund the development of some technical prototypes that are crucial for the implementation of the EuPRAXIA project and other European Research Infrastructures (e.g. enabling major upgrades to the ELI-Beamlines facility).

MALDIBANK: A Comprehensive Solution to Microbial Challenges In an era marked by pressing environmental and health challenges, including climate change, biodiversity loss, global epidemics, and food security, understanding and leveraging the power of microbes is critical. Microbes, fundamental to the biosphere, impact everything from ecosystem dynamics to human health. However, their vast diversity remains largely underestimated. To harness this potential, precise identification of microorganisms is crucial, especially given their varied implications across different sectors. Over the past 15 years, MALDI-TOF (Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization Time-of-Flight) mass spectrometry (MS) has revolutionized microbial identification in fields such as clinical microbiology, food safety, environmental monitoring, and sustainable agriculture. Despite its transformative potential, MALDI-TOF MS technology has been underutilized outside clinical microbiology. MALDIBANK emerges as a groundbreaking initiative to extend the reach of this technology, providing innovative solutions for understanding and utilizing microbial diversity for global problem-solving. MALDIBANK is conceptualized as a global, cloud-based, open MALDI spectra databank for the identification of microorganisms, combining a vast spectrum database with advanced algorithmic tools. This databank will facilitate processing, characterization, epidemiological surveillance, and more, embodying Open Science and FAIR data principles. It aims to become a new reference in microbial identification, drawing parallels with the impact of GenBank in genomics. By integrating 100,000 reference spectra with rich metadata and employing deep learning models, MALDIBANK will enhance microbial characterization and support areas like antimicrobial resistance prediction and environmental monitoring. It will serve as a dynamic resource for the global scientific community, enabling the exploration of microbial capabilities an

The food security on the planet is still a challenge. Experts predict that we will need to double food production in order to feed a population projected to reach 9,2 billion by 2050. Crop improvement should not only focus on species such as maize, wheat and soybean. Many other crops contribute to food security. The Cucurbitaceae family is positioned in front list of plant families for the number of species used as human food and for cultural, medicinal, and botanical significance. According to FAO estimate, despite a large growing area improving yield of many Cucurbitaceae crops could significantly add to food security. F1 hybrid cultivars have made a significant contribution to the world's food supply. Yet, one of the continuing challenges of plant breeding is still to master production of F1 hybrid seeds in many crops. The production of F1 hybrid seeds requires controlled pollination to ensure that the seed descent is indeed resulting from a crossing and not from a self-fertilization. Most of cultivated Cucurbitaceae species are monoecious or andromonoecious. The use of these two sexual morphs for F1 hybrid production requires hand emasculation and hand pollination of the female parental line. Furthermore, monoecious and andromonoecious sexual morphs are usually hurdles for yield improvement and yield stability. HybridSeed project aims to engineer plant prototypes with the goal to (i) reduce the cost of F1 hybrid seed production, (ii) improve yields of F1 hybrid plants, and (iii) simplify the itinerary of the crops, from the seed companies to the producers. HybridSeed technology is built on the knowledge of the genes controlling the development of unisexual and hermaphrodite flowers and their use to engineer sexual types that do not exist in nature, or more stable than those currently existing. The produced plant prototypes will be grown in conditions approaching seed companies and producer conditions and evaluated for yield and yield stability.

An organism’s survival depends on accurately perceiving and interpreting the environment. A significant part of our visual stimulations is however generated by our own actions, rather than external events. For example, the retina can experience similar visual stimulus driven by head-movement, or by a moving object. Therefore, self-motion related information is fundamental to contextualize visual stimuli. In other words, what the eye sees may not be what our brain perceives depending on our actions. In mammals, the vestibular system reports both the motion and orientation of the head. Very little is known about the pathways connecting the vestibular system to visual cortical areas, and how this signal is integrated with external visual stimuli to ultimately impact behaviour. The goal of this project is to unravel the neuronal circuits underlying visual processing during self-motion in mice, thereby providing new insights in sensory processing. To this aim, I will address the following questions: 1) What is the long-range and local connectivity of neurons modulated by head rotation in V1; 2) What are the circuit mechanisms and neuronal computations involved in the integration of self-motion related signals with visual inputs in V1; 3) How do head motion inputs to V1 influence visually-guided actions during behaviour. Achieving these goals relies on a multidisciplinary experimental strategy based on cutting-edge approaches to monitor and control circuit activity with high spatio-temporal resolution in a cell-type specific manner, neuroanatomical tracing, and computational modelling. This experimental strategy combined with my research background in visual and vestibular systems provides a unique opportunity to understand unexplored aspects of sensory processing, at both the cellular and systems levels. Altogether, this project will reveal a novel framework to understand how sensory processing operates during self-motion to guide behaviour.

The main goal of BlueGreen Governance is to develop innovative land-sea governance schemes based on scientific evidence and societal choices. The current management of oceans, seas and coasts is fragmented across multiple institutional layers and policy areas and based on past experience. BlueGreen Governance pursues an innovative approach to the governance of the seas and coastal areas that: promotes integration between institutional layers and across policy sectors with a clear impact on the use of the land and the sea; involves and engages citizens in decision-making processes, while at the same time including scientific evidence; responds predictively to changing physical conditions as indicated by scientific evidence as well as indigenous and local knowledge and citizen science; and uses e-governance tools in support of the previous three points. With this focus and approach, the project responds to the need for better-informed decision-making processes, social engagement and digital innovation while promoting more harmonious and effective science-policy-society interfaces. The promotion of better science-policy, science-society and society-policy interactions will be embedded in the digital transformation and application of e-governance tools for co-design and service delivery. BlueGreen Governance will implement and assess these innovative governance schemes in 8 cases across several European regions and sea basins and will draw lessons on how to trigger and facilitate effective institutional change via capacity building. The cases are: Comunidad Valenciana; North Adriatic; the Solent; Western Scheldt; Oslofjord; Canary Islands and Reunion. With this geographical scope, the project will investigate five marine basins (Western Mediterranean Sea, Eastern Mediterranean Sea, North Sea, Atlantic Ocean and Indian Ocean), including one transnational marine basin (i.e. the North Adriatic case) and one transnational river basin (i.e. the Western Scheldt case).

Conversion between electrical and optical signals enabled the use of near-infrared (near-IR) photons for high data rate transmission through optical fibre networks. Likewise, coherent conversion between microwave and optical photons stands as a promising solution to transfer quantum states between remote quantum processors, thus enabling the development of large-scale quantum networks. However, the vast frequency difference between microwave (GHz) and near-IR (200 THz) optical photons hampers direct coherent conversion. This limitation could be circumvented by phonon-mediated transduction, which is a coherent two-step process, comprising electromechanical and optomechanical conversions. On-chip microwave-optical conversion mediated by GHz phonons has the potential to be extremely efficient due to the large optomechanical response of common materials, and the similar wavelength of GHz phonons and near-IR photons. Yet, it is an open challenge to achieve efficient electromechanical and optomechanical conversion simultaneously in a single integrated circuit. State-of-the-art demonstrations show that surface acoustic waves (SAWs) allow efficient electromechanical conversion, while cavity optomechanics utilize tightly confined optical and mechanical modes to yield strong optomechanical coupling. However, combining these two approaches is still considered challenging, if not impossible. The SPRING project will overcome these limitations by developing a fundamentally new optomechanical coupling approach to bridge SAW electromechanics and cavity optomechanics. The original idea is to use subwavelength nanostructuration of silicon cavities to couple tightly confined optical modes and SAWs. The SPRING strategy will be used to demonstrate coherent microwave-optical conversion of single photons and quantum state transfer between superconducting qubits, monolithically integrated in a silicon chip, opening a new path for applications in communications, sensing and computing.

The execution of coordinated and adaptive movements is the final manifestation of virtually all brain processes. Altered motor function is hence an associate feature of almost all conditions that affect the nervous system and is highly debilitating. This program will shed new light on the neuronal basis of movements with a focus on the cooperative roles of the brain and the spinal cord for composing and orchestrating multifaceted and adaptive motor behaviors. Reticulospinal (RS) neurons of the brainstem reticular formation (RF) are pivotal for controlling the most vital movements. They have long been seen as a unified relay of command signals from various integrative centers upstream, to most, if not all, “executory” motor circuits downstream. Yet, based on recent findings and our ongoing work, we posit that RS neurons rather exhibit a substantial diversity and specialization by inputs and outputs that may support a form of selection and mixing of unitary components of composite motor behaviors. Imprinting from the advent of “multi-omics” strategies in the mouse model, we will intersect functional connectomics and single-cell gene expression (the transcriptome) to achieve a most comprehensive characterization of RS neurons’ diversity, specialization, and interactions with their upstream and downstream brain areas. We will first investigate the anatomo-functional organization of an already circumscribed subset of RS neurons for orchestrating orienting motor actions. We will in parallel investigate the role and connectivity of other RS neurons, and provide genetic hallmarks of new functionally-relevant subsets. Our results will propel forward our understanding of the complex organization of the RF, its role in orchestrating composite movements, and its links with the rest of the brain. They will also provide new genetic hallmarks of RS neurons’ diversity which will be precious handles to ultimately examine and act on specific cell types in post-traumatic contexts.

Animal pollinators are vital for life on earth. While human population keeps growing, pollinator populations are dropping, thus threatening food security. In agriculture, the main insect pollinators are bees, by far. The lack of knowledge on how domesticated plants attract and reward bees has hampered the selection of varieties with improved and mutually beneficial crop-pollinator relationships. We propose to investigate flower features, including developmental, morphological and chemical cues, in relation with bee foraging. Elucidating the molecular basis of these processes would not only help sustain yields, but it is key to understand the co-evolution of plants and pollinators. We chose melon as a model system, because it is a strictly entomophilous crop, and because it provides all flower sexual morphs useful to probe plant-insect interactions. ForBees is a multidisciplinary project that integrates molecular genetic analysis and precise phenotyping. First, we will study melon genetic biodiversity with the aim to identify alleles that control nectar-related traits and bee attraction. The comparative analysis of wild accessions, landraces and breeding lines will further test whether domestication led to the loss of useful traits affecting insect visits. Second, we will analyse the gene networks that drive nectar gland development and nectar production. Finally, potential key regulators will be validated genetically. Through this work, we aim to develop a toolbox to tailor the morphology and chemistry of the flowers towards improved bee foraging activities. In addition to research in melon, results from this project, and from previous works, will be translated into neglected crops of the Cucurbitaceae family. These are major food crops in many developing countries, ensuring food security and generating income for poor farmers. Yet, these crops suffer from low fruit set because of partial pollination and would greatly benefit from enhanced breeding tools.

This project will combine for the first time strong light-matter coupling in quantum-confined electronic systems with the optical and electronic non-linearities of semiconductor heterostructures: we will develop device concepts with unique ultra-fast, non-linear and quantum functionalities. The key ingredient is an unconventional use of the strong light-matter coupling regime (SCR), a fascinating concept that is recently transitioning from basic physics to quantum devices. We will first address fundamental physics problems, then we’ll turn to device applications. A key conceptual building block is that the nature of optical non-linearities is radically modified when operating in the SCR. This has profound consequences. We will study few-photon non-linearities, in particular the ultimate case of devices that can “sense” virtual photons. This will lead us to device concepts whose behavior is enabled by vacuum-field photons, bringing us radically beyond the state of art. We will then move to the case of many photons. We will focus on absorption saturation, that explored only in the weak coupling regime, where it is difficult to engineer. We have discovered that in the SCR instead it becomes tailorable and previously unavailable functionalities can be envisioned. This has profound consequences: we will demonstrate semiconductor saturable absorber mirrors (SESAM) for the mid-IR spectral range, a technology that revolutionized ultra-fast lasers in the near-IR, but is missing at longer wavelengths. We will apply them to fiber and interband cascade lasers, radically advancing the potential of those sources. These are ground-breaking demonstrations for mid-IR science and technology. SMART-QDEV is a project rooted in fundamental physics research, able to open up new horizons and research opportunities on longer-term and visionary topics. At the same time, SMART-QDEV has a clear vision for applications.

Silicon (Si) photonics stands as a solid candidate to address the scaling challenges of emerging communication systems with an ever-growing number of interconnected devices. However, Si has major physical limitations that prevent on-chip integration of key functions: strong two-photon absorption limiting nonlinear optical devices, Si centrosymmetry preventing fast optical modulation, and an indirect bandgap nature hindering light emission and amplification. The common solution to overcome these limitations is the hybrid integration of various materials on Si, each addressing one specific limitation. However, this strategy requires a dedicated technology for each material to be integrated, which compromises cost and scalability. In this context, the CRYPTONIT project will explore a new paradigm for Si photonics based on the hybrid integration of multifunctional zirconia-based crystalline oxides (c-oxides), providing several physical properties non-existent in Si: strong nonlinearities, ferroelectricity and light amplification. The original idea is to develop hybrid superlattices, comprising multiple nano-scale layers of different c-oxides to combine key optical functionalities, using a common Si-compatible fabrication process. The project will focus on the demonstration of advanced nonlinear and optoelectronic devices on Si, operating in the near-infrared for the development of highly-efficient and broadband photonic integrated circuits. The main objectives are: i) The development of a hybrid Si photonics platform based on multifunctional c-oxide superlattices; ii) The demonstration of high power and broadband frequency comb sources (strong nonlinearities and amplification); and the demonstration of high-speed >100 GHz optical modulators based on Pockels effect (ferroelectricity). These objectives are ground-breaking in nature and will open new horizons for research and applications in communications, sensing, and quantum photonics.

Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time. It is essential to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We need more and better photovoltacis (PV) to drastically reduce the CO2 emissions. PV will need to be widely distributed to be able to replace the enormous (and growing) amounts of conventional electrical energy. Availability of surface areas allocated to PV, preferably close to the end use of the electricity, will become an issue. Reliability and a high energy yield per area will become important for the success of PV products. Europe presents higher complexity than other regions, because of its limited space and high-density population. Current Silicon technology is basically limited by its single junction (one semiconductor bandgap) to efficiencies below 30%. Multi-junctions/Tandems using more than one semiconductor diode (aiming at different energies in the spectrum) are the demonstrated path to overpass this limit and achieve efficiencies close to 40%, as done for three junctions (3J) on III-V and with 35% achievable by using a Si bottom junction (3J GaInP/GaAs/Si). Two tandems technologies have emerged as promising to upgrade the current Si technology: perovskites/Si and III-V/Si. III-V/Si presents the highest efficiency and stability (20-30years) but two orders of magnitude higher cost. The ATACAMA project will develop the top junction for a III-V/Si tandem (AlGaAs/Si), with a drastic reduction in cost for the III-Vs by (1) ultra-thin absorbers using low-cost nanostructuring and (2) substrate multi-thin-epitaxial enable by a novel epitaxial lift-off process. Furthermore, the III-V/Si tandem has to attain a high efficiency (>30%)(3), that will ensure a cost-effective solution. Nevertheless, the tandem must ensure circularity (recyclable path) to split the Si from the III-V, by gluing with transparent polymers, with a melting point of 200°C, ensuring the possibility of easily recycling in the future the AlGaAs cell from the Si cell.

The impact of climate change is the largest in polar regions, due to multiple feedback loops leading to polar amplification. In Antarctica, short meteorological time series hamper our ability to evaluate the climate variability at interannual and decadal scale, and in particular the one linked with the anthropogenic climate change. It is also not clear though whether climate variability in polar region will increase, despite significant consequences on the global climate system. In this proposal, I will evaluate how climate variability in Antarctica varies for changing climatic conditions, using ice core isotopic composition (δ18O, d-excess and 17O-excess). The objectives of this project are to study the climate variability thanks to a large network of ice core records at high resolution and high precision. A large number of ice cores are available through large European projects (Beyond EPICA – Oldest Ice (BE-OI), EAIIST, …) but the analytical platform to measure all this ice at high precision is missing. By implementing the new generation of infrared spectrometer in an ice core measuring line, we will be able to increase both the throughput and precision, and measure triple isotopic composition on a large number of cores and resolve the climate variability in Antarctica.

Meiotic crossovers make us unique. Their distribution along chromosomes dictates which traits will be reassorted to create new and unique allele combinations on which selection can act. Early during meiosis, a large number of recombination interactions are initiated all across the genome, but only a few ultimately mature into crossovers. The final number and positions of crossovers are tightly regulated: along each chromosome, crossovers tend to be evenly spaced. This phenomenon, called crossover interference, was discovered in 1914 by Sturtevant and Morgan while drawing the first recombination map in flies. Emergence of spatial patterning requires communication. But how does the crossover formation machinery communicate with neighboring crossovers half a chromosome away? Our understanding of how this communication is established has been hindered by the limited resolution in time provided by classical cytology, giving us access to only snapshots of the process. In the DYNACO project, I will develop innovative solutions to explore the dynamics of crossover designation and interference. Using gentle live super-resolution microscopy combined with groundbreaking genetic and optogenetic tools in a very amenable system, the filamentous fungus Sordaria macrospora, I will address the following questions: (i) How do pro-crossover factors behave dynamically to enact and respond to crossover interference? (ii) What is the medium supporting crossover communication? (iii) What are the consequences of locally disrupting this communication? The DYNACO project will provide fundamental breakthroughs in our understanding of crossover formation, designation and interference. We will confront and reconcile many aspects of current models for crossover interference, and develop our own unified model. This work also has the potential to provide tools for the manipulation of recombination, to accelerate the introgression of selective traits into elite crop genomes.

Liver metastases commonly develop in up to 50% of patients with various cancer types. The most common cancer that metastasizes to the liver is colorectal cancer (CRC). At least 25% of CRC patients develop colorectal liver metastases (CRLM) during their illness. CRLM represent the major unmet clinical need for this malignancy, as the 5-year survival rate of patients with unresectable disease does not exceed 2%. New therapies that promote antitumor immunity have been recently developed, mostly focusing on enhancing T cell responses. Although these therapies have led to unprecedented successes, only a minority of patients benefit from these treatments, highlighting the need to identify new cells and molecules that could be exploited in next generation immunotherapies. Given the crucial role of innate immune responses in immunity, targeting these responses opens up new possibilities for tumour control. We hypothesize that the immunotherapy of liver metastases can be significantly improved through harnessing the biology of innate lymphoid cells (ILC), such as Natural Killer (NK) cells and ILC1s, and myeloid cells such as macrophages and DCs. Our team brings together experts in the biology of tissue-resident myeloid (Ginhoux, PI4) and lymphoid (Gasteiger, cPI) cells, in liver immunology (Fumagalli, PI3), and in the development of novel immunotherapeutic strategies that modulate immune cells in the fight against cancer (Vivier, PI2). By combining cutting-edge single cell and spatial transcriptomics of human patient samples with cross-species analyses in advanced genetic mouse models, we aim (1) to identify cellular interactions defining the metastatic tumor microenvironment across murine and human tissue-specimens, (2) to investigate immune cell functions regulating metastatic disease using a unique combination of advanced genetic mouse and human tissue models, and (3) to harness the anti-tumoral functions of innate immune cells via next generation cell engagers.

There is an urgent medical need for efficient diagnostics for Alzheimer’s disease and related tauopathies, as well as disease modifying treatments, due to the heavy burden of the disease on patients, families and society. To address this public health issue, TAME R&I training network gathers leading academic and industrial experts in tau research with the ambition to keep older people active and independent for longer. TAME aims to provide better understanding of tau-related diseases and supports the development of new, safer, personalised and more effective diagnosis and interventions for AD and the less common tauopathies. The beneficiaries and partners bring together resources and knowledge across different fields and technologies to provide a multidisciplinary approach necessary to take on the challenge. They have teamed-up to combine molecular and cellular neuroscience with computing, chemical and bio-engineering and their technology expertise. The first tau network of Europe, TAME, will focus on novel approaches using nanobodies, which have emerged as very promising antibody formats in tau research. The primary objective of the TAME is to train 9 fellows to deliver the next generation of talented life scientists. The program will be a combination of training in research, in personal and professional development and in open science, achieved by conducting research projects, attending courses and benefiting from internal mobility within TAME. The research training is based on cutting-edge technologies and advanced models for medical research, emphasizing the need for more human-based research, gender-personalised models and reduction in the use of animals. Consequently, through intense collaboration with all partners and the relevant industrial experience, these 9 fellows can anticipate improved career prospects and higher employability. TAME will provide an innovation-friendly framework in which scientific results can mature and be developed into products.

MolCal will contribute to establishing a critical mass of researchers in promising exploratory topics on caloric materials and energy conversion technologies for solid-state cooling and heating applications at near-ambient and very-low temperatures. Temperature control systems are responsible for approximately half of the EU energy consumption expenditure. This figure alone amply justifies the need to dedicate great efforts to the search for alternative refrigeration and heat pump methods. Research on caloric materials has never been as active as it is now, due to the prospect of new-generation refrigerators and heat pumps that are energy efficient and environmentally friendly, on the one hand, and the policies on low-energy consumption and global warming refrigerants, on the other. MolCal presents an approach never tried before in similar collaborative research training programmes. We will consider caloric materials that fall under the umbrella of molecule-based materials and can respond to different sources of the driving stimulus, be it magnetic, electric, and/or mechanical. Since there is no clear-cut consensus on which type of caloric material holds the most promise, this multi-front approach will be an advantage because it will permit transfer of methods already developed from the magnetocaloric subfield into the others, which are increasingly in the spotlight because of their enormous potentiality. Furthermore, MolCal will develop devices based on low-cost barocaloric materials and, due to the molecular characteristics, will progress towards challenging applications by exploring the limits of the smallest size of magnetic refrigerators. Academic and non-academic leaders, from top research institutions in Europe and outside, will expose the doctoral researchers to integrative, multidisciplinary, and multisectoral training in chemistry, materials science, physics, device development, and relevant transversal skills.

Developing the bioeconomy features high on the European policy agenda to tackle societal challenges such as climate change, the phasing out of fossil resources or the advent of the much needed ecological and energy transitions. However, transitioning into an economy based on regionally available biological resources will substantially increase the demand for biomass from forestry and agriculture, and may incur adverse effects on biodiversity, greenhouse gas emissions or water resources. Comprehensive, rigorous and transparent assessment procedures are thus required to ensure that the bioeconomy will deliver on its sustainability promise. Assessment methodologies have so far failed to embrace the various dimensions of sustainability and the multiple facets and stakeholders of bioeconomy systems. This lack of an integrated, holistic approach constitutes the key scientific question that DESTINY will address, by developing novel methods and tools as well as demonstrating how they can be mobilised to maximise systems performance in a range of generic value-chain cases-studies. Since such concepts mobilise a number of disciplines from agronomy and engineering to economics, political and social sciences, a novel type of scientist is warranted : the bioeconomist. The DESTINY doctoral network will train this new generation of researchers and practitioners through a multi-disciplinary curriculum, equipping 15 Doctoral Candidates with the knowledge they need to design and assess novel biomass production systems and bio-product value-chains. In their research programme at the crossroads between bioeconomy and sustainability science, these candidates will design sustainable bioeconomy systems for Europe, factoring in social, economic and governance aspects. DESTINY graduates will bridge a well-evidenced gap on the labour market for the bioeconomy and will secure jobs in the agricultural and forestry sectors, the bioeconmy industry, academia, consultancies and governments.

BullNet, consisting of 8 beneficiaries and 13 associated partner organisations, will build a multi-disciplinary and inter-sectorial research programme designed to unravel the complex underlying biology of compromised fertility of individual bulls. Cutting-edge basic, applied and machine-learning approaches will be used to deliver a robust, flexible semen product from young, appropriately reared and managed, first-season elite sires that can be used successfully for artificial insemination (AI) with predictable and consistent fertility, so as to provide the industry with key tools to meet current emissions and animal welfare demands. BullNet will also lead to the advancement of knowledge in how bull management strategies and semen processing affect the functional and molecular characteristics of sperm, thus opening scientific horizons for new applications in the area of assisted reproduction. The overall aim of this programme is to train a new generation of creative, entrepreneurial and innovative doctoral candidates (DCs) in the area of bull fertility. BullNet will expose DCs to different sectors and they will acquire a comprehensive set of transferable skills working in the specific research area relating to their individual research projects, with an emphasis on the need for technology transfer from academic institutions to commercial users. Moreover, given the wide range of academic and industry organisations involved, the DCs will be able to face current and future challenges in order to convert knowledge and ideas into products and services for economic, technological and societal benefit.

The development of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) has provided an alternative for people with difficulties conceiving naturally, and over 9 million babies have been born through ART since 1978. Moreover, the use of ART has increased dramatically (5.3-fold) during the last two decades and this trend will continue. While ART have undoubtedly made a positive impact on the lives of couples and individuals dealing with infertility, numerous studies reported potentially negative ART-derived effects on the health of offspring. The mechanisms involved and their consequences are poorly understood and there are critical unanswered questions, including whether the manipulations and the artificial environments in which gametes and embryos are cultured, or the increased paternal and maternal age at the time when the treatments are applied entail ART-derived health risks. Thus, there is a growing need to advance research on ART consequences and propose holistic solutions, as well as to develop innovative training programmes to prepare new researchers to deal with such concerns. The AFRODITA (Advancing Fertility and Reproduction thrOugh Dedicated and Innovative Technological Applications) consortium takes up this challenge and aims to implement jointly an innovative international, multi-sectorial, and multidisciplinary research and training programme (Joint Doctorate) by bringing together key scientific staff from the academia (5 European universities and 3 excellent research centres), the largest hospital in Denmark and the corporate world (8 enterprises) with a history of fruitful collaboration, that will guarantee excellent training and effective supervision for AFRODITA’s 15 doctoral candidates to enhance their career opportunities for different professional paths.

CanDoIt will show how a smart multimodal multi-physic sensor array associated with DNA oligonucleotides and their peptide nucleic acid (PNAs) analogues dedicated for liquid biopsies analysis has the potential for more accurate diagnostic and treatment monitoring of BC through the study of cutting-edge technologies in bio/nanomaterials, sensors and transducers design, fluidics systems, and artificial intelligence. The CanDoIt objectives are to: (1) Train the excellent next generation researchers for interdisciplinary careers in basic, applied and especially translational BC research and with “raising awareness” on social issues; (2) Develop cutting-edge technologies for BC diagnosis and monitoring therapeutic response by bringing together eminent experts from both industry and academia, including engineers, computational scientists, chemists, physicists, and clinicians; (3) Pursue key biological targets through intelligent methods, all the way from early stage to preclinical and clinical investigation; (4) In addition to respond to the BC issue, the intelligent biosystems proposed will be a real technological advance (breakthrough), thanks to the association of different transducers to go towards a multimodal platform, the association of structured nanomaterials inspired by living world and an implementation of intelligent algorithms for optimal analysis; (5) Build a high-impact structure ensuring multi-level dissemination and exploitation of all results.

Transformative advances in product formulation are required to meet the demand for sustainability across a wide range of EU-priority industrial areas. Colloidal gels – complex, out-of-equilibrium soft matter systems – are core components in many of the formulations encountered therein, including building materials (e.g., cement), energy materials (e.g., batteries and fuel cells), consumer care and food products, and medicine. Current industrial practice requires delicate balancing between thermodynamic parameters (composition and interactions), quenching kinetics, and processing conditions to achieve gel structures with the desired material performance (e.g., mechanical, thermal, or electrical properties). Without a robust physical understanding of how the microstructure can be controlled and how this links to material properties, this balancing remains limited to trial and error. Recent advances in colloidal-gel physics strongly imply that the rational design of colloidal gel properties is within reach. This design is based on tuning gel microstructure via external stimuli, such as shear, ultrasound, and (magnetic/electric) fields, and the addition of non-Brownian inclusions. The CoCoGel doctoral network will enable the translation from the current academic state of the art to industrial practice, focusing on these routes to controlling microstructure. We will bring together 6 academic and 6 industrial partners – experts in a range of experimental, computational, and theoretical techniques – who can realize the creation of new sustainable materials and production processes via these routes. Key to the success of our industrial doctoral training network is a deepening and extending of existing collaborations, as well as the training of a new generation of researchers with both multi-disciplinary expertise in soft materials and practical experience engaging with industry. These will drive further sustainable development over a wide range of European industries.

A transition towards sustainable food systems is urgently needed to face challenges such as climate change or scarcity of resources. Food impact accounts for 26% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Animal-based food products in the European diet is the most important factor determining the footprint of food consumption. Plant-based dairy and meat alternatives have grown in popularity in recent years for various reasons, including sustainability and health benefits as well as lifestyle trends and dietary restrictions. However, plant-based food products can be nutritionally unbalanced, and their flavour profiles may limit their acceptance by consumers. Microorganisms have been used in making food products for millennia. Besides their primary role in food preservation, by virtue of their fermentative metabolism, they contribute to improving food safety and organoleptic properties and can provide additional health-promoting effects. However, the diversity of microbial communities driving plant-based fermentations, as well as their key genetic and phenotypic traits and potential synergies among community members, remain poorly characterized. Many data exist but they are spread into different literatures (scientific and grey) or in best case in different databases, but not always reusable because difficult to find, access and because databases are not systematically interoperable. The FAIROmics innovative interdisciplinary research programme will gather universities and private companies to enable the FAIRification of omics data and databases interoperability, and develop knowledge graphs for data-driven decision making to rationally design microbial communities for imparting desirable characteristics to plant-based fermented foods in the context of open science and its regulations. The FAIROmics training programme aims at developing Doctoral candidates’ skills at the interface between artificial intelligence, life sciences, humanities and social sciences.