ERC FUNDED PROJECTS

1.2 billion people worldwide lack access to safe drinking water. Drinking water quality is threatened by newly emerging organic micro-pollutants (pesticides, pharmaceuticals, industrial chemicals) in source waters. Nanofiltration is a technology that is expected to play a key role in future water treatment processes due to its effectiveness in removal of micropollutants. However, the loss of membrane flux due to fouling is one of the main impediments in the development of membrane processes for use in drinking water treatment. Currently there is a wholly inadequate mechanistic understanding of the role of biofilm on the fouling of nanofiltration membranes. Applying techniques including confocal microscopy, force spectroscopy, and infrared spectroscopy using an experimental programme informed by a technique known as scale-down together with mathematical modelling, it is confidently expected that significant advances will be gained in the mechanistic understanding of nanofiltration biofouling. The specific objectives are 1. How is the rate of formation and extent of such biofilms influenced by the biological response to the local microenvironment? 2 Elucidate the effect of extracellular polysaccharide substances on physical properties, composition and structure of these biofilms. 3: Investigate mechanisms to enhance biofilm removal by a physical detachment process complemented by techniques that alter biofilm material properties. A more fundamental insight into the mechanisms of nanofiltration operation will help in further development of this treatment method in future water treatment processes.

1 468 987 €

Start date: 2011-10-01, End date: 2016-09-30

Real-world optimization problems pose major challenges to algorithmic research. For instance, (i) many important problems are believed to be intractable (i.e. NP-hard) and (ii) with the growth of data size, modern applications often require a decision making under {\em incomplete and dynamically changing input data}. After several decades of research, central problems in these domains have remained poorly understood (e.g. Is there an asymptotically most efficient binary search trees?) Existing algorithmic techniques either reach their limitation or are inherently tailored to special cases. This project attempts to untangle this gap in the state of the art and seeks new interplay across multiple areas of algorithms, such as approximation algorithms, online algorithms, fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) algorithms, exponential time algorithms, and data structures. We propose new directions from the {\em structural perspectives} that connect the aforementioned algorithmic problems to basic questions in combinatorics. Our approaches fall into one of the three broad schemes: (i) new structural theory, (ii) intermediate problems, and (iii) transfer of techniques. These directions partially build on the PI's successes in resolving more than ten classical problems in this context. Resolving the proposed problems will likely revolutionize our understanding about algorithms and data structures and potentially unify techniques in multiple algorithmic regimes. Any progress is, in fact, already a significant contribution to the algorithms community. We suggest concrete intermediate goals that are of independent interest and have lower risks, so they are suitable for Ph.D students.

1 411 258 €

Start date: 2018-02-01, End date: 2023-01-31

What does the fossil record tell us about the evolution of colour in animals through deep time? Evidence of colour in fossils can inform on the visual signalling strategies used by ancient animals. Research to date often has a narrow focus, lacks a broad phylogenetic and temporal context, and rarely incorporates information on taphonomy. This proposal represents a bold new holistic approach to the study of fossil colour: it will couple powerful imaging- and chemical analytical techniques with a rigorous programme of fossilisation experiments simulating decay, burial, and transport, and analysis of fossils and their sedimentary context, to construct the first robust models for the evolution of colour in animals through deep time. The research will resolve the original integumentary colours of fossil higher vertebrates, and the original colours of fossil hair; the fossil record of non-melanin pigments in feathers and insects; the biological significance of monotonal patterning in fossil insects; and the evolutionary history of scales and 3D photonic crystals in insects. Critically, the research will test, for the first time, whether evidence of fossil colour can solve broader evolutionary questions, e.g. the true affinities of enigmatic Cambrian chordate-like metazoans, and feather-like integumentary filaments in dinosaurs. The proposal entails construction of a dedicated experimental maturation laboratory for simulating the impact of burial on tissues. This laboratory will form the core of the world’s first integrated ‘experimental fossilisation facility’, consolidating the PI’s team as the global hub for fossil colour research. The research team comprises the PI, three postdoctoral researchers, and three PhD students, and will form an extensive research network via collaborations with 13 researchers from Europe and beyond. The project will reach out to diverse scientists and will inspire a positive attitude to science among the general public and policymakers alike.

1 562 000 €

Start date: 2016-01-01, End date: 2021-04-30

Poetry enjoys a special place in Arabic culture and literature. For centuries, Arabs of all faiths have considered poetry a key source for knowledge, intellectuality and wisdom. In the pre-Islamic era, poetry was considered as ‘the Arab knowledge’ and ‘the Arab cultural archive’, in which the social and cultural history, language, arts, music, religious and Arab’s human experience were stored and preserved. Being a part of Arabic culture, Jews of Arab lands equally enjoyed writing and reading poetry. APCG will investigate for the first time a hitherto neglected collection of Arabic poetry fragments written in Hebrew script (in Judaeo-Arabic), which has been preserved in arguably the most important Jewish treasure trove: the Cairo Genizah. The fragments, numbered in the hundreds, constitute a unique source for understanding medieval and Early Modern Egypt from three main perspectives: Arabic studies, Jewish social and cultural studies, and anthropological studies. The core aims of the project are: • to make the entirety of Arabic and Judaeo-Arabic poetry in the Cairo Genizah accessible to both academic scholars and to the public in a comprehensive database and in critical editions; • to reveal, through the study of poetry, hitherto hidden aspects of social and cultural history of the Jews in the Middle East with regard to literacy, education and intercommunal relations; • to explore hierarchies, interpersonal relationships and the social function of poetry in medieval and early modern Egypt through the study of Genizah poetry. To achieve the planned main objectives, APCG carries out a thorough interdisciplinary study of Genizah’s Arabic poetry. This approach involves research from philological, linguistic, literary, historical and anthropological perspectives.

1 456 246 €

Start date: 2020-07-01, End date: 2025-06-30