Project acronym 19TH-CENTURY_EUCLID
Project Nineteenth-Century Euclid: Geometry and the Literary Imagination from Wordsworth to Wells
Researcher (PI) Alice Jenkins
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW
Country United Kingdom
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH4, ERC-2007-StG
Summary This radically interdisciplinary project aims to bring a substantially new field of research – literature and mathematics studies – to prominence as a tool for investigating the culture of nineteenth-century Britain. It will result in three kinds of outcome: a monograph, two interdisciplinary and international colloquia, and a collection of essays. The project focuses on Euclidean geometry as a key element of nineteenth-century literary and scientific culture, showing that it was part of the shared knowledge flowing through elite and popular Romantic and Victorian writing, and figuring notably in the work of very many of the century’s best-known writers. Despite its traditional cultural prestige and educational centrality, geometry has been almost wholly neglected by literary history. This project shows how literature and mathematics studies can draw a new map of nineteenth-century British culture, revitalising our understanding of the Romantic and Victorian imagination through its writing about geometry.
Summary
This radically interdisciplinary project aims to bring a substantially new field of research – literature and mathematics studies – to prominence as a tool for investigating the culture of nineteenth-century Britain. It will result in three kinds of outcome: a monograph, two interdisciplinary and international colloquia, and a collection of essays. The project focuses on Euclidean geometry as a key element of nineteenth-century literary and scientific culture, showing that it was part of the shared knowledge flowing through elite and popular Romantic and Victorian writing, and figuring notably in the work of very many of the century’s best-known writers. Despite its traditional cultural prestige and educational centrality, geometry has been almost wholly neglected by literary history. This project shows how literature and mathematics studies can draw a new map of nineteenth-century British culture, revitalising our understanding of the Romantic and Victorian imagination through its writing about geometry.
Max ERC Funding
323 118 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-01-01, End date: 2011-10-31
Project acronym 2SEXES_1GENOME
Project Sex-specific genetic effects on fitness and human disease
Researcher (PI) Edward Hugh Morrow
Host Institution (HI) THE UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX
Country United Kingdom
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), LS8, ERC-2011-StG_20101109
Summary Darwin’s theory of natural selection rests on the principle that fitness variation in natural populations has a heritable component, on which selection acts, thereby leading to evolutionary change. A fundamental and so far unresolved question for the field of evolutionary biology is to identify the genetic loci responsible for this fitness variation, thereby coming closer to an understanding of how variation is maintained in the face of continual selection. One important complicating factor in the search for fitness related genes however is the existence of separate sexes – theoretical expectations and empirical data both suggest that sexually antagonistic genes are common. The phrase “two sexes, one genome” nicely sums up the problem; selection may favour alleles in one sex, even if they have detrimental effects on the fitness of the opposite sex, since it is their net effect across both sexes that determine the likelihood that alleles persist in a population. This theoretical framework raises an interesting, and so far entirely unexplored issue: that in one sex the functional performance of some alleles is predicted to be compromised and this effect may account for some common human diseases and conditions which show genotype-sex interactions. I propose to explore the genetic basis of sex-specific fitness in a model organism in both laboratory and natural conditions and to test whether those genes identified as having sexually antagonistic effects can help explain the incidence of human diseases that display sexual dimorphism in prevalence, age of onset or severity. This multidisciplinary project directly addresses some fundamental unresolved questions in evolutionary biology: the genetic basis and maintenance of fitness variation; the evolution of sexual dimorphism; and aims to provide novel insights into the genetic basis of some common human diseases.
Summary
Darwin’s theory of natural selection rests on the principle that fitness variation in natural populations has a heritable component, on which selection acts, thereby leading to evolutionary change. A fundamental and so far unresolved question for the field of evolutionary biology is to identify the genetic loci responsible for this fitness variation, thereby coming closer to an understanding of how variation is maintained in the face of continual selection. One important complicating factor in the search for fitness related genes however is the existence of separate sexes – theoretical expectations and empirical data both suggest that sexually antagonistic genes are common. The phrase “two sexes, one genome” nicely sums up the problem; selection may favour alleles in one sex, even if they have detrimental effects on the fitness of the opposite sex, since it is their net effect across both sexes that determine the likelihood that alleles persist in a population. This theoretical framework raises an interesting, and so far entirely unexplored issue: that in one sex the functional performance of some alleles is predicted to be compromised and this effect may account for some common human diseases and conditions which show genotype-sex interactions. I propose to explore the genetic basis of sex-specific fitness in a model organism in both laboratory and natural conditions and to test whether those genes identified as having sexually antagonistic effects can help explain the incidence of human diseases that display sexual dimorphism in prevalence, age of onset or severity. This multidisciplinary project directly addresses some fundamental unresolved questions in evolutionary biology: the genetic basis and maintenance of fitness variation; the evolution of sexual dimorphism; and aims to provide novel insights into the genetic basis of some common human diseases.
Max ERC Funding
1 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2012-01-01, End date: 2016-12-31
Project acronym 3DICE
Project 3D Interstellar Chemo-physical Evolution
Researcher (PI) Valentine Wakelam
Host Institution (HI) CENTRE NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE CNRS
Country France
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), PE9, ERC-2013-StG
Summary At the end of their life, stars spread their inner material into the diffuse interstellar medium. This diffuse medium gets locally denser and form dark clouds (also called dense or molecular clouds) whose innermost part is shielded from the external UV field by the dust, allowing for molecules to grow and get more complex. Gravitational collapse occurs inside these dense clouds, forming protostars and their surrounding disks, and eventually planetary systems like (or unlike) our solar system. The formation and evolution of molecules, minerals, ices and organics from the diffuse medium to planetary bodies, their alteration or preservation throughout this cosmic chemical history set the initial conditions for building planets, atmospheres and possibly the first bricks of life. The current view of interstellar chemistry is based on fragmental works on key steps of the sequence that are observed. The objective of this proposal is to follow the fractionation of the elements between the gas-phase and the interstellar grains, from the most diffuse medium to protoplanetary disks, in order to constrain the chemical composition of the material in which planets are formed. The potential outcome of this project is to get a consistent and more accurate description of the chemical evolution of interstellar matter. To achieve this objective, I will improve our chemical model by adding new processes on grain surfaces relevant under the diffuse medium conditions. This upgraded gas-grain model will be coupled to 3D dynamical models of the formation of dense clouds from diffuse medium and of protoplanetary disks from dense clouds. The computed chemical composition will also be used with 3D radiative transfer codes to study the chemical tracers of the physics of protoplanetary disk formation. The robustness of the model predictions will be studied with sensitivity analyses. Finally, model results will be confronted to observations to address some of the current challenges.
Summary
At the end of their life, stars spread their inner material into the diffuse interstellar medium. This diffuse medium gets locally denser and form dark clouds (also called dense or molecular clouds) whose innermost part is shielded from the external UV field by the dust, allowing for molecules to grow and get more complex. Gravitational collapse occurs inside these dense clouds, forming protostars and their surrounding disks, and eventually planetary systems like (or unlike) our solar system. The formation and evolution of molecules, minerals, ices and organics from the diffuse medium to planetary bodies, their alteration or preservation throughout this cosmic chemical history set the initial conditions for building planets, atmospheres and possibly the first bricks of life. The current view of interstellar chemistry is based on fragmental works on key steps of the sequence that are observed. The objective of this proposal is to follow the fractionation of the elements between the gas-phase and the interstellar grains, from the most diffuse medium to protoplanetary disks, in order to constrain the chemical composition of the material in which planets are formed. The potential outcome of this project is to get a consistent and more accurate description of the chemical evolution of interstellar matter. To achieve this objective, I will improve our chemical model by adding new processes on grain surfaces relevant under the diffuse medium conditions. This upgraded gas-grain model will be coupled to 3D dynamical models of the formation of dense clouds from diffuse medium and of protoplanetary disks from dense clouds. The computed chemical composition will also be used with 3D radiative transfer codes to study the chemical tracers of the physics of protoplanetary disk formation. The robustness of the model predictions will be studied with sensitivity analyses. Finally, model results will be confronted to observations to address some of the current challenges.
Max ERC Funding
1 166 231 €
Duration
Start date: 2013-09-01, End date: 2018-08-31
Project acronym 4PI-SKY
Project 4 pi sky: Extreme Astrophysics with Revolutionary Radio Telescopes
Researcher (PI) Robert Philip Fender
Host Institution (HI) THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
Country United Kingdom
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE9, ERC-2010-AdG_20100224
Summary Extreme astrophysical events such as relativistic flows, cataclysmic explosions and black hole accretion are one of the key areas for astrophysics in the 21st century. The extremes of physics experienced in these environments are beyond anything achievable in any laboratory on Earth, and provide a unique glimpse at the laws of physics operating in extraordinary regimes. All of these events are associated with transient radio emission, a tracer both of the acceleration of particles to relativistic energies, and coherent emitting regions with huge effective temperatures. By studying radio bursts from these phenomena we can pinpoint the sources of explosive events, understand the budget of kinetic feedback by explosive events in the ambient medium, and probe the physical state of the universe back to the epoch of reionisation, less than a billion years after the big bang. In seeking to push back the frontiers of extreme astrophysics, I will use a trio of revolutionary new radio telescopes, LOFAR, ASKAP and MeerKAT, pathfinders for the Square Kilometre Array, and all facilities in which I have a major role in the search for transients. I will build an infrastructure which transforms their combined operations for the discovery, classification and reporting of transient astrophysical events, over the whole sky, making them much more than the sum of their parts. This will include development of environments for the coordinated handling of extreme astrophysical events, in real time, via automated systems, as well as novel techniques for the detection of these events in a sea of noise. I will furthermore augment this program by buying in as a major partner to a rapid-response robotic optical telescope, and by cementing my relationship with an orbiting X-ray facility. This multiwavelength dimension will secure the astrophysical interpretation of our observational results and help to revolutionise high-energy astrophysics via a strong scientific exploitation program.
Summary
Extreme astrophysical events such as relativistic flows, cataclysmic explosions and black hole accretion are one of the key areas for astrophysics in the 21st century. The extremes of physics experienced in these environments are beyond anything achievable in any laboratory on Earth, and provide a unique glimpse at the laws of physics operating in extraordinary regimes. All of these events are associated with transient radio emission, a tracer both of the acceleration of particles to relativistic energies, and coherent emitting regions with huge effective temperatures. By studying radio bursts from these phenomena we can pinpoint the sources of explosive events, understand the budget of kinetic feedback by explosive events in the ambient medium, and probe the physical state of the universe back to the epoch of reionisation, less than a billion years after the big bang. In seeking to push back the frontiers of extreme astrophysics, I will use a trio of revolutionary new radio telescopes, LOFAR, ASKAP and MeerKAT, pathfinders for the Square Kilometre Array, and all facilities in which I have a major role in the search for transients. I will build an infrastructure which transforms their combined operations for the discovery, classification and reporting of transient astrophysical events, over the whole sky, making them much more than the sum of their parts. This will include development of environments for the coordinated handling of extreme astrophysical events, in real time, via automated systems, as well as novel techniques for the detection of these events in a sea of noise. I will furthermore augment this program by buying in as a major partner to a rapid-response robotic optical telescope, and by cementing my relationship with an orbiting X-ray facility. This multiwavelength dimension will secure the astrophysical interpretation of our observational results and help to revolutionise high-energy astrophysics via a strong scientific exploitation program.
Max ERC Funding
2 999 847 €
Duration
Start date: 2011-07-01, End date: 2017-06-30
Project acronym A-BINGOS
Project Accreting binary populations in Nearby Galaxies: Observations and Simulations
Researcher (PI) Andreas Zezas
Host Institution (HI) IDRYMA TECHNOLOGIAS KAI EREVNAS
Country Greece
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), PE9, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary "High-energy observations of our Galaxy offer a good, albeit not complete, picture of the X-ray source populations, in particular the accreting binary sources. Recent ability to study accreting binaries in nearby galaxies has shown that we would be short-sighted if we restricted ourselves to our Galaxy or to a few nearby ones. I propose an ambitious project that involves a comprehensive study of all the galaxies within 10 Mpc for which we can study in detail their X-ray sources and stellar populations. The study will combine data from a unique suite of observatories (Chandra, XMM-Newton, HST, Spitzer) with state-of-the-art theoretical modelling of binary systems. I propose a novel approach that links the accreting binary populations to their parent stellar populations and surpasses any current studies of X-ray binary populations, both in scale and in scope, by: (a) combining methods and results from several different areas of astrophysics (compact objects, binary systems, stellar populations, galaxy evolution); (b) using data from almost the whole electromagnetic spectrum (infrared to X-ray bands); (c) identifying and studying the different sub-populations of accreting binaries; and (d) performing direct comparison between observations and theoretical predictions, over a broad parameter space. The project: (a) will answer the long-standing question of the formation efficiency of accreting binaries in different environments; and (b) will constrain their evolutionary paths. As by-products the project will provide eagerly awaited input to the fields of gravitational-wave sources, γ-ray bursts, and X-ray emitting galaxies at cosmological distances and it will produce a heritage multi-wavelength dataset and library of models for future studies of galaxies and accreting binaries."
Summary
"High-energy observations of our Galaxy offer a good, albeit not complete, picture of the X-ray source populations, in particular the accreting binary sources. Recent ability to study accreting binaries in nearby galaxies has shown that we would be short-sighted if we restricted ourselves to our Galaxy or to a few nearby ones. I propose an ambitious project that involves a comprehensive study of all the galaxies within 10 Mpc for which we can study in detail their X-ray sources and stellar populations. The study will combine data from a unique suite of observatories (Chandra, XMM-Newton, HST, Spitzer) with state-of-the-art theoretical modelling of binary systems. I propose a novel approach that links the accreting binary populations to their parent stellar populations and surpasses any current studies of X-ray binary populations, both in scale and in scope, by: (a) combining methods and results from several different areas of astrophysics (compact objects, binary systems, stellar populations, galaxy evolution); (b) using data from almost the whole electromagnetic spectrum (infrared to X-ray bands); (c) identifying and studying the different sub-populations of accreting binaries; and (d) performing direct comparison between observations and theoretical predictions, over a broad parameter space. The project: (a) will answer the long-standing question of the formation efficiency of accreting binaries in different environments; and (b) will constrain their evolutionary paths. As by-products the project will provide eagerly awaited input to the fields of gravitational-wave sources, γ-ray bursts, and X-ray emitting galaxies at cosmological distances and it will produce a heritage multi-wavelength dataset and library of models for future studies of galaxies and accreting binaries."
Max ERC Funding
1 242 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-04-01, End date: 2019-03-31
Project acronym AARTFAAC
Project Amsterdam-ASTRON Radio Transient Facility And Analysis Centre: Probing the Extremes of Astrophysics
Researcher (PI) Ralph Antoine Marie Joseph Wijers
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITEIT VAN AMSTERDAM
Country Netherlands
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE9, ERC-2009-AdG
Summary Some of the most extreme tests of physical law come from its manifestations in the behaviour of black holes and neutron stars, and as such these objects should be used as fundamental physics labs. Due to advances in both theoretical work and observational techniques, I have a major opportunity now to significantly push this agenda forward and get better answers to questions like: How are black holes born? How can energy be extracted from black holes? What is the origin of magnetic fields and cosmic rays in jets and shocks? Is their primary energy stream hadronic or magnetic? I propose to do this by exploiting the advent of wide-field radio astronomy: extreme objects are very rare and usually transient, so not only must one survey large areas of sky, but also must one do this often. I propose to form and shape a group that will use the LOFAR wide-field radio telescope to hunt for these extreme transients and systematically collect enough well-documented examples of the behaviour of each type of transient. Furthermore, I propose to expand LOFAR with a true 24/7 all-sky monitor to catch and study even the rarest of events. Next, I will use my experience in gamma-ray burst followup to conduct a vigorous multi-wavelength programme of study of these objects, to constrain their physics from as many angles as possible. This will eventually include results from multi-messenger astrophysics, in which we use neutrinos, gravity waves, and other non-electromagnetic messengers as extra diagnostics of the physics of these sources. Finally, I will build on my experience in modelling accretion phenomena and relativistic explosions to develop a theoretical framework for these phenomena and constrain the resulting models with the rich data sets we obtain.
Summary
Some of the most extreme tests of physical law come from its manifestations in the behaviour of black holes and neutron stars, and as such these objects should be used as fundamental physics labs. Due to advances in both theoretical work and observational techniques, I have a major opportunity now to significantly push this agenda forward and get better answers to questions like: How are black holes born? How can energy be extracted from black holes? What is the origin of magnetic fields and cosmic rays in jets and shocks? Is their primary energy stream hadronic or magnetic? I propose to do this by exploiting the advent of wide-field radio astronomy: extreme objects are very rare and usually transient, so not only must one survey large areas of sky, but also must one do this often. I propose to form and shape a group that will use the LOFAR wide-field radio telescope to hunt for these extreme transients and systematically collect enough well-documented examples of the behaviour of each type of transient. Furthermore, I propose to expand LOFAR with a true 24/7 all-sky monitor to catch and study even the rarest of events. Next, I will use my experience in gamma-ray burst followup to conduct a vigorous multi-wavelength programme of study of these objects, to constrain their physics from as many angles as possible. This will eventually include results from multi-messenger astrophysics, in which we use neutrinos, gravity waves, and other non-electromagnetic messengers as extra diagnostics of the physics of these sources. Finally, I will build on my experience in modelling accretion phenomena and relativistic explosions to develop a theoretical framework for these phenomena and constrain the resulting models with the rich data sets we obtain.
Max ERC Funding
3 499 128 €
Duration
Start date: 2010-10-01, End date: 2016-09-30
Project acronym ACQDIV
Project Acquisition processes in maximally diverse languages: Min(d)ing the ambient language
Researcher (PI) Sabine Erika Stoll
Host Institution (HI) University of Zurich
Country Switzerland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH4, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary "Children learn any language that they grow up with, adapting to any of the ca. 7000 languages of the world, no matter how divergent or complex their structures are. What cognitive processes make this extreme flexibility possible? This is one of the most burning questions in cognitive science and the ACQDIV project aims at answering it by testing and refining the following leading hypothesis: Language acquisition is flexible and adaptive to any kind of language because it relies on a small set of universal cognitive processes that variably target different structures at different times during acquisition in every language. The project aims at establishing the precise set of processes and at determining the conditions of variation across maximally diverse languages. This project focuses on three processes: (i) distributional learning, (ii) generalization-based learning and (iii) interaction-based learning. To investigate these processes I will work with a sample of five clusters of languages including longitudinal data of two languages each. The clusters were determined by a clustering algorithm seeking the structurally most divergent languages in a typological database. The languages are: Cluster 1: Slavey and Cree, Cluster 2: Indonesian and Yucatec, Cluster 3: Inuktitut and Chintang, Cluster 4: Sesotho and Russian, Cluster 5: Japanese and Turkish. For all languages, corpora are available, except for Slavey where fieldwork is planned. The leading hypothesis will be tested against the acquisition of aspect and negation in each language of the sample and also against the two structures in each language that are most salient and challenging in them (e. g. complex morphology in Chintang). The acquisition processes also depend on statistical patterns in the input children receive. I will examine these patterns across the sample with respect to repetitiveness effects, applying data-mining methods and systematically comparing child-directed and child-surrounding speech."
Summary
"Children learn any language that they grow up with, adapting to any of the ca. 7000 languages of the world, no matter how divergent or complex their structures are. What cognitive processes make this extreme flexibility possible? This is one of the most burning questions in cognitive science and the ACQDIV project aims at answering it by testing and refining the following leading hypothesis: Language acquisition is flexible and adaptive to any kind of language because it relies on a small set of universal cognitive processes that variably target different structures at different times during acquisition in every language. The project aims at establishing the precise set of processes and at determining the conditions of variation across maximally diverse languages. This project focuses on three processes: (i) distributional learning, (ii) generalization-based learning and (iii) interaction-based learning. To investigate these processes I will work with a sample of five clusters of languages including longitudinal data of two languages each. The clusters were determined by a clustering algorithm seeking the structurally most divergent languages in a typological database. The languages are: Cluster 1: Slavey and Cree, Cluster 2: Indonesian and Yucatec, Cluster 3: Inuktitut and Chintang, Cluster 4: Sesotho and Russian, Cluster 5: Japanese and Turkish. For all languages, corpora are available, except for Slavey where fieldwork is planned. The leading hypothesis will be tested against the acquisition of aspect and negation in each language of the sample and also against the two structures in each language that are most salient and challenging in them (e. g. complex morphology in Chintang). The acquisition processes also depend on statistical patterns in the input children receive. I will examine these patterns across the sample with respect to repetitiveness effects, applying data-mining methods and systematically comparing child-directed and child-surrounding speech."
Max ERC Funding
1 998 438 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-09-01, End date: 2019-08-31
Project acronym ActionContraThreat
Project Action selection under threat: the complex control of human defense
Researcher (PI) Dominik BACH
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON
Country United Kingdom
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH4, ERC-2018-COG
Summary Run away, sidestep, duck-and-cover, watch: when under threat, humans immediately choreograph a large repertoire of defensive actions. Understanding action-selection under threat is important for anybody wanting to explain why anxiety disorders imply some of these behaviours in harmless situations. Current concepts of human defensive behaviour are largely derived from rodent research and focus on a small number of broad, cross-species, action tendencies. This is likely to underestimate the complexity of the underlying action-selection mechanisms. This research programme will take decisive steps to understand these psychological mechanisms and elucidate their neural implementation.
To elicit threat-related action in the laboratory, I will use virtual reality computer games with full body motion, and track actions with motion-capture technology. Based on a cognitive-computational framework, I will systematically characterise the space of actions under threat, investigate the psychological mechanisms by which actions are selected in different scenarios, and describe them with computational algorithms that allow quantitative predictions. To independently verify their neural implementation, I will use wearable magnetoencephalography (MEG) in freely moving subjects.
This proposal fills a lacuna between defence system concepts based on rodent research, emotion psychology, and clinical accounts of anxiety disorders. By combining a stringent experimental approach with the formalism of cognitive-computational psychology, it furnishes a unique opportunity to understand the mechanisms of action-selection under threat, and how these are distinct from more general-purpose action-selection systems. Beyond its immediate scope, the proposal has a potential to lead to a better understanding of anxiety disorders, and to pave the way towards improved diagnostics and therapies.
Summary
Run away, sidestep, duck-and-cover, watch: when under threat, humans immediately choreograph a large repertoire of defensive actions. Understanding action-selection under threat is important for anybody wanting to explain why anxiety disorders imply some of these behaviours in harmless situations. Current concepts of human defensive behaviour are largely derived from rodent research and focus on a small number of broad, cross-species, action tendencies. This is likely to underestimate the complexity of the underlying action-selection mechanisms. This research programme will take decisive steps to understand these psychological mechanisms and elucidate their neural implementation.
To elicit threat-related action in the laboratory, I will use virtual reality computer games with full body motion, and track actions with motion-capture technology. Based on a cognitive-computational framework, I will systematically characterise the space of actions under threat, investigate the psychological mechanisms by which actions are selected in different scenarios, and describe them with computational algorithms that allow quantitative predictions. To independently verify their neural implementation, I will use wearable magnetoencephalography (MEG) in freely moving subjects.
This proposal fills a lacuna between defence system concepts based on rodent research, emotion psychology, and clinical accounts of anxiety disorders. By combining a stringent experimental approach with the formalism of cognitive-computational psychology, it furnishes a unique opportunity to understand the mechanisms of action-selection under threat, and how these are distinct from more general-purpose action-selection systems. Beyond its immediate scope, the proposal has a potential to lead to a better understanding of anxiety disorders, and to pave the way towards improved diagnostics and therapies.
Max ERC Funding
1 998 750 €
Duration
Start date: 2019-10-01, End date: 2024-09-30
Project acronym ADAM
Project The Adaptive Auditory Mind
Researcher (PI) Shihab Shamma
Host Institution (HI) ECOLE NORMALE SUPERIEURE
Country France
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH4, ERC-2011-ADG_20110406
Summary Listening in realistic situations is an active process that engages perceptual and cognitive faculties, endowing speech with meaning, music with joy, and environmental sounds with emotion. Through hearing, humans and other animals navigate complex acoustic scenes, separate sound mixtures, and assess their behavioral relevance. These remarkable feats are currently beyond our understanding and exceed the capabilities of the most sophisticated audio engineering systems. The goal of the proposed research is to investigate experimentally a novel view of hearing, where active hearing emerges from a deep interplay between adaptive sensory processes and goal-directed cognition. Specifically, we shall explore the postulate that versatile perception is mediated by rapid-plasticity at the neuronal level. At the conjunction of sensory and cognitive processing, rapid-plasticity pervades all levels of auditory system, from the cochlea up to the auditory and prefrontal cortices. Exploiting fundamental statistical regularities of acoustics, it is what allows humans and other animal to deal so successfully with natural acoustic scenes where artificial systems fail. The project builds on the internationally recognized leadership of the PI in the fields of physiology and computational modeling, combined with the expertise of the Co-Investigator in psychophysics. Building on these highly complementary fields and several technical innovations, we hope to promote a novel view of auditory perception and cognition. We aim also to contribute significantly to translational research in the domain of signal processing for clinical hearing aids, given that many current limitations are not technological but rather conceptual. The project will finally result in the creation of laboratory facilities and an intellectual network unique in France and rare in all of Europe, combining cognitive, neural, and computational approaches to auditory neuroscience.
Summary
Listening in realistic situations is an active process that engages perceptual and cognitive faculties, endowing speech with meaning, music with joy, and environmental sounds with emotion. Through hearing, humans and other animals navigate complex acoustic scenes, separate sound mixtures, and assess their behavioral relevance. These remarkable feats are currently beyond our understanding and exceed the capabilities of the most sophisticated audio engineering systems. The goal of the proposed research is to investigate experimentally a novel view of hearing, where active hearing emerges from a deep interplay between adaptive sensory processes and goal-directed cognition. Specifically, we shall explore the postulate that versatile perception is mediated by rapid-plasticity at the neuronal level. At the conjunction of sensory and cognitive processing, rapid-plasticity pervades all levels of auditory system, from the cochlea up to the auditory and prefrontal cortices. Exploiting fundamental statistical regularities of acoustics, it is what allows humans and other animal to deal so successfully with natural acoustic scenes where artificial systems fail. The project builds on the internationally recognized leadership of the PI in the fields of physiology and computational modeling, combined with the expertise of the Co-Investigator in psychophysics. Building on these highly complementary fields and several technical innovations, we hope to promote a novel view of auditory perception and cognition. We aim also to contribute significantly to translational research in the domain of signal processing for clinical hearing aids, given that many current limitations are not technological but rather conceptual. The project will finally result in the creation of laboratory facilities and an intellectual network unique in France and rare in all of Europe, combining cognitive, neural, and computational approaches to auditory neuroscience.
Max ERC Funding
3 199 078 €
Duration
Start date: 2012-10-01, End date: 2018-09-30
Project acronym ADaPTIVE
Project Analysing Diversity with a Phenomic approach: Trends in Vertebrate Evolution
Researcher (PI) Anjali Goswami
Host Institution (HI) NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM
Country United Kingdom
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), LS8, ERC-2014-STG
Summary What processes shape vertebrate diversity through deep time? Approaches to this question can focus on many different factors, from life history and ecology to large-scale environmental change and extinction. To date, the majority of studies on the evolution of vertebrate diversity have focused on relatively simple metrics, specifically taxon counts or univariate measures, such as body size. However, multivariate morphological data provides a more complete picture of evolutionary and palaeoecological change. Morphological data can also bridge deep-time palaeobiological analyses with studies of the genetic and developmental factors that shape variation and must also influence large-scale patterns of evolutionary change. Thus, accurately reconstructing the patterns and processes underlying evolution requires an approach that can fully represent an organism’s phenome, the sum total of their observable traits.
Recent advances in imaging and data analysis allow large-scale study of phenomic evolution. In this project, I propose to quantitatively analyse the deep-time evolutionary diversity of tetrapods (amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals). Specifically, I will apply and extend new imaging, morphometric, and analytical tools to construct a multivariate phenomic dataset for living and extinct tetrapods from 3-D scans. I will use these data to rigorously compare extinction selectivity, timing, pace, and shape of adaptive radiations, and ecomorphological response to large-scale climatic shifts across all tetrapod clades. To do so, I will quantify morphological diversity (disparity) and rates of evolution spanning over 300 million years of tetrapod history. I will further analyse the evolution of phenotypic integration by quantifying not just the traits themselves, but changes in the relationships among traits, which reflect the genetic, developmental, and functional interactions that shape variation, the raw material for natural selection.
Summary
What processes shape vertebrate diversity through deep time? Approaches to this question can focus on many different factors, from life history and ecology to large-scale environmental change and extinction. To date, the majority of studies on the evolution of vertebrate diversity have focused on relatively simple metrics, specifically taxon counts or univariate measures, such as body size. However, multivariate morphological data provides a more complete picture of evolutionary and palaeoecological change. Morphological data can also bridge deep-time palaeobiological analyses with studies of the genetic and developmental factors that shape variation and must also influence large-scale patterns of evolutionary change. Thus, accurately reconstructing the patterns and processes underlying evolution requires an approach that can fully represent an organism’s phenome, the sum total of their observable traits.
Recent advances in imaging and data analysis allow large-scale study of phenomic evolution. In this project, I propose to quantitatively analyse the deep-time evolutionary diversity of tetrapods (amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals). Specifically, I will apply and extend new imaging, morphometric, and analytical tools to construct a multivariate phenomic dataset for living and extinct tetrapods from 3-D scans. I will use these data to rigorously compare extinction selectivity, timing, pace, and shape of adaptive radiations, and ecomorphological response to large-scale climatic shifts across all tetrapod clades. To do so, I will quantify morphological diversity (disparity) and rates of evolution spanning over 300 million years of tetrapod history. I will further analyse the evolution of phenotypic integration by quantifying not just the traits themselves, but changes in the relationships among traits, which reflect the genetic, developmental, and functional interactions that shape variation, the raw material for natural selection.
Max ERC Funding
1 482 818 €
Duration
Start date: 2015-06-01, End date: 2021-05-31
