Project acronym ENVGENE
Project Dissection of environmentally-mediated epigenetic silencing
Researcher (PI) Caroline Dean
Host Institution (HI) JOHN INNES CENTRE
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS2, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary We intend to achieve a step change in our understanding of the mechanistic basis of epigenetic regulation. We will capitalize on a plant epigenetic silencing system, vernalization, which has many features that allow the complete dissection of different facets of epigenetic regulation. In addition, the silencing is quantitatively modulated by the environment enabling dissection of how external cues mediate epigenetic silencing. We will combine genetics, molecular biology and biochemical approaches with computational modelling to allow us to translate the extensive nuts and bolts information into an understanding of how the engine works. A particular strength of modelling will be its predictive nature and ability to distinguish between key components and those with subsidiary or redundant roles. The system we will use is vernalization, the cold-induced Polycomb-silencing of the target locus, FLC. We will dissect the many phases of vernalization: the triggering of FLC repression by prolonged cold; the nucleation and epigenetic stability of chromatin changes at FLC; and the spreading of the silencing yet spatial restriction to FLC. Our goal will be a full understanding of the complexity involved in the epigenetic silencing of this locus, described in a quantitative model that reveals how the silencing is induced by temperature and how individual components of the silencing network are integrated into a robust whole. This ambitious goal, which will uncover fundamental concepts important to gene regulation in many organisms, will be achieved through a tight integration of molecular analysis and computational modelling, enabling efficient cycling between experimentation, prediction and validation.
Summary
We intend to achieve a step change in our understanding of the mechanistic basis of epigenetic regulation. We will capitalize on a plant epigenetic silencing system, vernalization, which has many features that allow the complete dissection of different facets of epigenetic regulation. In addition, the silencing is quantitatively modulated by the environment enabling dissection of how external cues mediate epigenetic silencing. We will combine genetics, molecular biology and biochemical approaches with computational modelling to allow us to translate the extensive nuts and bolts information into an understanding of how the engine works. A particular strength of modelling will be its predictive nature and ability to distinguish between key components and those with subsidiary or redundant roles. The system we will use is vernalization, the cold-induced Polycomb-silencing of the target locus, FLC. We will dissect the many phases of vernalization: the triggering of FLC repression by prolonged cold; the nucleation and epigenetic stability of chromatin changes at FLC; and the spreading of the silencing yet spatial restriction to FLC. Our goal will be a full understanding of the complexity involved in the epigenetic silencing of this locus, described in a quantitative model that reveals how the silencing is induced by temperature and how individual components of the silencing network are integrated into a robust whole. This ambitious goal, which will uncover fundamental concepts important to gene regulation in many organisms, will be achieved through a tight integration of molecular analysis and computational modelling, enabling efficient cycling between experimentation, prediction and validation.
Max ERC Funding
2 450 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-01-01, End date: 2013-12-31
Project acronym EPISUSCEPTIBILITY
Project Epigenome and Cancer Susceptibility
Researcher (PI) Päivi Tuulikki Peltomäki
Host Institution (HI) HELSINGIN YLIOPISTO
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS7, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary Early detection is crucial for the outcome of most cancers. Prevention of cancer development is even more desirable. To facilitate these ultimate goals we aim to construct a comprehensive view of the stepwise process through which common human cancers, such as colorectal cancer, arise. In particular, we aim to identify novel mechanisms of cancer susceptibility by focusing on the epigenome, whose alterations may underlie several phenomena related to chronic adult-onset disease that are not explained by genetics alone. The stepwise process of carcinogenesis can be accelerated or halted for various reasons, including inherited susceptibility and diet. The human multi-organ cancer syndromes hereditary nonpolyposis colorectal cancer (HNPCC) and familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP) as well as their murine counterparts, the Mlh1+/- mouse and the ApcMin/+ mouse, will be used as shortcuts to study the interplay between the epigenome and genome in tumorigenesis and to identify biomarkers of cancer susceptibility, malignant transformation, and tumor progression. This will be achieved by molecular profiling of normal and tumor tissues, cell line studies, in vitro functional assays, and in silico approaches. Additionally, the role that the epigenome plays to mediate the effects of the Western type diet on colorectal tumorigenesis will be examined in the mouse. Unlike genetic changes, epigenetic alterations are potentially reversible, which makes them promising targets for preventive and therapeutic interventions.
Summary
Early detection is crucial for the outcome of most cancers. Prevention of cancer development is even more desirable. To facilitate these ultimate goals we aim to construct a comprehensive view of the stepwise process through which common human cancers, such as colorectal cancer, arise. In particular, we aim to identify novel mechanisms of cancer susceptibility by focusing on the epigenome, whose alterations may underlie several phenomena related to chronic adult-onset disease that are not explained by genetics alone. The stepwise process of carcinogenesis can be accelerated or halted for various reasons, including inherited susceptibility and diet. The human multi-organ cancer syndromes hereditary nonpolyposis colorectal cancer (HNPCC) and familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP) as well as their murine counterparts, the Mlh1+/- mouse and the ApcMin/+ mouse, will be used as shortcuts to study the interplay between the epigenome and genome in tumorigenesis and to identify biomarkers of cancer susceptibility, malignant transformation, and tumor progression. This will be achieved by molecular profiling of normal and tumor tissues, cell line studies, in vitro functional assays, and in silico approaches. Additionally, the role that the epigenome plays to mediate the effects of the Western type diet on colorectal tumorigenesis will be examined in the mouse. Unlike genetic changes, epigenetic alterations are potentially reversible, which makes them promising targets for preventive and therapeutic interventions.
Max ERC Funding
2 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-04-01, End date: 2014-09-30
Project acronym EQUIARITH
Project Equidistribution in number theory
Researcher (PI) Philippe Michel
Host Institution (HI) ECOLE POLYTECHNIQUE FEDERALE DE LAUSANNE
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE1, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary The purpose of this proposal is to investigate from various perspectives some equidistribution problems associated with homogeneous spaces of arithmetic type: a typical problem (basically solved) is the distribution of the set of representations of a large integer by an integral quadratic form. Another harder problem is the study of the distribution of special points on Shimura varieties. In a different direction (linked with quantum chaos), the study of the concentration of Laplacian (Maass) eigenforms or of sections of holomorphic bundles is related to similar problems. Given X such a space and G>L the underlying algebraic group and its corresponding lattice L, the above questions boil down to studying the distribution of H-orbits x.H (or more generally H-invariant measures)on the quotient L\G for some subgroups H. This question may be studied different methods: Harmonic Analysis (HA): given a function f on L\G one studies the period integral of f along x.H. This may be done by automorphic methods. In favorable circumstances, the above periods are related to L-functions which one may hope to treat by methods from analytic number theory (the subconvexity problem). Ergodic Theory (ET): one studies the properties of weak*-limits of the measures supported by x.H using rigidity techniques: depending on the nature of H, one might use either rigidity of unipotent actions or the more recent rigidity results for torus actions in rank >1. In fact, HA and ET are intertwined and complementary : the use of ET in this context require a substantial input from number theory and HA, while ET lead to a soft understanding of several features of HA. In addition, the Langlands correspondence principle make it possible to pass from one group G to another. Based on earlier experience, our goal is to develop these interactions systematically and to develop new approaches to outstanding arithmetic problems :eg. the subconvexity problem or the Andre/Oort conjecture.
Summary
The purpose of this proposal is to investigate from various perspectives some equidistribution problems associated with homogeneous spaces of arithmetic type: a typical problem (basically solved) is the distribution of the set of representations of a large integer by an integral quadratic form. Another harder problem is the study of the distribution of special points on Shimura varieties. In a different direction (linked with quantum chaos), the study of the concentration of Laplacian (Maass) eigenforms or of sections of holomorphic bundles is related to similar problems. Given X such a space and G>L the underlying algebraic group and its corresponding lattice L, the above questions boil down to studying the distribution of H-orbits x.H (or more generally H-invariant measures)on the quotient L\G for some subgroups H. This question may be studied different methods: Harmonic Analysis (HA): given a function f on L\G one studies the period integral of f along x.H. This may be done by automorphic methods. In favorable circumstances, the above periods are related to L-functions which one may hope to treat by methods from analytic number theory (the subconvexity problem). Ergodic Theory (ET): one studies the properties of weak*-limits of the measures supported by x.H using rigidity techniques: depending on the nature of H, one might use either rigidity of unipotent actions or the more recent rigidity results for torus actions in rank >1. In fact, HA and ET are intertwined and complementary : the use of ET in this context require a substantial input from number theory and HA, while ET lead to a soft understanding of several features of HA. In addition, the Langlands correspondence principle make it possible to pass from one group G to another. Based on earlier experience, our goal is to develop these interactions systematically and to develop new approaches to outstanding arithmetic problems :eg. the subconvexity problem or the Andre/Oort conjecture.
Max ERC Funding
866 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2008-12-01, End date: 2013-11-30
Project acronym ERERE
Project Between Restoration and Revolution, National Constitutions and Global Law: an Alternative View on the European Century 1815-1914
Researcher (PI) Bo Stråth
Host Institution (HI) HELSINGIN YLIOPISTO
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH2, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary The point of departure of this project is that a good part of the present deficit of legitimacy of European institutions emerges from a deeply ahistoric view of Europe s past. Consequently, there is an urgent need for a more realistic history that rejects any teleological understanding of Europe as a self-propelling project on steady march towards a predetermined goal. The fragility of European peace and progress needs to be highlighted. The theoretical foundation of Europe in teleological modernisation and globalisation theories has lead to a-historical understandings of Europe s past that disturb our ability to plan for its future. Our realistic outline of Europe s past focuses on the century 1815-1914, which was the pre-war historical ground on which the peace of 1945 and our present conception of Europe were built. It testifies at least as much to conflict and fragility as to progress. The century is traversed by a series of tensions in the political, cultural, social, economic and legal fields and struggles between the protagonists of different conceptions of European modernity. The legal and political basis for a new European order established in the Vienna Treaty, called the European concert, opened an era that lasted until 1914 in which wars in Europe decreased, whereas the number of civil wars increased and the Revolution came to no end. The tensions were articulated in different geopolitical strategies, constitutional conceptions, prescriptions for economic efficiency and claims for social protection, and alternating views of the meaning of Europe. In one way or the other, they all dealt with the interactive dynamics between politics and law, nationally as well as internationally. These interactive dynamics were also visible in the permanent movement between search for and expectations of stability and experiences of fragility. The aim is to explore the tensions in deep detail and on that basis build an alternative historical view on Europe.
Summary
The point of departure of this project is that a good part of the present deficit of legitimacy of European institutions emerges from a deeply ahistoric view of Europe s past. Consequently, there is an urgent need for a more realistic history that rejects any teleological understanding of Europe as a self-propelling project on steady march towards a predetermined goal. The fragility of European peace and progress needs to be highlighted. The theoretical foundation of Europe in teleological modernisation and globalisation theories has lead to a-historical understandings of Europe s past that disturb our ability to plan for its future. Our realistic outline of Europe s past focuses on the century 1815-1914, which was the pre-war historical ground on which the peace of 1945 and our present conception of Europe were built. It testifies at least as much to conflict and fragility as to progress. The century is traversed by a series of tensions in the political, cultural, social, economic and legal fields and struggles between the protagonists of different conceptions of European modernity. The legal and political basis for a new European order established in the Vienna Treaty, called the European concert, opened an era that lasted until 1914 in which wars in Europe decreased, whereas the number of civil wars increased and the Revolution came to no end. The tensions were articulated in different geopolitical strategies, constitutional conceptions, prescriptions for economic efficiency and claims for social protection, and alternating views of the meaning of Europe. In one way or the other, they all dealt with the interactive dynamics between politics and law, nationally as well as internationally. These interactive dynamics were also visible in the permanent movement between search for and expectations of stability and experiences of fragility. The aim is to explore the tensions in deep detail and on that basis build an alternative historical view on Europe.
Max ERC Funding
2 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-09-01, End date: 2014-08-31
Project acronym EURECIA
Project Understanding and Assessing the Impact and Outcomes of the ERC Funding Schemes
Host Institution (HI) THE UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER
Call Details Support Actions (SA), ERC-2008-Support
Summary Our objective is to develop and apply a novel methodology to understand better EU research system dynamics and the European Research Council’s activities by assessing its funding schemes’ impact and outcomes. We will report on robustly measured, properly attributed impacts for: researchers (starting/advanced); the organisation of research; and science governance (national/transnational funding agencies, science policies). We have conceptualised how research communities, organisations and funders operate. Our robust, flexible methodology assumes to register impact by measurement of at least two time points and gives serious consideration to attribution issues. Our team members have international reputations in science studies, research intermediaries, science governance, organisational analysis, and methodology. We aim to: develop a framework to analyse ERC funding scheme impact(s) and interactions with existing governance regimes; develop a method to identify and attribute ERC impacts; apply this method (to test it and to collect Phase 1 data on a) researchers b) research organisations c) research funding organisations and d) the wider national/transnational science governance context); propose methodologies for discrete (panel) to assess progress towards the ERC’s desired/expected outcomes and impact; ensure our framework has a statement (and understanding) of ‘added value’; and aid ERC’s strategy (including scrutinising its objectives) in consultation with key stakeholders. Our research activities are: a ‘starting independent researchers’ survey; ‘starting independent researchers’/‘advanced investigators’ studies; host research organisation case studies; national research council (or equivalent) case studies; and ERC and EU funding landscape review. Our 9 WPs provide for in-built interactions between activities.
Summary
Our objective is to develop and apply a novel methodology to understand better EU research system dynamics and the European Research Council’s activities by assessing its funding schemes’ impact and outcomes. We will report on robustly measured, properly attributed impacts for: researchers (starting/advanced); the organisation of research; and science governance (national/transnational funding agencies, science policies). We have conceptualised how research communities, organisations and funders operate. Our robust, flexible methodology assumes to register impact by measurement of at least two time points and gives serious consideration to attribution issues. Our team members have international reputations in science studies, research intermediaries, science governance, organisational analysis, and methodology. We aim to: develop a framework to analyse ERC funding scheme impact(s) and interactions with existing governance regimes; develop a method to identify and attribute ERC impacts; apply this method (to test it and to collect Phase 1 data on a) researchers b) research organisations c) research funding organisations and d) the wider national/transnational science governance context); propose methodologies for discrete (panel) to assess progress towards the ERC’s desired/expected outcomes and impact; ensure our framework has a statement (and understanding) of ‘added value’; and aid ERC’s strategy (including scrutinising its objectives) in consultation with key stakeholders. Our research activities are: a ‘starting independent researchers’ survey; ‘starting independent researchers’/‘advanced investigators’ studies; host research organisation case studies; national research council (or equivalent) case studies; and ERC and EU funding landscape review. Our 9 WPs provide for in-built interactions between activities.
Max ERC Funding
479 907 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-02-01, End date: 2012-04-30
Project acronym EUROPUBLICISLAM
Project Islam in the Making of a European Public Sphere
Researcher (PI) Nilufer Gole
Host Institution (HI) ECOLE DES HAUTES ETUDES EN SCIENCES SOCIALES
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH5, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary During the last three decades, Islam has gained visibility in European public spheres through new religious symbols, but as well as new public figures, men and women, pious and secular who carry Islam in European public life. Islamic entry in the public sphere, and the claims for religious visibility provoke a series of debates on gender equality, freedom of expression and cultural (civilisational) differences in European publics. EUROPUBLICISLAM sets itself the intellectual research agenda of bringing together different fields of knowledge and analysis of the transformative forces that appear in the contemporary meeting of Islam and Europe. It proposes to develop an innovative understanding of the sporadic and at times violent ways in which Islam intervenes in the making of the European public sphere. EUROPUBLICISLAM engages with the European scholarly agenda on migration, the construction of a European public sphere, and Islam. It aims at shifting the contemporary theorization of Islam in Europe away from the integration and security paradigms, and towards a new theory of dynamics of interaction and mutual change. A new research field is marked out in combining and transforming the contemporary theorizations of European public sphere and European Islam. EUROPUBLICISLAM proposes to study religious symbols, artistic cultural productions and public figures affecting the everyday politics of cultural discord. It aims to re-conceptualize the place of Islam in the making of a European public sphere. An innovative methodology is proposed to study the constellations , the assemblages that bring together cultural differences in proximity and in confrontation across national public spheres, following a transnational dynamics. EUROPUBLICISLAM will thus contribute to the production of innovative research on the making and imaging a European public sphere where transformative cultural and aesthetic mixes and thus political pluralism are taking place.
Summary
During the last three decades, Islam has gained visibility in European public spheres through new religious symbols, but as well as new public figures, men and women, pious and secular who carry Islam in European public life. Islamic entry in the public sphere, and the claims for religious visibility provoke a series of debates on gender equality, freedom of expression and cultural (civilisational) differences in European publics. EUROPUBLICISLAM sets itself the intellectual research agenda of bringing together different fields of knowledge and analysis of the transformative forces that appear in the contemporary meeting of Islam and Europe. It proposes to develop an innovative understanding of the sporadic and at times violent ways in which Islam intervenes in the making of the European public sphere. EUROPUBLICISLAM engages with the European scholarly agenda on migration, the construction of a European public sphere, and Islam. It aims at shifting the contemporary theorization of Islam in Europe away from the integration and security paradigms, and towards a new theory of dynamics of interaction and mutual change. A new research field is marked out in combining and transforming the contemporary theorizations of European public sphere and European Islam. EUROPUBLICISLAM proposes to study religious symbols, artistic cultural productions and public figures affecting the everyday politics of cultural discord. It aims to re-conceptualize the place of Islam in the making of a European public sphere. An innovative methodology is proposed to study the constellations , the assemblages that bring together cultural differences in proximity and in confrontation across national public spheres, following a transnational dynamics. EUROPUBLICISLAM will thus contribute to the production of innovative research on the making and imaging a European public sphere where transformative cultural and aesthetic mixes and thus political pluralism are taking place.
Max ERC Funding
1 414 645 €
Duration
Start date: 2008-12-01, End date: 2013-03-31
Project acronym EVOCULTURE
Project The Evolution of Culture
Researcher (PI) Kevin Neville Laland
Host Institution (HI) THE UNIVERSITY COURT OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ST ANDREWS
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS8, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary The capacity for culture is clearly a critical factor underlying the success of our species, but how and why did it evolve? What are the selection pressures that favoured the evolution of cultural capabilities (e.g. social learning, innovation, teaching), and how has selection fashioned these to operate efficiently? The study of such abilities is central to a broad range of disciplines, and significant progress in the scientific understanding of their origin and operation will ripple out to exert considerable influence, both within and outside academia. This project utilises a broad but integrated package of highly innovative empirical and theoretical techniques, including the development of novel analytical tools that allow behavioural researchers to identify social learning and predict the diffusion of innovations, application of potentially revolutionary statistical methods for inferring causal influences on the evolution of brain and culture from correlational data, and a new empirical system providing an unparalleled opportunity to investigate the evolution and biological basis of social learning. I will also organize international competitions to identify effective social learning rules ( tournaments ), in which entrants each propose learning strategies that are pitted against each other in computer simulation, and the most effective wins a prize. Collectively, the projects offer a major step forward in our understanding of human evolution, adaptation and culture and will stimulate considerable interdisciplinary exchange.
Summary
The capacity for culture is clearly a critical factor underlying the success of our species, but how and why did it evolve? What are the selection pressures that favoured the evolution of cultural capabilities (e.g. social learning, innovation, teaching), and how has selection fashioned these to operate efficiently? The study of such abilities is central to a broad range of disciplines, and significant progress in the scientific understanding of their origin and operation will ripple out to exert considerable influence, both within and outside academia. This project utilises a broad but integrated package of highly innovative empirical and theoretical techniques, including the development of novel analytical tools that allow behavioural researchers to identify social learning and predict the diffusion of innovations, application of potentially revolutionary statistical methods for inferring causal influences on the evolution of brain and culture from correlational data, and a new empirical system providing an unparalleled opportunity to investigate the evolution and biological basis of social learning. I will also organize international competitions to identify effective social learning rules ( tournaments ), in which entrants each propose learning strategies that are pitted against each other in computer simulation, and the most effective wins a prize. Collectively, the projects offer a major step forward in our understanding of human evolution, adaptation and culture and will stimulate considerable interdisciplinary exchange.
Max ERC Funding
2 128 195 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-04-01, End date: 2015-03-31
Project acronym EXPANDERS
Project Expander Graphs in Pure and Applied Mathematics
Researcher (PI) Alexander Lubotzky
Host Institution (HI) THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY OF JERUSALEM
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE1, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary Expander graphs are finite graphs which play a fundamental role in many areas of computer science such as: communication networks, algorithms and more. Several areas of deep mathematics have been used in order to give explicit constructions of such graphs e.g. Kazhdan property (T) from representation theory of semisimple Lie groups, Ramanujan conjecture from the theory of automorphic forms and more. In recent years, computer science has started to pay its debt to mathematics: expander graphs are playing an increasing role in several areas of pure mathematics. The goal of the current research plan is to deepen these connections in both directions with special emphasis of the more recent and surprising application of expanders to group theory, the geometry of 3-manifolds and number theory.
Summary
Expander graphs are finite graphs which play a fundamental role in many areas of computer science such as: communication networks, algorithms and more. Several areas of deep mathematics have been used in order to give explicit constructions of such graphs e.g. Kazhdan property (T) from representation theory of semisimple Lie groups, Ramanujan conjecture from the theory of automorphic forms and more. In recent years, computer science has started to pay its debt to mathematics: expander graphs are playing an increasing role in several areas of pure mathematics. The goal of the current research plan is to deepen these connections in both directions with special emphasis of the more recent and surprising application of expanders to group theory, the geometry of 3-manifolds and number theory.
Max ERC Funding
1 082 504 €
Duration
Start date: 2008-10-01, End date: 2014-09-30
Project acronym FAILFLOW
Project Failure and Fluid Flow in Porous Quasibrittle Materials
Researcher (PI) Gilles Pijaudier-Cabot
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITE DE PAU ET DES PAYS DE L'ADOUR
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE8, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary This project focuses on fluid flow in porous materials with evolving microstructure in the context of civil engineering applications and geomechanics. When the distribution of cracks and the distribution of pore size evolve in concrete and rocks, the influence on the permeability in the case of a single or a multiphase fluid flow needs some in depth investigation. A recent review of state of the art in modelling progressive mechanical breakdown and associated fluid flow in heterogeneous rock shows that little is known on the coupled effects between micro cracking and the intrinsic permeability of a solid phase. The present project intends to tackle this relationship between mechanical breakdown and associated fluid flow in the context of poromechanics extended to non local modelling. In particular, we will investigate how the internal length which plays a pivotal role at the inception and propagation of material failure may interact with the permeability, what enhanced Darcy-like relationship might be derived in order to apprehend such effects and how to model fluid flow in tight porous materials. The models will be extended to complex and multicomponent systems reproducing as closely as possible the behaviour of real fluids in order to understand and to describe the thermodynamical behaviour due to confinement such as modification of phase transitions and capillary condensation. The principal investigator of this project is a specialist in the field of continuum damage mechanics, failure due to strain and damage localisation. He has been the founder and among the major promoters of non local damage modelling, which is today a state of the art model in computational structural failure analyses. After a decade of research on durability problems for which he was elected at Institut Universitaire de France, his research interests recently turned toward petroleum engineering, the focus of the research team he joined two years ago at université de Pau.
Summary
This project focuses on fluid flow in porous materials with evolving microstructure in the context of civil engineering applications and geomechanics. When the distribution of cracks and the distribution of pore size evolve in concrete and rocks, the influence on the permeability in the case of a single or a multiphase fluid flow needs some in depth investigation. A recent review of state of the art in modelling progressive mechanical breakdown and associated fluid flow in heterogeneous rock shows that little is known on the coupled effects between micro cracking and the intrinsic permeability of a solid phase. The present project intends to tackle this relationship between mechanical breakdown and associated fluid flow in the context of poromechanics extended to non local modelling. In particular, we will investigate how the internal length which plays a pivotal role at the inception and propagation of material failure may interact with the permeability, what enhanced Darcy-like relationship might be derived in order to apprehend such effects and how to model fluid flow in tight porous materials. The models will be extended to complex and multicomponent systems reproducing as closely as possible the behaviour of real fluids in order to understand and to describe the thermodynamical behaviour due to confinement such as modification of phase transitions and capillary condensation. The principal investigator of this project is a specialist in the field of continuum damage mechanics, failure due to strain and damage localisation. He has been the founder and among the major promoters of non local damage modelling, which is today a state of the art model in computational structural failure analyses. After a decade of research on durability problems for which he was elected at Institut Universitaire de France, his research interests recently turned toward petroleum engineering, the focus of the research team he joined two years ago at université de Pau.
Max ERC Funding
1 490 200 €
Duration
Start date: 2008-12-01, End date: 2013-11-30
Project acronym FERLODIM
Project Atomic Fermi Gases in Lower Dimensions
Researcher (PI) Christophe Salomon
Host Institution (HI) CENTRE NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE CNRS
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE2, ERC-2008-AdG
Summary The complex interplay between Coulomb repulsion and Fermi statistics in two dimensional systems is responsible for some of the most dramatic phenomena encountered in solid state physics (High critical temperature superfluidity, Fractional Quantum Hall Effect,..). However, despite decades of efforts, many questions regarding these systems are still unsolved. In FERLODIM, we plan to take advantage of recent progress in ultracold gases, to simulate several fundamental Hamiltonians describing these many-body systems in 1 and 2 dimensions. We will realize two ultra-cold atom machines allowing for a full characterization of the many-body wave function of an ensemble of interacting fermions in periodic potentials, called optical lattices. Our experiments will rely on a high resolution imaging system allowing both for single atom detection and the possibility of tailoring optical potentials of arbitrary shape and geometry. This unique design will allow us to address a variety of physical situations, depending on the geometry of the light induced potentials. One-dimensional problems will be addressed, from spin chains to Luttinger liquids. In pure two dimensional configurations, we will investigate the link between the repulsive Hubbard model, superfluidity and the Mott insulator transition, as well as frustration effects in periodic potentials. Finally we will explore the physics of interacting fermions under rotation in the lowest Landau level, and the connection with fractional Quantum Hall systems.
Summary
The complex interplay between Coulomb repulsion and Fermi statistics in two dimensional systems is responsible for some of the most dramatic phenomena encountered in solid state physics (High critical temperature superfluidity, Fractional Quantum Hall Effect,..). However, despite decades of efforts, many questions regarding these systems are still unsolved. In FERLODIM, we plan to take advantage of recent progress in ultracold gases, to simulate several fundamental Hamiltonians describing these many-body systems in 1 and 2 dimensions. We will realize two ultra-cold atom machines allowing for a full characterization of the many-body wave function of an ensemble of interacting fermions in periodic potentials, called optical lattices. Our experiments will rely on a high resolution imaging system allowing both for single atom detection and the possibility of tailoring optical potentials of arbitrary shape and geometry. This unique design will allow us to address a variety of physical situations, depending on the geometry of the light induced potentials. One-dimensional problems will be addressed, from spin chains to Luttinger liquids. In pure two dimensional configurations, we will investigate the link between the repulsive Hubbard model, superfluidity and the Mott insulator transition, as well as frustration effects in periodic potentials. Finally we will explore the physics of interacting fermions under rotation in the lowest Landau level, and the connection with fractional Quantum Hall systems.
Max ERC Funding
2 050 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2009-01-01, End date: 2013-12-31
