ERC FUNDED PROJECTS

Pharaonic Egypt is commonly known for its pyramids and tomb treasures. The present knowledge of Egyptian everyday life and social structures derives mostly from mortuary records associated with the upper classes, whereas traces of ordinary life from domestic sites are generally disregarded. Settlement archaeology in Egypt and Nubia (Ancient North Sudan) is still in its infancy; it is timely to strenghten this field. Responsible for the pottery at three major settlement sites (Abydos and Elephantine in Egypt; Sai Island in Sudan), the PI is in a unique position to co-ordinate a research project on settlement patterns in Northeast Africa of the 2nd millennium BC based on the detailed analysis of material remains. The selected case studies situated across ancient and modern borders and of diverse environmental and cultural preconditions, show very similar archaeological remains. Up to now, no attempt has been made to explain this situation in detail. The focus of the project is the well-preserved, only partially explored site of Sai Island, seemingly an Egyptian microcosm in New Kingdom Upper Nubia. Little time is left to conduct the requisite large-scale archaeology as Sai is endangered by the planned high dam of Dal. With the application of microarchaeology we will introduce an approach that is new in Egyptian settlement archaeology. Our interdisciplinary research will result in novel insights into (a) multifaceted lives on Sai at a micro-spatial level and (b) domestic life in 2nd millennium BC Egypt and Nubia from a macroscopic view. The present understanding of the political situation in Upper Nubia during the New Kingdom as based on written records will be significantly enlarged by the envisaged approach. Furthermore, in reconstructing Sai Island as “home away from home”, the project presents a showcase study of what we can learn about acculturation and adaptation from ancient cultures, in this case from the coexistence of Egyptians and Nubians

1 497 460 €

Start date: 2012-12-01, End date: 2018-04-30

The active target and time projection chamber (ACTAR TPC) is a novel gas-filled detection system that will permit new studies into the structure and decays of the most exotic nuclei. The use of a gas volume that acts as a sensitive detection medium and as the reaction target itself (an “active target”) offers considerable advantages over traditional nuclear physics detectors and techniques. In high-energy physics, TPC detectors have found profitable applications but their use in nuclear physics has been limited. With the ACTAR TPC design, individual detection pad sizes of 2 mm are the smallest ever attempted in either discipline but is a requirement for high-efficiency and high-resolution nuclear spectroscopy. The corresponding large number of electronic channels (16000 from a surface of only 25×25 cm) requires new developments in high-density electronics and data-acquisition systems that are not yet available in the nuclear physics domain. New experiments in regions of the nuclear chart that cannot be presently contemplated will become feasible with ACTAR TPC.

1 290 000 €

Start date: 2014-02-01, End date: 2019-01-31

"How are actions initiated by the human brain when there is no external sensory cue or other immediate imperative? How do subtle ongoing interactions within the brain and between the brain, body, and sensory context influence the spontaneous initiation of action? How should we approach the problem of trying to identify the neural events that cause spontaneous voluntary action? Much is understood about how the brain decides between competing alternatives, leading to different behavioral responses. But far less is known about how the brain decides ""when"" to perform an action, or ""whether"" to perform an action in the first place, especially in a context where there is no sensory cue to act such as during foraging. This project seeks to open a new chapter in the study of spontaneous voluntary action building on a novel hypothesis recently introduced by the applicant (Schurger et al, PNAS 2012) concerning the role of ongoing neural activity in action initiation. We introduce brain-behavior forecasting, the converse of movement-locked averaging, as an approach to identifying the neurodynamic states that commit the motor system to performing an action ""now"", and will apply it in the context of information foraging. Spontaneous action remains a profound mystery in the brain basis of behavior, in humans and other animals, and is also central to the problem of asynchronous intention-detection in brain-computer interfaces (BCIs). A BCI must not only interpret what the user intends, but also must detect ""when"" the user intends to act, and not respond otherwise. This remains the biggest challenge in the development of high-performance BCIs, whether invasive or non-invasive. This project will take a systematic and collaborative approach to the study of spontaneous self-initiated action, incorporating computational modeling, neuroimaging, and machine learning techniques towards a deeper understanding of voluntary behavior and the robust asynchronous detection of decisions-to-act."

1 338 130 €

Start date: 2015-10-01, End date: 2020-09-30

A significant advance in the field of development has been the appreciation that radial glial cells are progenitors and give birth to neurons in the brain. In order to advance this exciting area of biology, we need approaches that combine structural and functional studies of these cells. This is reflected by the emerging realisation that dynamic interactions involving radial glia may be critical for the regulation of their proliferative behaviour. It has been observed that radial glia experience transient elevations in intracellular Ca2+ but the nature of these signals, and the information that they convey, is not known. The inability to observe these cells in vivo and over the course of their development has also meant that basic questions remain unexplored. For instance, how does the behaviour of a radial glial cell at one point in development, influence the final identity of its progeny? I propose to build a research team that will capitalise upon methods we have developed for observing individual radial glia and their progeny in an intact vertebrate nervous system. The visual system of Xenopus Laevis tadpoles offers non-invasive optical access to the brain, making time-lapse imaging of single cells feasible over minutes and weeks. The system s anatomy lends itself to techniques that measure the activity of the cells in a functional sensory network. We will use this to examine signalling mechanisms in radial glia and how a radial glial cell s experience influences its proliferative behaviour and the types of neuron it generates. We will also examine the interactions that continue between a radial glial cell and its daughter neurons. Finally, we will explore the relationships that exist within neuronal progeny derived from a single radial glial cell.

1 284 808 €

Start date: 2010-02-01, End date: 2015-01-31