Project acronym CAVITYQPD
Project Cavity quantum phonon dynamics
Researcher (PI) Mika Antero Sillanpaeae
Host Institution (HI) AALTO KORKEAKOULUSAATIO SR
Country Finland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), PE3, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary "Large bodies usually follow the classical equations of motion. Deviations from this can be called
macroscopic quantum behavior. These phenomena have been experimentally verified with cavity Quantum
Electro Dynamics (QED), trapped ions, and superconducting Josephson junction systems. Recently, evidence
was obtained that also moving objects can display such behavior. These objects are micromechanical
resonators (MR), which can measure tens of microns in size and are hence quite macroscopic. The degree of
freedom is their vibrations: phonons.
I propose experimental research in order to push quantum mechanics closer to the classical world than ever
before. I will try find quantum behavior in the most classical objects, that is, slowly moving bodies. I will use
MR's, accessed via electrical resonators. Part of it will be in analogy to the previously studied macroscopic
systems, but with photons replaced by phonons. The experiments are done in a cryogenic temperature mostly
in dilution refrigerator. The work will open up new perspectives on how nature works, and can have
technological implications.
The first basic setup is the coupling of MR to microwave cavity resonators. This is a direct analogy to
optomechanics, and can be called circuit optomechanics. The goals will be phonon state transfer via a cavity
bus, construction of squeezed states and of phonon-cavity entanglement. The second setup is to boost the
optomechanical coupling with a Josephson junction system, and reach the single-phonon strong-coupling for
the first time. The third setup is the coupling of MR to a Josephson junction artificial atom. Here we will
access the MR same way as the motion of a trapped ions is coupled to their internal transitions. In this setup,
I am proposing to construct exotic quantum states of motion, and finally entangle and transfer phonons over
mm-distance via cavity-coupled qubits. I believe within the project it is possible to perform rudimentary Bell
measurement with phonons."
Summary
"Large bodies usually follow the classical equations of motion. Deviations from this can be called
macroscopic quantum behavior. These phenomena have been experimentally verified with cavity Quantum
Electro Dynamics (QED), trapped ions, and superconducting Josephson junction systems. Recently, evidence
was obtained that also moving objects can display such behavior. These objects are micromechanical
resonators (MR), which can measure tens of microns in size and are hence quite macroscopic. The degree of
freedom is their vibrations: phonons.
I propose experimental research in order to push quantum mechanics closer to the classical world than ever
before. I will try find quantum behavior in the most classical objects, that is, slowly moving bodies. I will use
MR's, accessed via electrical resonators. Part of it will be in analogy to the previously studied macroscopic
systems, but with photons replaced by phonons. The experiments are done in a cryogenic temperature mostly
in dilution refrigerator. The work will open up new perspectives on how nature works, and can have
technological implications.
The first basic setup is the coupling of MR to microwave cavity resonators. This is a direct analogy to
optomechanics, and can be called circuit optomechanics. The goals will be phonon state transfer via a cavity
bus, construction of squeezed states and of phonon-cavity entanglement. The second setup is to boost the
optomechanical coupling with a Josephson junction system, and reach the single-phonon strong-coupling for
the first time. The third setup is the coupling of MR to a Josephson junction artificial atom. Here we will
access the MR same way as the motion of a trapped ions is coupled to their internal transitions. In this setup,
I am proposing to construct exotic quantum states of motion, and finally entangle and transfer phonons over
mm-distance via cavity-coupled qubits. I believe within the project it is possible to perform rudimentary Bell
measurement with phonons."
Max ERC Funding
2 004 283 €
Duration
Start date: 2015-01-01, End date: 2019-12-31
Project acronym CrowdLand
Project Harnessing the power of crowdsourcing to improve land cover and land-use information
Researcher (PI) Steffen Martin Fritz
Host Institution (HI) INTERNATIONALES INSTITUT FUER ANGEWANDTE SYSTEMANALYSE
Country Austria
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH3, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary Information about land cover, land use and the change over time is used for a wide range of applications such as nature protection and biodiversity, forest and water management, urban and transport planning, natural hazard prevention and mitigation, agricultural policies and monitoring climate change. Furthermore, high quality spatially explicit information on land cover change is an essential input variable to land use change modelling, which is increasingly being used to better understand the potential impact of certain policies. The amount of observed land cover change also serves as an important indicator of how well different regional, national and European policies have been implemented.
However, outside Europe and outside the developed world in particular, information on land cover and land cover change in poorer countries is hardly available and no national or regional dense sample based monitoring approaches such as LUCAS exists which deliver sufficiently accurate land cover and land cover change information. Moreover in particular in developing countries, there is no or very little information on land-use and crop management. Only very limited data available from FAO and an incomplete coverage of sub-national statistics (e.g. IFPRI) are available.
This research project will assess the potential of using crowdsourcing to close these big data gaps in developing and developed countries with a number of case studies and different data collection methods. The CrowdLand project will be carried out in two very different environments, i.e. Austria and Kenya.The overall research objectives of this project are to 1) test the potential of using social gaming to collect land use information 2) test the potential of using mobile money to collect data in developing countries 3) understand the data quality collected via crowdsourcing 4) apply advanced methods to filter crowdsourced data in order to attain improved accuracy.
Summary
Information about land cover, land use and the change over time is used for a wide range of applications such as nature protection and biodiversity, forest and water management, urban and transport planning, natural hazard prevention and mitigation, agricultural policies and monitoring climate change. Furthermore, high quality spatially explicit information on land cover change is an essential input variable to land use change modelling, which is increasingly being used to better understand the potential impact of certain policies. The amount of observed land cover change also serves as an important indicator of how well different regional, national and European policies have been implemented.
However, outside Europe and outside the developed world in particular, information on land cover and land cover change in poorer countries is hardly available and no national or regional dense sample based monitoring approaches such as LUCAS exists which deliver sufficiently accurate land cover and land cover change information. Moreover in particular in developing countries, there is no or very little information on land-use and crop management. Only very limited data available from FAO and an incomplete coverage of sub-national statistics (e.g. IFPRI) are available.
This research project will assess the potential of using crowdsourcing to close these big data gaps in developing and developed countries with a number of case studies and different data collection methods. The CrowdLand project will be carried out in two very different environments, i.e. Austria and Kenya.The overall research objectives of this project are to 1) test the potential of using social gaming to collect land use information 2) test the potential of using mobile money to collect data in developing countries 3) understand the data quality collected via crowdsourcing 4) apply advanced methods to filter crowdsourced data in order to attain improved accuracy.
Max ERC Funding
1 397 200 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-04-01, End date: 2020-03-31
Project acronym HISTORICALDATABASE
Project The Swedish historical database project
Researcher (PI) Per Einar Pettersson Lidbom
Host Institution (HI) STOCKHOLMS UNIVERSITET
Country Sweden
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH1, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary The Swedish historical data base project will put together and make publicly available highly disaggregated data on roughly a yearly basis for about 2500 Swedish administrative districts over the period 1749-1952. The finished data set will consist of comprehensive and detailed information on economic activity, political characteristics, vital statistics, occupational structure, education, social and agriculture statistics and infrastructure investments (e.g., railway construction). The comprehensiveness and complete coverage of historical data at the local administrative level is what makes this project unique from an international perspective. Since Sweden has the longest continuous and reliable data series on population and vital statistics in the world,starting as early as 1749, makes it possible to construct a comprehensive panel data set over all 2,500 Swedish local administrative units covering a 200 year period. Consequently, the total number of observations for each variable can be as large as 0.5 million (N=2500×T=200). With this type of rich and disaggregated historical data it become possible to get a better understanding of economic growth, structural transformation and economic development. Also, within-country variation allows for more satisfying empirical identification strategies such as instrumental variables, regression discontinuities or difference-in-differences estimation. As a case in point, I have demonstrated the potential usefulness of the Swedish historical data by addressing the question of whether redistribution of resources towards the poor differs between types of democracy after democratization. The identification strategy is based on a regression-discontinuity design where the type of democracy partly is a function of population size. This paper is currently “revise and resubmit” 2nd round at Econometrica. After collecting the new data, we intend to studying a number of questions related to economic development and growth.
Summary
The Swedish historical data base project will put together and make publicly available highly disaggregated data on roughly a yearly basis for about 2500 Swedish administrative districts over the period 1749-1952. The finished data set will consist of comprehensive and detailed information on economic activity, political characteristics, vital statistics, occupational structure, education, social and agriculture statistics and infrastructure investments (e.g., railway construction). The comprehensiveness and complete coverage of historical data at the local administrative level is what makes this project unique from an international perspective. Since Sweden has the longest continuous and reliable data series on population and vital statistics in the world,starting as early as 1749, makes it possible to construct a comprehensive panel data set over all 2,500 Swedish local administrative units covering a 200 year period. Consequently, the total number of observations for each variable can be as large as 0.5 million (N=2500×T=200). With this type of rich and disaggregated historical data it become possible to get a better understanding of economic growth, structural transformation and economic development. Also, within-country variation allows for more satisfying empirical identification strategies such as instrumental variables, regression discontinuities or difference-in-differences estimation. As a case in point, I have demonstrated the potential usefulness of the Swedish historical data by addressing the question of whether redistribution of resources towards the poor differs between types of democracy after democratization. The identification strategy is based on a regression-discontinuity design where the type of democracy partly is a function of population size. This paper is currently “revise and resubmit” 2nd round at Econometrica. After collecting the new data, we intend to studying a number of questions related to economic development and growth.
Max ERC Funding
1 200 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-04-01, End date: 2019-03-31
Project acronym Micro-RIP
Project Functional analysis of uncultivated microbes using radioisotope probing
Researcher (PI) Marja Tiirola
Host Institution (HI) JYVASKYLAN YLIOPISTO
Country Finland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), LS9, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary Environmental microbiology calls for more advanced research methods for resolving microbial functions and regulation in environmental samples. The proposed project introduces an unconventional technology, radioisotope probing (RIP). This approach is based on the invention of radioactivity measurement via pH analysis. When the analysis of radioactivity is now combined with semiconductor sequencing, the technology offers two-dimensional analysis of millions of molecules on a sequencing chip. Hybridization of experimentally labeled RNA and radioactivity measurement would provide a second dimension for the sequencing analysis, facilitating various new applications in environmental microbiology, as well as potential applications for different needs of biochemistry and medical research.
The project aims to develop and test three novel RIP applications to analyse functional diversity, transcriptional regulation and mRNA processing in microbial communities, especially focusing on prokaryotic species. The applications are utilized for studying regulation of microbial decomposition, which is the key question, when predicting the effects of climate change. It is hypothesized that more frequent flood, droughts and redox fluctuations can prime the biodegradation of otherwise stable boreal carbon pools.
Functional diversity of microbes utilizing model and complex substrates is studied in terrestrial and aquatic environments using time-series samplings and labeling experiments. Prevailing mechanisms in the cellular regulation in microbial communities are investigated using community-level methylation and regulatory RNA patterns. The effect of external stressor (toxicants and changing oxygen regimes) on these patterns is analyzed using sequencing and RIP to reveal the mechanisms regulating the processes beyond mere community composition.
Summary
Environmental microbiology calls for more advanced research methods for resolving microbial functions and regulation in environmental samples. The proposed project introduces an unconventional technology, radioisotope probing (RIP). This approach is based on the invention of radioactivity measurement via pH analysis. When the analysis of radioactivity is now combined with semiconductor sequencing, the technology offers two-dimensional analysis of millions of molecules on a sequencing chip. Hybridization of experimentally labeled RNA and radioactivity measurement would provide a second dimension for the sequencing analysis, facilitating various new applications in environmental microbiology, as well as potential applications for different needs of biochemistry and medical research.
The project aims to develop and test three novel RIP applications to analyse functional diversity, transcriptional regulation and mRNA processing in microbial communities, especially focusing on prokaryotic species. The applications are utilized for studying regulation of microbial decomposition, which is the key question, when predicting the effects of climate change. It is hypothesized that more frequent flood, droughts and redox fluctuations can prime the biodegradation of otherwise stable boreal carbon pools.
Functional diversity of microbes utilizing model and complex substrates is studied in terrestrial and aquatic environments using time-series samplings and labeling experiments. Prevailing mechanisms in the cellular regulation in microbial communities are investigated using community-level methylation and regulatory RNA patterns. The effect of external stressor (toxicants and changing oxygen regimes) on these patterns is analyzed using sequencing and RIP to reveal the mechanisms regulating the processes beyond mere community composition.
Max ERC Funding
1 997 913 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-03-01, End date: 2019-02-28
Project acronym TRITOS
Project TRansItions and Turbulence Of complex Suspensions
Researcher (PI) Luca Brandt
Host Institution (HI) KUNGLIGA TEKNISKA HOEGSKOLAN
Country Sweden
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), PE8, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary The aim of this project is to forge a physical understanding of the transitions and of the turbulent flow of semi-dilute/dense non-colloidal suspensions, for different particle features and suspending fluids.
It is estimated that 10% of the world energy consumption is due to the transport and handling of granular materials of which particle suspensions are an important part. A deep understanding of the mechanisms underlying the flow of particle suspensions, the transition to turbulence and the turbulence characteristics is crucial for many important practical applications involving engineered complex fluids, such as pastes and paper pulp. A better prediction and control of the flow of suspensions will therefore have a huge impact.
Complex fluids are multiscale by nature where the physics at the microscale affects the macroscopic behaviour of the flow and vice versa giving rise to surprising and spectacular phenomena as well as making this one of the most important practical problem still to solve. Investigating the mechanisms by which the system microstructure determines the macroscopic flow properties and vice versa will not only give valuable insights into the nature of flowing suspensions but also will also lead to new ways to model and control it. Future generations of engineering CFD tools will have to contain models for complex suspensions. The fundamental approach proposed here, combined with challenging scientific and engineering examples backed up by experimental evidence, will make this possible and demonstrate it to a wider engineering community. The proposed project is based on highly accurate simulations of multiphase flow systems and state-of-the-art experiments. Such a holistic approach will enable us to understand the underlying mechanisms of instabilities and suspension turbulence and to develop accurate criteria for their prediction far in advance of what we could achieve with either approach separately.
Summary
The aim of this project is to forge a physical understanding of the transitions and of the turbulent flow of semi-dilute/dense non-colloidal suspensions, for different particle features and suspending fluids.
It is estimated that 10% of the world energy consumption is due to the transport and handling of granular materials of which particle suspensions are an important part. A deep understanding of the mechanisms underlying the flow of particle suspensions, the transition to turbulence and the turbulence characteristics is crucial for many important practical applications involving engineered complex fluids, such as pastes and paper pulp. A better prediction and control of the flow of suspensions will therefore have a huge impact.
Complex fluids are multiscale by nature where the physics at the microscale affects the macroscopic behaviour of the flow and vice versa giving rise to surprising and spectacular phenomena as well as making this one of the most important practical problem still to solve. Investigating the mechanisms by which the system microstructure determines the macroscopic flow properties and vice versa will not only give valuable insights into the nature of flowing suspensions but also will also lead to new ways to model and control it. Future generations of engineering CFD tools will have to contain models for complex suspensions. The fundamental approach proposed here, combined with challenging scientific and engineering examples backed up by experimental evidence, will make this possible and demonstrate it to a wider engineering community. The proposed project is based on highly accurate simulations of multiphase flow systems and state-of-the-art experiments. Such a holistic approach will enable us to understand the underlying mechanisms of instabilities and suspension turbulence and to develop accurate criteria for their prediction far in advance of what we could achieve with either approach separately.
Max ERC Funding
1 998 350 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-04-01, End date: 2019-03-31
