Project acronym DEVOCEAN
Project Impact of diatom evolution on the oceans
Researcher (PI) Daniel CONLEY
Host Institution (HI) LUNDS UNIVERSITET
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE10, ERC-2018-ADG
Summary Motivated by a series of recent discoveries, DEVOCEAN will provide the first comprehensive evaluation of the emergence of diatoms and their impact on the global biogeochemical cycle of silica, carbon and other nutrients that regulate ocean productivity and ultimately climate. I propose that the proliferation of phytoplankton that occurred after the Permian-Triassic extinction, in particular the diatoms, fundamentally influenced oceanic environments through the enhancement of carbon export to depth as part of the biological pump. Although molecular clocks suggest that diatoms evolved over 200 Ma ago, this result has been largely ignored because of the lack of diatoms in the geologic fossil record with most studies therefore focused on diversification during the Cenozoic where abundant diatom fossils are found. Much of the older fossil evidence has likely been destroyed by dissolution during diagenesis, subducted or is concealed deep within the Earth under many layers of rock. DEVOCEAN will provide evidence on diatom evolution and speciation in the geological record by examining formations representing locations in which diatoms are likely to have accumulated in ocean sediments. We will generate robust estimates of the timing and magnitude of dissolved Si drawdown following the origin of diatoms using the isotopic silicon composition of fossil sponge spicules and radiolarians. The project will also provide fundamental new insights into the timing of dissolved Si drawdown and other key events, which reorganized the distribution of carbon and nutrients in seawater, changing energy flows and productivity in the biological communities of the ancient oceans.
Summary
Motivated by a series of recent discoveries, DEVOCEAN will provide the first comprehensive evaluation of the emergence of diatoms and their impact on the global biogeochemical cycle of silica, carbon and other nutrients that regulate ocean productivity and ultimately climate. I propose that the proliferation of phytoplankton that occurred after the Permian-Triassic extinction, in particular the diatoms, fundamentally influenced oceanic environments through the enhancement of carbon export to depth as part of the biological pump. Although molecular clocks suggest that diatoms evolved over 200 Ma ago, this result has been largely ignored because of the lack of diatoms in the geologic fossil record with most studies therefore focused on diversification during the Cenozoic where abundant diatom fossils are found. Much of the older fossil evidence has likely been destroyed by dissolution during diagenesis, subducted or is concealed deep within the Earth under many layers of rock. DEVOCEAN will provide evidence on diatom evolution and speciation in the geological record by examining formations representing locations in which diatoms are likely to have accumulated in ocean sediments. We will generate robust estimates of the timing and magnitude of dissolved Si drawdown following the origin of diatoms using the isotopic silicon composition of fossil sponge spicules and radiolarians. The project will also provide fundamental new insights into the timing of dissolved Si drawdown and other key events, which reorganized the distribution of carbon and nutrients in seawater, changing energy flows and productivity in the biological communities of the ancient oceans.
Max ERC Funding
2 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2019-10-01, End date: 2024-09-30
Project acronym e-NeuroPharma
Project Electronic Neuropharmacology
Researcher (PI) Rolf Magnus BERGGREN
Host Institution (HI) LINKOPINGS UNIVERSITET
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE5, ERC-2018-ADG
Summary As the population ages, neurodegenerative diseases (ND) will have a devastating impact on individuals and society. Despite enormous research efforts there is still no cure for these diseases, only care! The origin of ND is hugely complex, spanning from the molecular level to systemic processes, causing malfunctioning of signalling in the central nervous system (CNS). This signalling includes the coupled processing of biochemical and electrical signals, however current approaches for symptomatic- and disease modifying treatments are all based on biochemical approaches, alone.
Organic bioelectronics has arisen as a promising technology providing signal translation, as sensors and modulators, across the biology-technology interface; especially, it has proven unique in neuronal applications. There is great opportunity with organic bioelectronics since it can complement biochemical pharmacology to enable a twinned electric-biochemical therapy for ND and neurological disorders. However, this technology is traditionally manufactured on stand-alone substrates. Even though organic bioelectronics has been manufactured on flexible and soft carriers in the past, current technology consume space and volume, that when applied to CNS, rule out close proximity and amalgamation between the bioelectronics technology and CNS components – features that are needed in order to reach high therapeutic efficacy.
e-NeuroPharma includes development of innovative organic bioelectronics, that can be in-vivo-manufactured within the brain. The overall aim is to evaluate and develop electrodes, delivery devices and sensors that enable a twinned biochemical-electric therapy approach to combat ND and other neurological disorders. e-NeuroPharma will focus on the development of materials that can cross the blood-brain-barrier, that self-organize and -polymerize along CNS components, and that record and regulate relevant electrical, electrochemical and physical parameters relevant to ND and disorders
Summary
As the population ages, neurodegenerative diseases (ND) will have a devastating impact on individuals and society. Despite enormous research efforts there is still no cure for these diseases, only care! The origin of ND is hugely complex, spanning from the molecular level to systemic processes, causing malfunctioning of signalling in the central nervous system (CNS). This signalling includes the coupled processing of biochemical and electrical signals, however current approaches for symptomatic- and disease modifying treatments are all based on biochemical approaches, alone.
Organic bioelectronics has arisen as a promising technology providing signal translation, as sensors and modulators, across the biology-technology interface; especially, it has proven unique in neuronal applications. There is great opportunity with organic bioelectronics since it can complement biochemical pharmacology to enable a twinned electric-biochemical therapy for ND and neurological disorders. However, this technology is traditionally manufactured on stand-alone substrates. Even though organic bioelectronics has been manufactured on flexible and soft carriers in the past, current technology consume space and volume, that when applied to CNS, rule out close proximity and amalgamation between the bioelectronics technology and CNS components – features that are needed in order to reach high therapeutic efficacy.
e-NeuroPharma includes development of innovative organic bioelectronics, that can be in-vivo-manufactured within the brain. The overall aim is to evaluate and develop electrodes, delivery devices and sensors that enable a twinned biochemical-electric therapy approach to combat ND and other neurological disorders. e-NeuroPharma will focus on the development of materials that can cross the blood-brain-barrier, that self-organize and -polymerize along CNS components, and that record and regulate relevant electrical, electrochemical and physical parameters relevant to ND and disorders
Max ERC Funding
3 237 335 €
Duration
Start date: 2019-09-01, End date: 2024-08-31
Project acronym GLOBEGOV
Project The Rise of Global Environmental Governance:A History of the Contemporary Human-Earth Relationship
Researcher (PI) Sverker SoeRLIN
Host Institution (HI) KUNGLIGA TEKNISKA HOEGSKOLAN
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH6, ERC-2017-ADG
Summary GLOBEGOVE is a historical study of humanity’s relation to planetary conditions and constraints and how it has become understood as a governance issue. The key argument is that Global Environmental Governance (GEG), which has arisen in response to this issue, is inseparable from the rise of a planetary Earth systems science and a knowledge-informed understanding of global change that has affected broad communities of practice. The overarching objective is to provide a fundamentally new perspective on GEG that challenges both previous linear, progressivist narratives through incremental institutional work and the way contemporary history is written and understood.
GLOBEGOVE will be implemented as an expressly global history along four Trajectories, which will ensure both transnational as well as transdisciplinary analysis of GEG as a major contemporary phenomenon.
Trajectory I: Formation articulates a proto-history of GEG after 1945 when the concept of ‘the environment’ in its new integrative meaning was established and a slow formation of policy ideas and institutions could start.
Trajectory II: The complicated turning of environmental research into governance investigates the relation between environmental science and environmental governance which GLOBEGOV examines as an open ended historical process. Why was it that high politics and diplomacy came in closer relations with environmental sciences?
Trajectory III: Alternative agencies – governance through business and civic society explores corporate responses, including self-regulation through the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility, to growing concerns about environmental degradation and pollution, and business-science relations.
Trajectory IV: Integrating Earth into History – scaling, mediating, remembering will turn to historiography itself and examine how concepts and ideas from the rising Earth system sciences have been influencing both GEG and the way we think historically about Earth and humanity.
Summary
GLOBEGOVE is a historical study of humanity’s relation to planetary conditions and constraints and how it has become understood as a governance issue. The key argument is that Global Environmental Governance (GEG), which has arisen in response to this issue, is inseparable from the rise of a planetary Earth systems science and a knowledge-informed understanding of global change that has affected broad communities of practice. The overarching objective is to provide a fundamentally new perspective on GEG that challenges both previous linear, progressivist narratives through incremental institutional work and the way contemporary history is written and understood.
GLOBEGOVE will be implemented as an expressly global history along four Trajectories, which will ensure both transnational as well as transdisciplinary analysis of GEG as a major contemporary phenomenon.
Trajectory I: Formation articulates a proto-history of GEG after 1945 when the concept of ‘the environment’ in its new integrative meaning was established and a slow formation of policy ideas and institutions could start.
Trajectory II: The complicated turning of environmental research into governance investigates the relation between environmental science and environmental governance which GLOBEGOV examines as an open ended historical process. Why was it that high politics and diplomacy came in closer relations with environmental sciences?
Trajectory III: Alternative agencies – governance through business and civic society explores corporate responses, including self-regulation through the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility, to growing concerns about environmental degradation and pollution, and business-science relations.
Trajectory IV: Integrating Earth into History – scaling, mediating, remembering will turn to historiography itself and examine how concepts and ideas from the rising Earth system sciences have been influencing both GEG and the way we think historically about Earth and humanity.
Max ERC Funding
2 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2018-10-01, End date: 2023-09-30
Project acronym GRINDOOR
Project Green Nanotechnology for the Indoor Environment
Researcher (PI) Claes-Goeran Sture Granqvist
Host Institution (HI) UPPSALA UNIVERSITET
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), PE5, ERC-2010-AdG_20100224
Summary The GRINDOOR project aims at developing and implementing new materials that enable huge energy savings in buildings and improve the quality of the indoor environment. About 40% of the primary energy, and 70% of the electricity, is used in buildings, and therefore the outcome of this project can have an impact on the long-term energy demand in the EU and the World. It is a highly focused study on new nanomaterials based on some transition metal oxides, which are used for four interrelated applications related to indoor lighting and indoor air: (i) electrochromic coatings are integrated in devices and used in “smart windows” to regulate the inflow of visible light and solar energy in order to minimize air condition and create indoor comfort, (ii) thermochromic nanoparticulate coatings are used on windows to provide large temperature-dependent control of the inflow of infrared solar radiation (in stand-alone cases as well as in conjunction with electrochromics), (iii) oxide-based gas sensors are used to measure indoor air quality especially with regard to formaldehyde, and (iv) photocatalytic coatings are used for indoor air cleaning. The investigated materials have many things in common and a joint and focused study, such as the one proposed here, will generate important new knowledge that can be transferred between the various sub-projects. The new oxide materials are prepared by advanced reactive gas deposition—using unique equipment—and high-pressure reactive dc magnetron sputtering. The materials are characterized and investigated by a wide range of state-of-the-art techniques.
Summary
The GRINDOOR project aims at developing and implementing new materials that enable huge energy savings in buildings and improve the quality of the indoor environment. About 40% of the primary energy, and 70% of the electricity, is used in buildings, and therefore the outcome of this project can have an impact on the long-term energy demand in the EU and the World. It is a highly focused study on new nanomaterials based on some transition metal oxides, which are used for four interrelated applications related to indoor lighting and indoor air: (i) electrochromic coatings are integrated in devices and used in “smart windows” to regulate the inflow of visible light and solar energy in order to minimize air condition and create indoor comfort, (ii) thermochromic nanoparticulate coatings are used on windows to provide large temperature-dependent control of the inflow of infrared solar radiation (in stand-alone cases as well as in conjunction with electrochromics), (iii) oxide-based gas sensors are used to measure indoor air quality especially with regard to formaldehyde, and (iv) photocatalytic coatings are used for indoor air cleaning. The investigated materials have many things in common and a joint and focused study, such as the one proposed here, will generate important new knowledge that can be transferred between the various sub-projects. The new oxide materials are prepared by advanced reactive gas deposition—using unique equipment—and high-pressure reactive dc magnetron sputtering. The materials are characterized and investigated by a wide range of state-of-the-art techniques.
Max ERC Funding
2 328 726 €
Duration
Start date: 2011-06-01, End date: 2016-05-31
Project acronym QUALIAGE
Project Spatial protein quality control and its links to aging, proteotoxicity, and polarity
Researcher (PI) Lars Bertil Thomas Nystroem
Host Institution (HI) GOETEBORGS UNIVERSITET
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS3, ERC-2010-AdG_20100317
Summary Propagation of a species requires periodic cell renewal to avoid clonal senescence. My
laboratory has described a new mechanism for such cell renewal in yeast, in which damaged
protein aggregates are transported out of the daughter buds along actin cables to preserve
youthfulness. Such spatial protein quality control (SQC) is a Sir2p-dependent process and by establishing the global genetic interaction network of SIR2, we identified the
polarisome as the machinery required for mitotic segregation and translocation of protein
aggregates. In addition, we found that the fusion of smaller aggregates into large inclusion
bodies, a process that has been suggested to reduce the toxicity of such aggregates, requires
actin cables and their nucleation at the septin ring. Sir2p controls damage segregation by
affecting deacetylation and the activity of the chaperonin CCT, enhancing actin folding and
polymerization. Considering that CCT has been implicated in mitigating
aggregation/toxicity of polyglutamine proteins, e.g. huntingtin, and that actin cables is
affecting formation, fusion, and resolution of aggregates, we hypothesize that CCT
deacetylation may underlie Sirt1¿s (mammalian orthologues of Sir2p) documented beneficial
effects in several neurodegenerative disorders caused by proteotoxic aggregates. This project
is aimed at approaching this hypothesis and to elucidate, on a genome-wide scale, how the
cell tether, sort, fuse, and detoxify aggregates with the help of CCT, actin cables, and the
polarity machinery. This will be accomplished by combining the power of synthetic genetic
array analysis, high-content imaging, genome wide proximity ligand assays, and microfluidics.
Using such approaches, the project seeks to decipher the machineries of the spatial quality
control network as a means to identify new therapeutic targets that may retard or postpone
the development of age-related maladies, including neurodegenerative disorders.
Summary
Propagation of a species requires periodic cell renewal to avoid clonal senescence. My
laboratory has described a new mechanism for such cell renewal in yeast, in which damaged
protein aggregates are transported out of the daughter buds along actin cables to preserve
youthfulness. Such spatial protein quality control (SQC) is a Sir2p-dependent process and by establishing the global genetic interaction network of SIR2, we identified the
polarisome as the machinery required for mitotic segregation and translocation of protein
aggregates. In addition, we found that the fusion of smaller aggregates into large inclusion
bodies, a process that has been suggested to reduce the toxicity of such aggregates, requires
actin cables and their nucleation at the septin ring. Sir2p controls damage segregation by
affecting deacetylation and the activity of the chaperonin CCT, enhancing actin folding and
polymerization. Considering that CCT has been implicated in mitigating
aggregation/toxicity of polyglutamine proteins, e.g. huntingtin, and that actin cables is
affecting formation, fusion, and resolution of aggregates, we hypothesize that CCT
deacetylation may underlie Sirt1¿s (mammalian orthologues of Sir2p) documented beneficial
effects in several neurodegenerative disorders caused by proteotoxic aggregates. This project
is aimed at approaching this hypothesis and to elucidate, on a genome-wide scale, how the
cell tether, sort, fuse, and detoxify aggregates with the help of CCT, actin cables, and the
polarity machinery. This will be accomplished by combining the power of synthetic genetic
array analysis, high-content imaging, genome wide proximity ligand assays, and microfluidics.
Using such approaches, the project seeks to decipher the machineries of the spatial quality
control network as a means to identify new therapeutic targets that may retard or postpone
the development of age-related maladies, including neurodegenerative disorders.
Max ERC Funding
2 371 262 €
Duration
Start date: 2011-06-01, End date: 2016-05-31
Project acronym SELF-UNITY
Project The Unity of the Bodily Self
Researcher (PI) Hans Henrik EHRSSON
Host Institution (HI) KAROLINSKA INSTITUTET
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH4, ERC-2017-ADG
Summary How do we come to experience ourselves as single physical entities? Under normal healthy conditions, we humans always experience a single body as our own physical self, and this bodily self is undivided and perceived as a single whole. But what cognitive processes and brain mechanisms mediate this unity of the bodily self? This fundamental question has long been beyond the reach of experimental studies because of the lack of behavioral paradigms that allow controlled manipulation of basic components of the self-unity. To address this issue, we here propose the use of novel full-body illusion paradigms to “fragment”, “duplicate” or “split” the sense of bodily self during well-controlled behavioral and neuroimaging experiments. By studying the behavioral and neural principles that determine specific illusory changes in perceived self-unity, we can elucidate much about the neurocognitive mechanisms that support the sense of having a single unitary bodily self under normal conditions. Our pioneering behavioral paradigms utilize the newest virtual reality technologies, and these are combined with multimodal neuroimaging using the most advanced analysis methods, such as multivariate pattern recognition. The aims of the project are to unravel (i) how we come to experience a single bodily self as opposed to multiple ones; (ii) how we perceive a coherent bodily self instead of fragmented parts; and (iii) how information from different sensory modalities – including vestibular and interoceptive signals – are integrated to achieve this coherent sense of a singular bodily self. The new basic knowledge generated by this project will be important for future clinical neuroscience research into major psychiatric and neurological disorders with disturbances in self-unity, such as schizophrenia, dissociative disorders and stroke with body neglect, by providing novel ideas for hypotheses about the involved neurocognitive pathophysiology.
Summary
How do we come to experience ourselves as single physical entities? Under normal healthy conditions, we humans always experience a single body as our own physical self, and this bodily self is undivided and perceived as a single whole. But what cognitive processes and brain mechanisms mediate this unity of the bodily self? This fundamental question has long been beyond the reach of experimental studies because of the lack of behavioral paradigms that allow controlled manipulation of basic components of the self-unity. To address this issue, we here propose the use of novel full-body illusion paradigms to “fragment”, “duplicate” or “split” the sense of bodily self during well-controlled behavioral and neuroimaging experiments. By studying the behavioral and neural principles that determine specific illusory changes in perceived self-unity, we can elucidate much about the neurocognitive mechanisms that support the sense of having a single unitary bodily self under normal conditions. Our pioneering behavioral paradigms utilize the newest virtual reality technologies, and these are combined with multimodal neuroimaging using the most advanced analysis methods, such as multivariate pattern recognition. The aims of the project are to unravel (i) how we come to experience a single bodily self as opposed to multiple ones; (ii) how we perceive a coherent bodily self instead of fragmented parts; and (iii) how information from different sensory modalities – including vestibular and interoceptive signals – are integrated to achieve this coherent sense of a singular bodily self. The new basic knowledge generated by this project will be important for future clinical neuroscience research into major psychiatric and neurological disorders with disturbances in self-unity, such as schizophrenia, dissociative disorders and stroke with body neglect, by providing novel ideas for hypotheses about the involved neurocognitive pathophysiology.
Max ERC Funding
2 583 560 €
Duration
Start date: 2019-01-01, End date: 2023-12-31
Project acronym THE RISE
Project Travels, transmissions and transformations in the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC in northern Europe: the rise of
Bronze Age societies
Researcher (PI) Kristian Kristiansen
Host Institution (HI) GOETEBORGS UNIVERSITET
Country Sweden
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH6, ERC-2010-AdG_20100407
Summary Research problem: The 3rd and 2nd millennium was a period that saw major social and cultural transformations in Europe, from migrations and the introduction of metal (the Bronze Age) to new cultural identities and languages. As these two millennia were formative for Europe’s later history, these are hotly debated issues. However, they can now be resolved, at least in part, by the application of new science-based methodologies and the development of new interpretative frameworks.
Aims and methodologies: The project does so by adopting an interdisciplinary methodological approach that combines science and culture. Isotope tracing in combination with recent advances in ancient DNA is employed to test human origins and movements during the two millennia, as well as the origin of wool and textiles. Lead isotope is adopted to trace the origin of copper. Based on this the project will document and explain the forging of new identities and new types of interaction during the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC in temperate northern Europe, but with implications for western Eurasia.
Progress and originality: Accomplishment of front-line research results by combining archaeology with new developments in the natural sciences to produce new knowledge about the mobility of people, animals, things, ideas and technologies. This will allow a critical comparison of different types of evidence on mobility from DNA to strontium isotope analyses, and will lead to improved knowledge about the ways in which European regional cultures and identities were formed in the Bronze Age through interaction. Finally, the project will potentially change our understanding and thinking about human mobility as a key factor in cultural and social change.
Summary
Research problem: The 3rd and 2nd millennium was a period that saw major social and cultural transformations in Europe, from migrations and the introduction of metal (the Bronze Age) to new cultural identities and languages. As these two millennia were formative for Europe’s later history, these are hotly debated issues. However, they can now be resolved, at least in part, by the application of new science-based methodologies and the development of new interpretative frameworks.
Aims and methodologies: The project does so by adopting an interdisciplinary methodological approach that combines science and culture. Isotope tracing in combination with recent advances in ancient DNA is employed to test human origins and movements during the two millennia, as well as the origin of wool and textiles. Lead isotope is adopted to trace the origin of copper. Based on this the project will document and explain the forging of new identities and new types of interaction during the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC in temperate northern Europe, but with implications for western Eurasia.
Progress and originality: Accomplishment of front-line research results by combining archaeology with new developments in the natural sciences to produce new knowledge about the mobility of people, animals, things, ideas and technologies. This will allow a critical comparison of different types of evidence on mobility from DNA to strontium isotope analyses, and will lead to improved knowledge about the ways in which European regional cultures and identities were formed in the Bronze Age through interaction. Finally, the project will potentially change our understanding and thinking about human mobility as a key factor in cultural and social change.
Max ERC Funding
2 488 264 €
Duration
Start date: 2011-06-01, End date: 2016-05-31
