Project acronym MigrantParents
Project Reproducing Europe: Migrant Parenting and Questions of Citizenship
Researcher (PI) Anouk De Koning
Host Institution (HI) STICHTING KATHOLIEKE UNIVERSITEIT
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH2, ERC-2014-STG
Summary This project is an anthropological study of citizenship in a Europe where the presence of migrants has increasingly come to be seen as a burden or threat. This project examines how citizenship is debated, produced and negotiated in this context. It does so through a multilevel study of debates, interventions and practices related to migrant parenting in Paris, Milan and Amsterdam. The experiences of Egyptian migrant parents – a relatively new North African and (partly) Muslim migrant group – serve as its vantage point.
Migrant parenting provides a new and fertile angle to explore questions of citizenship, understood here as membership and participation in the nation. Migrant parents are frequently seen as potential threat to the reproduction of the nation, and may thus be targeted by a variety of citizenship agendas designed to ensure the proper reproduction of citizens. This research examines how migrant parents engage with such agendas. It thereby studies the intersection of 1. political debates regarding migrant parents and the nation, 2. interventions through which states regulate and shape the reproduction of citizens, and 3. everyday interactions in the context of parenting.
Theoretically, this research will advance theories of citizenship through its innovative focus on migrant parenting, enabling an understanding of how correspondences between family and nation impact citizenship. It also contributes to citizenship studies through its innovative multilevel analysis, which details how citizenship is produced at the intersection of political debates, institutional interventions, and everyday interactions. Additionally, its comparative design enables an assessment of the impact of particular political debates and institutional arrangements on citizenship in Europe. This study will thereby further our understanding of the complex set of conditions that shape social life in contemporary European cities.
Summary
This project is an anthropological study of citizenship in a Europe where the presence of migrants has increasingly come to be seen as a burden or threat. This project examines how citizenship is debated, produced and negotiated in this context. It does so through a multilevel study of debates, interventions and practices related to migrant parenting in Paris, Milan and Amsterdam. The experiences of Egyptian migrant parents – a relatively new North African and (partly) Muslim migrant group – serve as its vantage point.
Migrant parenting provides a new and fertile angle to explore questions of citizenship, understood here as membership and participation in the nation. Migrant parents are frequently seen as potential threat to the reproduction of the nation, and may thus be targeted by a variety of citizenship agendas designed to ensure the proper reproduction of citizens. This research examines how migrant parents engage with such agendas. It thereby studies the intersection of 1. political debates regarding migrant parents and the nation, 2. interventions through which states regulate and shape the reproduction of citizens, and 3. everyday interactions in the context of parenting.
Theoretically, this research will advance theories of citizenship through its innovative focus on migrant parenting, enabling an understanding of how correspondences between family and nation impact citizenship. It also contributes to citizenship studies through its innovative multilevel analysis, which details how citizenship is produced at the intersection of political debates, institutional interventions, and everyday interactions. Additionally, its comparative design enables an assessment of the impact of particular political debates and institutional arrangements on citizenship in Europe. This study will thereby further our understanding of the complex set of conditions that shape social life in contemporary European cities.
Max ERC Funding
1 498 425 €
Duration
Start date: 2015-11-01, End date: 2020-10-31
Project acronym MiLifeStatus
Project Migrant Life Course and Legal Status Transition
Researcher (PI) Maarten Vink
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITEIT MAASTRICHT
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH2, ERC-2015-CoG
Summary When does citizenship provide a boost to migrant integration? A fast-track to citizenship can maximise the potential for settlement success, though too short a pathway can disincentivise integration. Not all migrants have an equal interest in naturalising and some are discouraged by restrictive policies. Yet little is known about why, how and for whom legal status transition matters and, especially, how policy variation impacts on this relation. Which migrants are most discouraged by stricter requirements for naturalisation? For whom carries citizenship the largest pay-off? Does it still matter if a migrant acquires citizenship after a long waiting period? This project combines for the first time the ideas that a) migrants have different motivations to naturalise; b) legal status transitions are conditioned by the institutional and socioeconomic contexts in origin and destination countries and c) the potential ‘integration premium’ associated with naturalisation is conditioned by the trajectory into citizenship.
The innovative project contributions are:
1. modelling migrants’ legal status transitions as life course events, which are shaped by migrants’ origin, their family context and societal structures and institutions;
2. analysing the relevance of citizenship for work and income, living conditions, health status and out-migration among immigrants and for educational attainment among their descendants;
3. developing novel methodologies to analyse step-to-citizenship trajectories and the impact of policy changes on status transitions and related outcomes among migrant groups and cohorts;
4. testing models on the basis of a unique combination of longitudinal register-based and survey-based micro-data in 8 European and North American countries, which provide the comparative context to analyse the impact of institutional variation;
5. yielding information for targeted citizenship policies to maximise settlement success for immigrants and their children.
Summary
When does citizenship provide a boost to migrant integration? A fast-track to citizenship can maximise the potential for settlement success, though too short a pathway can disincentivise integration. Not all migrants have an equal interest in naturalising and some are discouraged by restrictive policies. Yet little is known about why, how and for whom legal status transition matters and, especially, how policy variation impacts on this relation. Which migrants are most discouraged by stricter requirements for naturalisation? For whom carries citizenship the largest pay-off? Does it still matter if a migrant acquires citizenship after a long waiting period? This project combines for the first time the ideas that a) migrants have different motivations to naturalise; b) legal status transitions are conditioned by the institutional and socioeconomic contexts in origin and destination countries and c) the potential ‘integration premium’ associated with naturalisation is conditioned by the trajectory into citizenship.
The innovative project contributions are:
1. modelling migrants’ legal status transitions as life course events, which are shaped by migrants’ origin, their family context and societal structures and institutions;
2. analysing the relevance of citizenship for work and income, living conditions, health status and out-migration among immigrants and for educational attainment among their descendants;
3. developing novel methodologies to analyse step-to-citizenship trajectories and the impact of policy changes on status transitions and related outcomes among migrant groups and cohorts;
4. testing models on the basis of a unique combination of longitudinal register-based and survey-based micro-data in 8 European and North American countries, which provide the comparative context to analyse the impact of institutional variation;
5. yielding information for targeted citizenship policies to maximise settlement success for immigrants and their children.
Max ERC Funding
1 799 034 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-08-01, End date: 2021-07-31
Project acronym MIRNA_AD
Project Role of microRNA dysregulation in Alzheimers Disease
Researcher (PI) Bart Geert Alfons Paul De Strooper
Host Institution (HI) VIB
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS5, ERC-2010-AdG_20100317
Summary Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is a major health problem in aging societies. Remarkable progress in the study of the rare genetic forms of the disease has lead to the identification of several key players like APP and the secretases, but the molecular basis of sporadic AD remains largely unresolved. The convergence of several factors (multicausality) has to be considered. miRNAs are crucially involved in normal brain functioning and integrity. Evidence obtained from analyzing a limited number of brains indicates that miRNA expression is affected in sporadic AD. We propose the hypothesis that such changes can affect normal functioning of neurons increasing their susceptibility to AD. We will document in 3 brain regions in >100 sporadic AD patients and in >100 controls alterations in miRNA expression and explore whether similar alterations can be detected in cerebrospinal fluid. This part of the study will firmly establish which miRNAs are altered in AD. We will then investigate the functional relevance of those miRNAs by gain and loss of function experiments in brains of zebra fish and mice. We will determine the target genes of the miRNA with genetic and proteomic approaches, and establish the functional networks controlled by those miRNA. We anticipate that this will lead to complete novel insights in the role of miRNAs in AD and in maintenance of brain integrity. Our work is likely to have diagnostic relevance for AD and will identify novel drug targets for the disease.
Summary
Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is a major health problem in aging societies. Remarkable progress in the study of the rare genetic forms of the disease has lead to the identification of several key players like APP and the secretases, but the molecular basis of sporadic AD remains largely unresolved. The convergence of several factors (multicausality) has to be considered. miRNAs are crucially involved in normal brain functioning and integrity. Evidence obtained from analyzing a limited number of brains indicates that miRNA expression is affected in sporadic AD. We propose the hypothesis that such changes can affect normal functioning of neurons increasing their susceptibility to AD. We will document in 3 brain regions in >100 sporadic AD patients and in >100 controls alterations in miRNA expression and explore whether similar alterations can be detected in cerebrospinal fluid. This part of the study will firmly establish which miRNAs are altered in AD. We will then investigate the functional relevance of those miRNAs by gain and loss of function experiments in brains of zebra fish and mice. We will determine the target genes of the miRNA with genetic and proteomic approaches, and establish the functional networks controlled by those miRNA. We anticipate that this will lead to complete novel insights in the role of miRNAs in AD and in maintenance of brain integrity. Our work is likely to have diagnostic relevance for AD and will identify novel drug targets for the disease.
Max ERC Funding
2 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2011-05-01, End date: 2016-04-30
Project acronym MiTSoPro
Project Migration and Transnational Social Protection in (post-)crisis Europe
Researcher (PI) Jean-Michel Lafleur
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITE DE LIEGE
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH2, ERC-2015-STG
Summary The negative employment and social developments across Europe since the start of the crisis, coupled with increased fiscal constraints and changing migration patterns, have led to increasing depictions of EU and third-country immigrants as ‘abusers’ of their social protection systems. Member States have accordingly sought reduce migrants’ ability to access social protection benefits, despite the fact that they are disproportionately at risk of poverty and social exclusion.
This project looks at the different strategies that migrants have to access social protection within (post) crisis Europe and does so by explicitly integrating social policy and migration studies’ approaches on the phenomenon. More precisely, it aims to study transnational social protection, that we define as migrants’ cross-border strategies to cope with social risks in areas such as health, long-term care, pensions or unemployment that combine entitlements to host and home state-based public welfare policies and market-, family- and community-based practices.
This study thus consists in, first, identifying the social protection policies and programs that home countries make accessible to their citizens abroad, and then compiling this information into an online database. We will then aggregate the results of the database into a Transnational Social Protection Index (TSPIx) in order to determine the overall level of engagement of each state with citizens abroad in a comparative way.
Second, on the basis of the results of the index, we will select case studies of migrants from two EU and two non-EU countries that vary in their level of engagement in providing social protection to their citizens abroad. We will then undertake multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork to qualitatively assess the informal social protection strategies used by migrants and examine their interaction with formal host and home state social protection provision.
Summary
The negative employment and social developments across Europe since the start of the crisis, coupled with increased fiscal constraints and changing migration patterns, have led to increasing depictions of EU and third-country immigrants as ‘abusers’ of their social protection systems. Member States have accordingly sought reduce migrants’ ability to access social protection benefits, despite the fact that they are disproportionately at risk of poverty and social exclusion.
This project looks at the different strategies that migrants have to access social protection within (post) crisis Europe and does so by explicitly integrating social policy and migration studies’ approaches on the phenomenon. More precisely, it aims to study transnational social protection, that we define as migrants’ cross-border strategies to cope with social risks in areas such as health, long-term care, pensions or unemployment that combine entitlements to host and home state-based public welfare policies and market-, family- and community-based practices.
This study thus consists in, first, identifying the social protection policies and programs that home countries make accessible to their citizens abroad, and then compiling this information into an online database. We will then aggregate the results of the database into a Transnational Social Protection Index (TSPIx) in order to determine the overall level of engagement of each state with citizens abroad in a comparative way.
Second, on the basis of the results of the index, we will select case studies of migrants from two EU and two non-EU countries that vary in their level of engagement in providing social protection to their citizens abroad. We will then undertake multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork to qualitatively assess the informal social protection strategies used by migrants and examine their interaction with formal host and home state social protection provision.
Max ERC Funding
1 306 718 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-11-01, End date: 2021-10-31
Project acronym MLG
Project Causes and Consequences of Multilevel Governance
Researcher (PI) Gary Marks
Host Institution (HI) STICHTING VU
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH2, ERC-2009-AdG
Summary This five-year research programme is motivated by the question: Why does the structure of government vary, and how does this affect the quality of democracy and governance? The programme estimates and explains the scope and depth of authority exercised by subnational governments and international governmental organizations (IGOs) from 1950 to 2010. This will allow deeper understanding of a major policy development multilevel governance, the dispersion of authority away from central states to subnational and supranational levels. While major institutions, including the World Bank, the European Parliament, and European Commission recommend multilevel governance, some policy analysts claim that multilevel governance exacerbates corruption, leads to gridlock, engenders moral hazard, constrains redistribution, obfuscates accountability, and wastes money. However, comparative information about how international and subnational government varies across countries and over time is lacking, and so it is not possible to discipline normative claims against evidence. The contribution of the research programme is threefold. First, it provides carefully constructed, comparative, and reliable estimates of subnational and international government for a wide range of countries over an extended time period. Second, it seeks to advance understanding of the causes of multilevel governance, building on the major theories in the field. Third, it provides a rigorous assessment of the consequences of multilevel governance. Theories of the causes and consequences of multilevel governance will be evaluated quantitatively and in a case study of government response to climate change.
Summary
This five-year research programme is motivated by the question: Why does the structure of government vary, and how does this affect the quality of democracy and governance? The programme estimates and explains the scope and depth of authority exercised by subnational governments and international governmental organizations (IGOs) from 1950 to 2010. This will allow deeper understanding of a major policy development multilevel governance, the dispersion of authority away from central states to subnational and supranational levels. While major institutions, including the World Bank, the European Parliament, and European Commission recommend multilevel governance, some policy analysts claim that multilevel governance exacerbates corruption, leads to gridlock, engenders moral hazard, constrains redistribution, obfuscates accountability, and wastes money. However, comparative information about how international and subnational government varies across countries and over time is lacking, and so it is not possible to discipline normative claims against evidence. The contribution of the research programme is threefold. First, it provides carefully constructed, comparative, and reliable estimates of subnational and international government for a wide range of countries over an extended time period. Second, it seeks to advance understanding of the causes of multilevel governance, building on the major theories in the field. Third, it provides a rigorous assessment of the consequences of multilevel governance. Theories of the causes and consequences of multilevel governance will be evaluated quantitatively and in a case study of government response to climate change.
Max ERC Funding
2 478 807 €
Duration
Start date: 2010-05-01, End date: 2015-04-30
Project acronym MobileKids
Project Children in multi-local post-separation families
Researcher (PI) Laura Merla
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITE CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH2, ERC-2015-STG
Summary This project focuses on the experience of two cohorts of children aged 10 and 13 at the beginning of the study and who are living in multi-local, post-separation families in Belgium, in France and in Italy, that is, families where the mother and the father are either divorced or separated, live in different households in the same country, and share the physical custody of their child(ren).
A major goal of this project is to investigate the diversity of children’s experience of multi-local family life and identify their specific needs, through children’s own accounts of their lives. This means understanding if, and under what circumstances, children appropriate their multi-local lives and develop an habitus that incorporates the capacity to maintain social relations in a multi-local context and to appropriate mobility and virtual connectedness.
The project combines three levels of analysis: the macro-level of policies, the meso-level of family environments (family resources, cultures and practices; and spatial contexts), and the micro-level of children’s lives, which consists in examining how children maintain their social and family relationships as they move with various temporalities between two households that are located in specific administrative territories and spatial entities. This means understanding how children’s interpersonal relationships and networks of significant others shape, and are re-shaped by their mobility in post-separation families; and the interconnections between geographical and virtual mobility.
The study combines four methods: a policy analysis of multilocality, secondary data analysis of relevant databases, semi-structured interviews with children’s mothers and fathers, and a qualitative, in-depth study of the lived experiences of 90 children.
Summary
This project focuses on the experience of two cohorts of children aged 10 and 13 at the beginning of the study and who are living in multi-local, post-separation families in Belgium, in France and in Italy, that is, families where the mother and the father are either divorced or separated, live in different households in the same country, and share the physical custody of their child(ren).
A major goal of this project is to investigate the diversity of children’s experience of multi-local family life and identify their specific needs, through children’s own accounts of their lives. This means understanding if, and under what circumstances, children appropriate their multi-local lives and develop an habitus that incorporates the capacity to maintain social relations in a multi-local context and to appropriate mobility and virtual connectedness.
The project combines three levels of analysis: the macro-level of policies, the meso-level of family environments (family resources, cultures and practices; and spatial contexts), and the micro-level of children’s lives, which consists in examining how children maintain their social and family relationships as they move with various temporalities between two households that are located in specific administrative territories and spatial entities. This means understanding how children’s interpersonal relationships and networks of significant others shape, and are re-shaped by their mobility in post-separation families; and the interconnections between geographical and virtual mobility.
The study combines four methods: a policy analysis of multilocality, secondary data analysis of relevant databases, semi-structured interviews with children’s mothers and fathers, and a qualitative, in-depth study of the lived experiences of 90 children.
Max ERC Funding
1 499 312 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-09-01, End date: 2021-08-31
Project acronym ModifALS
Project From zebrafish to man
Modifying amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS): translation of biology into therapy
Researcher (PI) Wim Robberecht
Host Institution (HI) VIB
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS5, ERC-2013-ADG
Summary Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a fatal neurodegenerative disease of the motor neurons. As for other neurodegenerative disorders, translation of newly acquired biological insights into therapies has been difficult. In the current project we intend to contribute to the development of therapeutic approaches for ALS. We want to generate novel models, identify new therapeutic targets for intervention, and translate these into validated options for drug development in ALS. This will be done by establishing a continuous line of research from the (unbiased) screening for targets in a small animal model (zebrafish), to the exploration of their therapeutic potential, and the validation in patients. In addition, by exploring the significance of some of the findings for other neurodegenerative disorders, we hope to demonstrate this approach to be valid for the field of neurodegenerative disorders in general. This research will be performed bases on 6 work packages (WP): 1.screening of a zebrafish model for ALS to identify therapeutic targets; 2. validation of these targets in larger vertebrate ALS models; 3. investigation of the mechanism of action of these targets in order to establish approaches to interfere with them; 4. validation of these targets in human ALS; 5. generation of preclinical data on these targets; 6. exploration of the possible role of these targets in other neurodegenerative diseases.
Results from WP1 will be used for further research in WP2, results from WP2 in WP3, etc. We have gathered a large set of data in preparatory work in zebrafish, enabling us to start all WPs from the beginning of the project on.
This project involves collaborations with several other groups, national and international, which all have been established. Furthermore, all transgenic mice needed to initiate all these WPs have been generated and available to us.
Summary
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a fatal neurodegenerative disease of the motor neurons. As for other neurodegenerative disorders, translation of newly acquired biological insights into therapies has been difficult. In the current project we intend to contribute to the development of therapeutic approaches for ALS. We want to generate novel models, identify new therapeutic targets for intervention, and translate these into validated options for drug development in ALS. This will be done by establishing a continuous line of research from the (unbiased) screening for targets in a small animal model (zebrafish), to the exploration of their therapeutic potential, and the validation in patients. In addition, by exploring the significance of some of the findings for other neurodegenerative disorders, we hope to demonstrate this approach to be valid for the field of neurodegenerative disorders in general. This research will be performed bases on 6 work packages (WP): 1.screening of a zebrafish model for ALS to identify therapeutic targets; 2. validation of these targets in larger vertebrate ALS models; 3. investigation of the mechanism of action of these targets in order to establish approaches to interfere with them; 4. validation of these targets in human ALS; 5. generation of preclinical data on these targets; 6. exploration of the possible role of these targets in other neurodegenerative diseases.
Results from WP1 will be used for further research in WP2, results from WP2 in WP3, etc. We have gathered a large set of data in preparatory work in zebrafish, enabling us to start all WPs from the beginning of the project on.
This project involves collaborations with several other groups, national and international, which all have been established. Furthermore, all transgenic mice needed to initiate all these WPs have been generated and available to us.
Max ERC Funding
2 467 990 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-05-01, End date: 2019-04-30
Project acronym MOLECMAP
Project Quantitative Molecular Map of the Neuronal Surface
Researcher (PI) Zoltan Jozsef Nusser
Host Institution (HI) INSTITUTE OF EXPERIMENTAL MEDICINE - HUNGARIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), LS5, ERC-2011-ADG_20110310
Summary The most fundamental roles of nerve cells are the detection of chemical neurotransmitters to generate synaptic potentials; the summation of these potentials to create their output signals; and the consequent release of their own neurotransmitter molecules. All of these functions require the orchestrated work of hundreds of molecules targeted to specialized regions of the cells. In nerve cells, more than in any other cell type, a single molecule could fulfill very different functional roles depending on its subcellular location. For example, dendritic voltage-gated Ca2+ channels play a role in the integration and plasticity of synaptic inputs, whereas the same channels when concentrated in presynaptic active zones are essential for neurotransmitter release. Thus, the function of a protein in nerve cells cannot be understood from its expression or lack of it, but its precise subcellular location, density and molecular environment needs to be determined. The major aim of the present proposal is to create a quantitative molecular map of the surface of hippocampal pyramidal cells (PCs). We will start by examining voltage-gated ion channels due to their pivotal roles in input summation, output generation and neurotransmitter release. We will apply high resolution quantitative molecular neuroanatomical techniques to reveal their densities in 19 different axo-somato-dendritic plasma membrane compartments of CA1 PCs. Functional predictions will be generated using detailed, morphologically realistic multicompartmental PC models with experimentally determined ion channel distributions and densities. Such predictions will be tested by combining in vitro patch-clamp electrophysiology and imaging techniques with correlated light- and electron microscopy. Our results will provide the first quantitative molecular map of the neuronal surface and will reveal new mechanisms that increase the computational power and the functional diversity of nerve cells.
Summary
The most fundamental roles of nerve cells are the detection of chemical neurotransmitters to generate synaptic potentials; the summation of these potentials to create their output signals; and the consequent release of their own neurotransmitter molecules. All of these functions require the orchestrated work of hundreds of molecules targeted to specialized regions of the cells. In nerve cells, more than in any other cell type, a single molecule could fulfill very different functional roles depending on its subcellular location. For example, dendritic voltage-gated Ca2+ channels play a role in the integration and plasticity of synaptic inputs, whereas the same channels when concentrated in presynaptic active zones are essential for neurotransmitter release. Thus, the function of a protein in nerve cells cannot be understood from its expression or lack of it, but its precise subcellular location, density and molecular environment needs to be determined. The major aim of the present proposal is to create a quantitative molecular map of the surface of hippocampal pyramidal cells (PCs). We will start by examining voltage-gated ion channels due to their pivotal roles in input summation, output generation and neurotransmitter release. We will apply high resolution quantitative molecular neuroanatomical techniques to reveal their densities in 19 different axo-somato-dendritic plasma membrane compartments of CA1 PCs. Functional predictions will be generated using detailed, morphologically realistic multicompartmental PC models with experimentally determined ion channel distributions and densities. Such predictions will be tested by combining in vitro patch-clamp electrophysiology and imaging techniques with correlated light- and electron microscopy. Our results will provide the first quantitative molecular map of the neuronal surface and will reveal new mechanisms that increase the computational power and the functional diversity of nerve cells.
Max ERC Funding
2 494 446 €
Duration
Start date: 2012-02-01, End date: 2017-01-31
Project acronym MONITORING
Project "Monitoring modernity: A comparative analysis of practices of social imagination in the monitoring of global flows of goods, capital and persons"
Researcher (PI) Willem Schinkel
Host Institution (HI) ERASMUS UNIVERSITEIT ROTTERDAM
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH2, ERC-2011-StG_20101124
Summary "This project aims to study institutions specialized in visualizing society. Such institutions have proliferated in recent decades. From regulatory bodies to auditing institutions and regimes of supervision, from monitoring agencies to surveillance apparatuses, social life is full of reflexive spaces specialized in the visualization of that social life. Much of social theory assumes that societies exist on the basis of a work of imagination, yet very little comparative cross-sectional work exists on such ‘social imagination’. Much can be learned about social life when the institutions it brings forth to observe that social life are observed sociologically.
In four subprojects, this research investigates: 1) How societies are imagined through the visualization of the border between society and nature, particularly in the context of the assessment of global flows of goods in: a) measurements of climate change, and b) the visualization of the economy and its implicit understanding of nature as mediated through production; 2) How economic borders, risks and responsibilities are imagined by the regulation and oversight of global flows of capital; 3) How national societies are imagined by the social scientific measurement of global flows of persons, notably immigrants in the assessment of their integration; 4) How the social space of the EU is imagined by the surveillance of global flows of persons, notably irregular migrants, by means of specialized EU-databases.
This project is innovative in three ways. First, it is the first comparative cross-sectional study of the professionalized practice of the ‘imaginary constitution of society’. Second, it integrates theories and methods from various fields. Third, it renews understanding of the practical assemblage of imagined collectives such as ‘national societies’, and contributes to ‘globalization theory’ by analyzing the everyday routinized ways in which ‘global assemblages’ produce plausible boundaries and localities."
Summary
"This project aims to study institutions specialized in visualizing society. Such institutions have proliferated in recent decades. From regulatory bodies to auditing institutions and regimes of supervision, from monitoring agencies to surveillance apparatuses, social life is full of reflexive spaces specialized in the visualization of that social life. Much of social theory assumes that societies exist on the basis of a work of imagination, yet very little comparative cross-sectional work exists on such ‘social imagination’. Much can be learned about social life when the institutions it brings forth to observe that social life are observed sociologically.
In four subprojects, this research investigates: 1) How societies are imagined through the visualization of the border between society and nature, particularly in the context of the assessment of global flows of goods in: a) measurements of climate change, and b) the visualization of the economy and its implicit understanding of nature as mediated through production; 2) How economic borders, risks and responsibilities are imagined by the regulation and oversight of global flows of capital; 3) How national societies are imagined by the social scientific measurement of global flows of persons, notably immigrants in the assessment of their integration; 4) How the social space of the EU is imagined by the surveillance of global flows of persons, notably irregular migrants, by means of specialized EU-databases.
This project is innovative in three ways. First, it is the first comparative cross-sectional study of the professionalized practice of the ‘imaginary constitution of society’. Second, it integrates theories and methods from various fields. Third, it renews understanding of the practical assemblage of imagined collectives such as ‘national societies’, and contributes to ‘globalization theory’ by analyzing the everyday routinized ways in which ‘global assemblages’ produce plausible boundaries and localities."
Max ERC Funding
1 353 255 €
Duration
Start date: 2012-09-01, End date: 2017-08-31
Project acronym MULTICONNECT
Project Imaging Brain Circuits to Decode Brain Computations: Multimodal Multiscale Imaging of Cortical Microcircuits to Model Predictive Coding in Human Vision
Researcher (PI) Alard Franc Roebroeck
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITEIT MAASTRICHT
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), LS5, ERC-2014-STG
Summary The human brain is one of the largest and most complex biological networks known to exist. The architecture of its circuits, and therefore the computational basis of human cognition, remains largely unknown. The central aim of this proposal is to image human cortical connectivity at multiple spatial scales in order to understand human cortical computations.
Whereas canonical cortical microcircuits are an established theory of the repeating structure of the neocortex’s circuits, predictive coding provides a prominent proposal of what these circuits compute. This leads to the core hypothesis of this proposal: the variations in predictive coding computations performed by human cortical microcircuits in different visual areas are grounded in variations in their microcircuit connectivity. As a central case-study, this proposal investigates human visual apparent motion perception in V1/2/3 and V5/MT+.
The proposed research program is organized in two workpackages (WP I and II). WP I has the aim of imaging the multiscale connections of human neocortical microcircuits. The projects in WP I focus on structure and move from the mesoscale down to the microscale. WP II has the aim of modelling how microcircuits support predictive coding computations. The projects in WP II focus on function and move from the microscale back up to the mesoscale. Structural and functional assessment of microcircuitry in the human brain only recently became possible with the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at ultra-high field-strengths (UHF) of 7T and above. UHF diffusion MRI, combined with light microscopy, is used to image circuit structure in WP I. UHF functional MRI is used for computational modelling of computations in WP II.
Successful completion of the planned research will significantly advance our understanding of the computations in cortical microcircuits, deliver important new human connectomic reference data, and improve generative models of human cortical processing.
Summary
The human brain is one of the largest and most complex biological networks known to exist. The architecture of its circuits, and therefore the computational basis of human cognition, remains largely unknown. The central aim of this proposal is to image human cortical connectivity at multiple spatial scales in order to understand human cortical computations.
Whereas canonical cortical microcircuits are an established theory of the repeating structure of the neocortex’s circuits, predictive coding provides a prominent proposal of what these circuits compute. This leads to the core hypothesis of this proposal: the variations in predictive coding computations performed by human cortical microcircuits in different visual areas are grounded in variations in their microcircuit connectivity. As a central case-study, this proposal investigates human visual apparent motion perception in V1/2/3 and V5/MT+.
The proposed research program is organized in two workpackages (WP I and II). WP I has the aim of imaging the multiscale connections of human neocortical microcircuits. The projects in WP I focus on structure and move from the mesoscale down to the microscale. WP II has the aim of modelling how microcircuits support predictive coding computations. The projects in WP II focus on function and move from the microscale back up to the mesoscale. Structural and functional assessment of microcircuitry in the human brain only recently became possible with the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at ultra-high field-strengths (UHF) of 7T and above. UHF diffusion MRI, combined with light microscopy, is used to image circuit structure in WP I. UHF functional MRI is used for computational modelling of computations in WP II.
Successful completion of the planned research will significantly advance our understanding of the computations in cortical microcircuits, deliver important new human connectomic reference data, and improve generative models of human cortical processing.
Max ERC Funding
1 500 000 €
Duration
Start date: 2015-06-01, End date: 2020-05-31
