For support for an ERC application, please contact Research Funding Europe (RFE).
Current Starting Grants
RadNu
Krijn De Vries, RadNu, StG 2018
Radio detection of the PeV - EeV cosmic-neutrino flux
In 2013, the IceCube neutrino telescope detected the first high-energy neutrino flux originating beyond our galaxy. At the highest energies, the cosmic neutrino flux drops rapidly; above a few PeV the IceCube neutrino detector runs low in statistics. To probe the cosmic neutrino flux at these energies and above, an even larger volume than the cubic kilometre currently covered by IceCube is needed. Radio signals provide the ideal means to probe the cosmic neutrino flux above PeV energies. Utilising the radar echo method as well as the complementary Askaryan radio emission to probe cosmic neutrinos interacting in a dense medium such as ice, allows to efficiently cover the required detection volumes. The EU-funded RadNu project aims to develop these novel radar and radio detection techniques to measure high-energy, neutrino-induced, particle cascades in dense media.
Read more
LUMIERE
Christophe Snoeck, LUMIERE, StG 2020
Landscape Use and Mobility In EuRopE - Bridging the gap between cremation and inhumation
The study of both inhumed and cremated human remains can shed light on changes in mobility, migration and landscape use patterns of early populations in Europe. The EU-funded LUMIERE project will identify the movement of people on a local, regional and European scale. It will explain how and why people moved as well as how they used their surrounding landscape between the Neolithic and the Early Medieval period, when both cremation and inhumation were practiced. The project will use state-of-the art bioarchaeology methods to merge information obtained directly from both cremated and inhumed individuals and develop new analytical tools for the isotopic study of archaeological human remains. The new approaches will increase the number of cremated specimens that can be examined and improve the quality of the information obtained.
FROGWY
Wen-Juan Ma, FROGWY, StG 2021
Evolutionary Genomics of Unconventional Sex Chromosomes in Frogs
Frogs are an ideal model system for the study of sex chromosome diversity and evolution. Unlike the highly degenerated Y chromosomes in humans, frogs exhibit mostly undifferentiated sex chromosomes, and frequent birth and death of sex chromosomes (turnovers). Notably, they exhibit both XY sex determination where Y determines the offspring sex and is only inherited from fathers to sons, and ZW sex determination where W determines the sex and is inherited from mothers to daughters. Conventional thought suggests that the Y/W genetically degenerates with time. Why are sex chromosomes in frogs not degenerated and with frequent turnovers? The ERC-funded FrogWY project will use robber frogs to study unconventional sex chromosome evolution, challenging the paradigm predicted by the canonical model of degenerate Y/W.
CURIAE VIRIDES
Liliana Lizarazo-Rodriguez, CURIAE VIRIDES, StG 2020
How the third wave of global judicial (and social) activism is filling ecological governance gaps and challenging the liability-remedy paradigm.
Today, ecological degradation is increasingly linked to the subsistence of human beings. Many stakeholders flag ecological governance gaps and increasingly trigger courts to require governments and leading firms of global value chains to adopt the necessary measures to prevent or mitigate ecological risks or damages. However, there is no clarity about the role victims of ecological damage play in these proceedings. For this reason, the EU-funded CURIAE VIRIDES project will explore the progressive transformation of human rights litigation into more ecocentric litigation and the role of (activist) courts. It will study how social litigation is greening, its consequences for victims of ecological damages, and the quality of ecocentric judgements.
COLOR-UP
Martin Virte, COLOR-UP, StG 2020
All-optical sub-THz signal filtering with multi-COLOR lasers
The so-called sub-terahertz frequency range is of critical importance to growing applications in high-speed wireless communications, radars, remote sensing and biomedical and security imaging. With the explosion of photonics integrated circuits (PICs), the potential of sub-THz on-chip devices is tremendous, but their uptake is facing certain important challenges. The EU-funded COLOR-UP project plans to remove one of these roadblocks through the innovative use of multi-colour lasers to deliver on-chip frequency filters performing in the desired range and beyond. They will be showcased in a PIC designed to emit light in the telecommunications frequency range.
VERITRACE
Cornelis J. Schilt, VERITRACE, StG 2022
Traces de la Verité: The reappropriation of ancient wisdom in early modern natural philosophy
Ancient wisdom writings were very popular during the early modern period and studied by early modern natural philosophers like Kepler, Bacon, Gassendi, Newton and Leibniz. These writings were considered part of a tradition that regarded them as containing universal truths about God, humanity and the cosmos. However, exactly how they informed these natural philosophers in their knowledge-making processes remains largely unknown. The VERITRACE project, funded by the European Research Council, aims to delve into the debates surrounding these texts and analyse how they were perceived during the early modern era in Europe. By customising existing techniques for distant reading, the project will scrutinise a large corpus of early modern printed works. Ultimately, it will deepen our understanding of how these writings, rediscovered in the Renaissance, informed the early modern foundations of modern science.
TRAJECT
Lara Pivodic, TRAJECT, StG 2022
Uncovering commonalities and differences: Towards a novel framework for identifying end-of-life trajectories of older people with serious chronic illness
Older people who die from serious chronic disease typically experience long periods (months or years) of illness and complex fluctuations in their physical health and in their social, psychological, and existential well-being. This project will conduct a mixedmethod, inter-disciplinary investigation of these end-of-life trajectories. It responds to the long-standing scientific challenge of identifying commonalities in end-of-life trajectories across groups of people, without masking important inter-individual differences. Its central aim is to gain understanding of what is generalisable and what is individually specific in older people’s end-of-life trajectories and in the circumstances that shape them.
This project applies a novel methodological and analytical framework, examining trajectories through two distinct scientific lenses: a structured quantitative approach known from the biomedical sciences to capture fluctuations in a standardised way, and an experience-focused qualitative approach from the humanities to study the subjective stories and meanings behind changes in health.
In a convergent mixed-methods investigation, this work combines 1) a large quantitative longitudinal study and 2) a serial narrative interview study; both with older people (70 years or over) with serious chronic illness who are nearing the end of life. The results of these two methods will be integrated through triangulation and by systematically threading key findings from one method across to the other.
This work will lead to a fundamental re-thinking of how we examine, understand, and categorise end-of-life trajectories. It will reveal the full extent of their complexity and indicate possibilities and limits of generalisation. These novel insights will propel scientific advances towards achieving a good end of life in ageing societies. They will also drive methodological innovation beyond my field, balancing the perspective of the researcher and the researched.
INEQNEWS
Antonis Kalogeropoulos, INEQNEWS, StG 2022
Understanding and Alleviating Inequalities in Digital News Consumption
This project’s vision is to understand and develop strategies to mitigate inequalities in digital news consumption, the acquisition of political knowledge and vulnerability to misinformation. While inequalities in digital news access have been lowered with very high levels of internet access in many countries, there are indications that inequalities in digital news use and the benefits of being exposed to it, like the acquisition of political knowledge, are increasing. Academic literature has been instrumental in describing how digital intermediaries (e.g. social media or search engines) and different modes (mobile devices) have changed the way people consume news, however little attention has been given to how these changes manifest against the backdrop of pre-existing social inequalities in news use and the acquisition of political information. Thus, the project will a) reliably identify digital inequalities in news use, the acquisition of political knowledge, and vulnerability in online misinformation in countries of the Global North and the Global South. In its examination it will focus on b) long-standing informational inequalities related to social class, gender, and age and c) the role of new information technologies like digital intermediaries and mobile devices. Apart from identifying people with low levels of news use, this project will d) explore the ways that parts of the population navigate and face disadvantages in a complex digital media environment.
Last, this project, will for the first time, e) test digital public health style interventions that could reduce inequalities in digital news use, political knowledge, and exposure to as well as belief in online misinformation. To achieve these objectives, this project will employ a novel set of methods. Overall, this project will be the first to examine and to find ways to alleviate inequalities in digital news use, using a holistic mixed-methods approach in a Global North/South comparative framework.
FORAGENCY
Benoît Henriet, FORAGENCY, StG 2022
Foraging, Fishing and Hunting as Agency in Colonial Central Africa (c. 1885 - c. 1960)
FORAGENCY offers a new take on indigenous agency in colonial Central Africa. It will study how local communities managed to counter, alleviate and/or minimize their encroachment by outside forces through the maintenance and adaptation of pre-existing uses of the environment. Inhabitants of Central Africa indeed mobilised foraging, fishing and hunting to avoid wage labour, cultural suppression and economic dependency in several ways. First, consuming, transforming and selling foraged or hunted products constituted sources of income outside of the networks of colonial capitalism. Second, these practices necessitated the maintenance and diffusion of knowledge fostered within vernacular social structures, which ran contrary to the colonial “civilizing mission”. Third, by trading and consuming such products, local communities circumvented the colonial market economy. The project addresses four questions: [1] Which techniques are mobilised for hunting, fishing and foraging? [2] Which strategies are used to trade and consume hunted and foraged products against colonial laws and values? [3] How are economic structures such as marketplaces and money mobilised outside of colonial capitalism? [4] Which knowledge is necessary to hunt, forage and transform natural products? They will be answered through four thematic sub-studies: on intoxicating substances; on hunted and foraged foodstuffs; on curative uses of nature; and on vernacular environmental agency. Each sub-study will consider the ecological interactions between four colonial cities and their hinterland: Léopoldville, Brazzaville, Stanleyville and Usumbura. FORAGENCY will combine archival data, material culture, oral testimonies and participatory observation. It will lead to the development of a new conceptual framework on indigenous ecologies, at the crossroads of decolonial and posthumanist studies, which will open new perspectives on the history of vernacular responses to colonialism and capitalism.
REEL BORDERS
Kevin Smets, REEL BORDERS, StG 2020
Fiction Film and Borderlands
While modern Europe is characterised by openness and collaboration, borders still outline distinct cultural identities throughout the EU. Border regions often present unique opportunities to study how frontiers affect people's identities and sense of belonging. The EU-funded REEL BORDERS project will use fiction film to study and explain how borders are perceived and represented by inhabitants of these regions. This could offer a unique view on how borders can affect conflict, migration and geopolitics, and shed light on how film can be used to shape the perception of territorial frontiers. The goal is to enhance our understanding of borders, advancing cultural studies and the uses of fiction film in Europe and beyond.
DATAUNION
Rocco Bellanova, DATAUNION, StG 2021
The European Data Union: European Security Integration through Database Interoperability
Data is growing exponentially, and information stored in autonomous databases is becoming increasingly interconnected. Europe’s policymakers are building a Data Union – one of the largest real-life experiments of database interoperability – to facilitate public authorities’ access across diverse IT systems. This is important in terms of public security practices, institutional governance and protecting fundamental rights. However, little is known about how interoperability structures and rearranges modern power relations. In this context, the EU-funded DATAUNION project will theorise the socio-material practices that underpin database interoperability. It will evaluate the implications of the Data Union’s construction, develop a multimodal study of how digital technologies feed European security integration, and deliver new insights about the frictions shaping the making of a European Data Union.
ICEÂł
Harry Zekollari, Ice cubed, StG 2023
ICEÂł : Modelling the global multi-century evolution of glacier ICE in 3D
Glaciers are key contributors to sea-level rise and are critical water resources that supply fresh water to hundreds of millions of people around the world. It is therefore of paramount importance to accurately simulate the future evolution of these precious ice bodies. Despite recent progress in modelling the global evolution of glaciers, existing simulations suffer from vast uncertainties related to (i) model input, (ii) a simplified representation of glacier processes, and (iii) an important mismatch between the timescales over which models are calibrated (multi-annual to decadal) and those over which the future glacier projections occur (century timescale). ICEÂł will revolutionise the regional- to global-scale modelling of glaciers, by (i) strongly reducing uncertainties in model input through innovative inversion of climatic information, (ii) developing new approaches to model glacier processes in 3D, and (iii) for the first time simulating past glacier evolution globally over centennial time scales with an ice-dynamic model. These improvements will culminate in new global glacier evolution projections under a range of future emission scenarios, which will in turn inform the next generation of sea-level rise and water availability projections. While redefining the landscape of large-scale glacier modelling, ICEÂł will also ensure that the novelties it produces are incorporated in climate change impact models to guide policymakers and practitioners in adapting to a changing environment.
CODE
Antonio Calcara, CODE, StG 2023
Competition in the Digital Era: Geopolitics and Technology in the 21st Century
CODE examines technological competition between China, the United States (US) and Europe in three key sectors for contemporary economics and geopolitics: semiconductors, cloud computing and space. Theoretically, the project aims to integrate analytical tools from international relations, political economy and management and innovation to provide a comprehensive theory to explain the dynamics of competition for access to and control of critical technologies. Methodologically, the project aims to use qualitative and quantitative tools to measure technological competition, as well as markets and patent databases, which will then be analysed using network analysis and machine learning tools. Empirically, the project will focus on three of the most important sectors where technological competition is currently taking place: semiconductors, cloud computing and space technology. CODE aims to build a multidisciplinary research group, ideally including researchers with quantitative and qualitative skills who are interested in technological and geopolitical competition. The project will zoom in on the following themes: technological competition between China, the US and Europe and its geopolitical implications; geoeconomics, European strategic autonomy and technological sovereignty; China’s industrial and innovation policy; the return of industrial policy in the US and Europe; the role of digital technologies, big data and artificial intelligence in international politics; the role of public and private actors in space policy in China, the US and Europe; state-business relations and economic statecraft; and the role of commercial technologies and the private sector in the field of security and defence.
Current Consolidator Grants
SINATRA
Luis SimĂłn, SINATRA, CoG 2021
Subject or Object? SINo-American competition and European sTRAtegic autonomy
The power struggle between the United States and China is intensifying. How could Europe position itself in this growing rivalry? The EU-funded SINATRA project will explore the degree to which the EU freely makes decisions concerning its dealings with both superpowers in areas such as trade, thechnology and foreign and security policy. It rejects the theory that the EU will become either an independent subject, object or battlefield in the Sino-American rivalry; instead, it claims that the EU is both subject and object. In arguing its case, the project will examine European, American and Chinese voting patterns, as well as spoken or written communication in different global organisations and debates.
ReplaceMi
Kiavash Movahedi, ReplaceMi, CoG 2022
Microglia engineering and replacement to treat brain disease
Microglia are cells that reside in the brain and are involved in maintaining brain health and modulating inflammation. Dysfunctional microglia have been linked to neurological disorders, making them a prime target for therapy. Microglia are capable of self-renewal, offering a unique opportunity for cell therapy. However, there are no current approaches for the specific replacement of microglia. Funded by the European Research Council, the ReplaceMi project aims to develop an innovative strategy to replace embryonic microglia using specific progenitors. Using induced pluripotent stem cells, researchers will identify progenitors that can efficiently engraft in the brain as microglia. ReplaceMi will also investigate how microglia can be transformed into protein production factories to treat neurodegenerative disorders and identify gene networks for improving microglial disease responses
MERLIT
Ulrike Pirker, MERLIT, CoG 2022
Meritocracy and Literature: Transcultural Approaches to Hegemonic Forms
MERLIT is the first systematic, diachronic and comparative investigation of meritocratic narratives in literature. Meritocratic thinking manifests itself in powerful narratives across the globe, from the constitutionally embedded “pursuit of happiness” to neoliberal narratives of self-enhancement. MERLIT investigates forms of these narratives, which are embraced for their seemingly empowering and universalist appeal, but also criticised for their enmeshment with structures of domination and privilege. MERLIT explores how meritocratic narratives are written, how they are written into cultures, but also how they are written back to in text forms that have shaped the zeitgeist of particular moments respectively. Although research into meritocratic thinking is a vibrant interdisciplinary field, it is characterised (1) by a lack of investigations into the formal principles underpinning – or challenging – meritocratic articulations, (2) by a narrow focus on (white) Western contexts and (3) by a concentration on recent developments. To counter these gaps, (1) MERLIT explores in six work packages how practices of writing have played, and continue to play, crucial roles in shaping meritocratic articulations but also critiques thereof; (2) MERLIT expands the contextual focus of existing scholarship by engaging with radical writing practices from the Global South and a range of transculturally entangled anglophone contexts; eventually, (3) MERLIT challenges perceptions of meritocratic thinking and its critiques as recent phenomena by engaging with changing forms of articulating value, merit and success from the 17th century to the present. Situated at the intersections of literary history, new formalist theory and cultural translation, MERLIT not only offers a literary history of meritocratic thought, but significantly advances our understanding of the workings of a set of hegemonic forms in and through writing, and of the formative, worldmaking role of literature.
CertiFox
Bart Bogaerts, CertiFox, CoG 2023
Certified First-Order Model Expansion
The field of combinatorial optimization is concerned with developing generic tools that take a declarative problem description and automatically compute an optimal solution to it. Often, users specify their problem in a high-level, human-understandable formal language. This specification is first translated into a low-level specification a solver understands and subsequently solved. Thanks to tremendous progress in solving technology, we can now solve a wide variety of NP-hard (or worse) problems in practice. Moreover, these tools are increasingly used in real-life applications, including high-value and life-affecting decisions. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that they be completely reliable. The central objective of this proposal is to develop methodologies and tools with which we can guarantee with 100% certainty that the right problem has been solved correctly.
To achieve this ambitious objective, I will build on recent breakthroughs in proof logging, where solvers do not just output an answer, but also a proof (or certificate) of correctness. However, a major limitation of current techniques is that correctness is not proven relative to the human-understandable specification written by the user, but relative to the low-level translation that the solver receives, meaning that there is no guarantee that the solver is solving the original problem. In this project, I will investigate end-to-end guarantees of correctness. When successful, this will have a major impact on the way combinatorial optimization software is developed, evaluated, and used: the proofs produced will enable (1) debugging, since proofs contain detailed information about where bugs occurred, (2) auditability, since proofs can be stored and checked by an independent third party, and even (3) rigorous evaluation of algorithmic improvements.
FLUX
Steven GODERIS, CoG 2023
Tracing the FLUX of cosmic dust arriving to Earth during the Phanerozoic
For the last 4.5 billion years, extraterrestrial (ET) materials have continuously bombarded the Earth. Today, the Solar System debris that reaches the Earth’s surface is dominated by particles less than 2 mm in size, termed micrometeorites (MMs). Until recently, the established misconception was that these MMs did not survive geological timescales, limiting reconstructions of the dust flux through time that are currently based on finding rare relict mineral phases or applying geochemical tools (e.g., Ir contents, 3He isotope ratios). Following a successful proof-of-concept study on a Late Devonian section, FLUX proposes first to extract fossil MMs from selected stratigraphic intervals across the Phanerozoic to document their characteristics and origin and second to use them as a novel high-resolution proxy to better understand the dynamical interactions between the Solar System and Earth. As such, fossil MMs may serve as an alternative new source of information on Solar System processes, complementary to classic meteorites. By combining expertise in meteoritics, geochemistry, and chemostratigraphy, FLUX addresses the following questions: 1) How did the flux of cosmic dust evolve during the Phanerozoic? 2) Can stratigraphic intervals marked by a dramatic increase in the mass of cosmic dust accreting to the Earth be identified? 3) Do increased ET flux events reflect asteroid family-forming events in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, and are they influenced by changes in the shape of Earth’s orbit? 4) Can oxidized iron-rich MMs be used to reconstruct the gross primary productivity or atmospheric CO2 levels of the deep past? 5) Did ET flux fluctuations affect the global Earth environment, for example through ocean fertilization? Ultimately, FLUX will better position the Earth in the context of a dynamic Solar System and constrain the causes and consequences of the variations in the flux of cosmic dust to Earth.
Advanced Grants
Mireille Hildebrandt, CoHuBiCoL, AdG 2017
Counting as a Human Being in the Era of Computational Law
This project will investigate how the prominence of counting and computation transforms many of the assumptions, operations and outcomes of the law. It targets two types of computational law: artificial legal intelligence or data-driven law (based on machine learning), and cryptographic or code-driven law (based on blockchain technologies). Both disrupt, erode and challenge conventional legal scholarship and legal practice. The core thesis of the research is that the upcoming integration of computational law into mainstream legal practice, could transform the mode of existence of law and notably of the Rule of Law. Such a transformation will affect the nature of legal protection, potentially reducing the capability of individual human beings to invoke legal remedies, restricting or ruling out effective redress. To understand and address this transformation, modern positive law will be analysed as text-driven law, enabling a comparative analysis of text-driven, data-driven and code-driven normativity. The overarching goal is to develop a new hermeneutics for computational law, based on (1) research into the assumptions and (2) the implications of computational law, and on (3) the development of conceptual tools to rethink and reconstruct the Rule of Law in the era of computational law. The intermediate goals are an in-depth assessment of the nature of legal protection in text-driven law, and of the potential for legal protection in data-driven and code-driven law. The new hermeneutics will enable a new practice of interpretation on the cusp of law and computer science. The research methodology is based on legal theory and philosophy of law in close interaction with computer science, integrating key insights into the affordances of computational architectures into legal methodology, thus achieving a pivotal innovation of legal method.
Current Proof of Concept Grants
EVO-LC
Wim De Malsche, EVO-LC, PoC 2022
Column with AC-EOF Induced Vortices for HPLC
In most high-performance analytical instruments, which are used to carry out blood analysis, for example, the first step is separation, in which the various components in a sample to be examined are divided into groups before being presented to a detector. Further improvement of the process is limited due to the slow spontaneous transport of the components in the traditionally exploited, naturally occurring, diffusion process.
In the context of ERC Starting Grant EVODIS, the µFlow group of Prof. Wim De Malsche of VUB was able to generate a vortex mixing effect between channel walls of microdevices, in order to accelerate the mass transport rate much more than what is possible by pure diffusion only, therewith reducing dispersion. This effect was achieved by applying an oscillating electric field.
In EVO-LC these lateral vortices will be integrated in an HPLC column to realize an improvement in chromatographic efficiency by a factor of 2-3 under relevant chromatographic conditions. As part of the ERC POC a demonstrator for such miniaturized HPLC column will be built. The new column promises faster and higher-performance separations in a miniaturized system, which can be used in analytical labs, but also for patients in a point-of-care setting. One possible application is the analysis of haemoglobin levels for better diagnosis and monitoring of diabetes.
VORTEX SENSOR
Wim De Malsche, VORTEX SENSOR, PoC 2022 (start project 1/03/24)
Vortex microflow inducer that enables detection of ultra-low concentrations of species in sensors
According to WHO, in 2018, more than 100,000 chemicals were released into the global environment due to their production, use, and disposal. In this regard, water is the key element for their effective transport in the food chain and since remediation can be extremely difficult, such pollution is leading to acute or chronic toxicity in aquatic organisms, loss of habitats and biodiversity as well as human diseases. But, industrial wastewater flows contain hazardous and toxic species that are not easy to process, and treatment installations need extremely reliable and sensitive sensing solutions to continuously monitor the efficiency of the side stream treatment processes. At the same time, the world population is increasingly depending on aquaculture for nutritious food. Frequent analysis of the water quality is essential and needs to be performed at point-of-testing, not in remote laboratories. The common challenges in environmental control, wastewater management and aquaculture are that, in small sample sizes, species need to be detected that are present in very low concentrations, with a technique that can be performed at point-of-testing, at low cost and in a minimum of time. In the last decade, new sensor technologies have emerged that can meet these challenges. These sensors however require the sample to flow over the sensor surface and, importantly, detection is only possible if the target species in flow makes contact with the sensor surface. This is one of the key technological hurdles that today’s microfluidics sensors have not overcome yet. In VORTEX SENSOR vortices will be induced in the flow channel with acoustic streaming, an approach which was developed in ERC Starting Grant EVODIS. This will enable long range transport of compounds towards the sensor surface. In VORTEX SENSOR a prototype of the very first biosensor with vortex microflow inducer will be built and its performance will be validated with two relevant pathogens for aquaculture of salmon.
