Hydrogen, the simplest of all atoms, forms the stable and well-known diatomic hydrogen molecule, H2. Hydrogen also forms a very stable triatomic positive ion, H3+, which is a very important ingredient for interstellar molecular clouds and has been studied for many years. It is much less well known that also a negatively charged form of triatomic hydrogen exists. Experimentally it has only been seen a few times and also theoretically it has only been the topic of a small number of studies up to now. In this project, the formation, the properties, and the fragmentation of the H3- system and the related hydrogen anion complexes HCO-, HN2-, and HNO- will be studied using a closely interacting team of experimentalists and theoreticians. We will target the formation processes, the structure and stability of these negative ions, and their fragmentation pathways after photodetachment. This information will be very useful to search for an interstellar appearance of these anions. We will perform calculations in the Orsay and Bordeaux groups to obtain quantitative rate coefficients for of the association of H- with H2, CO, NO and N2, both radiatively and by three-body collisions down to a temperature of a few Kelvin. This information will be used to plan the experiments in Innsbruck and demonstrate the formation of the anion complexes in a cryogenic radiofrequency ion trap. Spectroscopic studies in different near- and far-infrared spectral regions will then be carried in the laboratory to obtain rotational and vibrational transition frequencies for comparison with ab initio calculations performed in France. The comparison will be used to refine the structure calculations and obtain high quality predictions of the entire eigenstate spectrum of these anions. In addition, these data will be made available to astronomers to search for emission lines of the hydrogen anion complexes in radioastronomical observations. To study the stability of the negative ion complexes precise calculations of their binding energy with respect to dissociation as well as their adiabatic and vertical electron affinities will be performed using up-to-date quantum chemistry approaches. These calculations will be tested in experiments on thermally activated collision induced dissociation of the anions and on photodetachment near threshold, from which electron affinities can be deduced. By including the formation and fragmentation rates into models of interstellar chemistry, the abundance of H- relative to H3- will be derived and compared to neutral hydrogen using either detected H3- line emission or upper limits of H3- column densities. As a result this project will provide a new level of understanding of the structure and stability of different hydrogen molecular anion complexes and the role of the hydrogen anion in cold, dark areas of the interstellar medium.

Determining the conformation of a small molecule inside a huge molecular weight structure is crucial for the understanding of the fundamental molecular processes that drive the interactions. Many of these complexes are neither crystalline nor soluble and are thus difficult to study by classical methods such as NMR, X-ray diffraction etc. To the best of our knowledge, a limited number of atomic structures of such systems were reported to date. In our project, we propose a new strategy based on the synergetic combination of organic synthesis (chimio-, regio- and stereo-specific tritium labeling; carbon-13 and nitrogen-15 labeling), solid state NMR and molecular modeling as a novel unique tool-kit to determine the conformation of a small molecule embedded in a high molecular and non-crystalline assembly. To develop our strategy we choose a model small molecule, the Phe-Phe dipeptide that forms either crystals or self-assembled nanotubes depending on the solvent. If the crystalline atomic structure of Phe-Phe has been solved, the structure of the self-assembled nanotubes of Phe-Phe is still unknown. To solve such structure, precise intra- and intermolecular distances should be determined to get not only the conformation of the molecule but also its packing within the assembly. We will develop our strategy (chemical synthesis, solid state NMR and molecular modeling) on Phe-Phe crystal. This strategy will be then applied to determine the atomic structure of Phe-Phe nanotubes. The result of this project is expected to pave the way for numerous forthcoming applications such as pharmacology, biology (determination of a ligand structure bounded to its receptor, self-assembled molecules) and nanotechnology (determination of the conformation and the precise position of a small molecule within a supramolecular architecture).

The emergence of novel materials, such as 2D systems and functional oxides, whose properties stem from the ultrafast evolution, on a time scale ranging from picoseconds to sub-femtoseconds, of atomic and electronic rearrangements under an external stimulus, is key enabling technology for future innovative devices. Thermoelectric and photovoltaic cells based on two-dimensional atomic monolayers, optical sensors, universal memories and supercapacitors, based on multiferroics systems, are examples of electronic devices which could reach the commercial stage in the close or near future. Although an enormous effort has been devoted to the comprehension and improvement of these materials and devices, the capabilities of investigating their spatiotemporal dynamics is hindered by the difficulty of simultaneously studying electronic and atomic motions at the proper length and time scales. In this scenario, a multi-dimensional approach for visualization of matter with both high temporal and spatial resolutions, together with energy and momentum selection, is therefore an essential pre-requisite to fully capture their dynamic behavior. This project aims to develop a new experimental platform, where sub-femtosecond photoelectron emission microscopy and femtosecond electron diffraction and imaging will work in symbiosis to provide the real-time access to electron and atomic dynamics in surfaces, interfaces and nanosystems. This highly inter- and multi-disciplinary project will pave the way for an unprecedented insight into the non-equilibrium phenomena of advanced materials, and will play a fundamental role in the rational design and engineering of future applications. In order to reveal the performance and potentialities of the proposed strongly innovative experimental platform, two types of systems, two-dimensional (2D) materials and multiferroics, have been selected. In 2D materials, the investigation of the dynamics of energy and charge carriers will provide a key understanding on how to suppress or enhance thermal and electrical conductivities, which crucially determine the efficiency of thermoelectric and photovoltaic cells. In multiferroics, the proposed methodology will provide direct information on the key factors governing the dynamic coupling between electronic relaxation processes and atomic rearrangements during ultrafast reversible domain switching induced by external IR and optical stimuli. The proposed experimental platform is of absolute novelty in the entire French scientific landscape. The project will therefore introduce a unique instrumentation to French research, giving France a strategic position within the European and world scientific scenario, aligning the country with those highly competitive systems, such as in Germany and United States, where a significant effort is currently being devoted towards the implementation of advanced facilities for the investigation of ultrafast phenomena.

Over the last decades, people have been exposed to increasing noise from multiple sources, including transportation noise, amplified music, concerts, TV and video games. Regulations dealing with occupational or leisure noise in western countries do not consider the cumulative effect of daily exposure at loud but non-traumatic sound pressure levels (80dB SPL), which is still considered harmless. Recent studies suggest that this complacency is misplaced: significant damage to the peripheral auditory system is not necessarily accompanied by immediate impairments that can be measured with audiometry. It is thus possible that auditory function could be progressively degraded by environmental noise, but this damage would remain undetected in epidemiologic studies based solely on audiometry. The purpose of the project DAILYNOISE is to assess the long-term effects of daily 8 hour exposure to noise at 80dB SPL, which mimics noise levels routinely encountered in everyday life. To this end, we use an animal model with a short lifespan (the Sprague-Dawley rat, 2 years) to follow degradation to the whole auditory system over the course of a lifespan. First, modifications of the auditory nerve output due to peripheral damage and frequent stimulation may lead to plasticity-related changes at upper stages of the auditory system. Also, age-related changes will interfere with neural processing of natural sounds and background noise. The DAILYNOISE project proposes to track for the first time peripheral, subcortical, cortical and behavioral changes in auditory function in individual animals from young adulthood to old age. We will quantify i) impairment in hair cell function; ii) classical audiometry measures of subcortical neural processing; iii) cortical spectral and temporal processing, including processing of communication sounds such as conspecific and heterospecific vocalizations; iv) robustness of neural responses to noise, which is attenuated in people suffering from hearing loss related to aging or exposure to traumatic sounds; v) modifications of thalamocortical inhibitory processes, which are also known to be down-regulated by either noise-induced or aging-induced hearing loss. Techniques ranging from the cellular (immunohistochemistry) to more integrated levels (in-vivo electrophysiology, computational neuroscience, behavioral training) will be deployed and integrated for this project. This ambitious set of experiments is made possible by the broad range of expertise of the DAILYNOISE team. Epidemiologic as well as animal studies suggest (without proving) that long-term environmental noise damages and significantly modifies auditory processing in our animals. This project will for the first time determine whether environmental noise actually induces hearing impairment. In addition to its innovative methodology, DAILYNOISE will have significant impact on public policy and health, providing empirical data that will inform the development of better regulations, and influencing better-informed lifestyle choices, potentially improving the living conditions and health of hundreds of millions of inhabitants inside and outside the workplace.

Slow wave sleep and its underlying corticothalamocortical activity -slow oscillations- appears to be critical not only for memory but also for the maintenance of the brain?s structural and functional connectivity. At the same time, slow oscillations are an emergent pattern from the network, highly revealing of the underlying structure and dynamics of the system. In this project we plan to develop a data-constrained realistic model of the generation of slow oscillations. It will consist of a biophysically realistic model of adaptive exponential integrate-and-fire cells fully compatible with existing neuromorphic implementations in HBP. The model will go beyond state-of-art models by first describing mathematically and then fitting to real cortical data not only the first-order structure (mean), but also the second-order structure (variance and correlations) of the spatio-temporal organization of slow-wave oscillations. This model will be first developed and used to understand and document the cellular and network mechanisms slow wave oscillatory activity, and then to investigate the transformation of slow wave sleep with age and in two murine models of neurodegenerative disease associated to ageing. The model will be built and constrained using experimental data of cortical activity during slow oscillations obtained covering multiple scales. These data, together with a set of purpose-developed analytical methods, will reveal the causal contribution of genetically identified neurons to the slow wave dynamics, the 2D and 3D patterns of propagation of activity across different areas, an will go all the way to the very extensive data set of EEG obtained from large populations of humans during sleep through the SME in the project. A large emphasis will be on the analytical methods used at all levels, and the resulting tools will be useful for the scientific community. With this approach, we want to understand the underlying cortical system at multiple scales and reproduce it in silico. This will open up the possibilities for designing sensory stimulation patterns during sleep that restore young sleep in ageing individuals, an intervention expected to have a positive impact on cognition. This specific application will be directly accessible to society through the exploitation of the project led by the partner company.