The incidental, accidental, or intentional release of manufactured nanomaterials into the environment and its exposure to humans is inevitable due to the exponential growth in invention, production, and use of them. It can have a huge impact in our health specially in the most sensible and exposed human body organs such us lungs, stomach, and brain. iCare aim to to develop a resilient and adaptive set of advanced imaging technologies to quantify physical-chemistry properties for ANMC in complex matrices. The main objective will focus on a integrated model system to characterize and predict the impact of nanomaterials on brain health to prevent the toxicity nanomaterials. The project makes accessible for industry a set of techniques and methodologies to evaluate changes in morphology, chemical composition and reactivity of nanomaterials when exposed to complex homogenous matrices mimicking environmental and biological exposure, with a particular emphasis on high-resolution imaging methodologies. To achieve this goal the project the project brings together in the consortium 11 partners from different backgrounds such as RTOs, SMEs, industries and universities from different EU and non-eu countries and coming from different fields like nanotech, toxicology, advanced materials, advanced imaging, … During the 48 months long of the project, the consortium will work on the development of different activities to achieve the following results: 1)new imaging methods achieving new high resolution methodologies and new super resolution imaging techniques 2)development of toxicology testing protocols and addressing current gaps in nanotoxicology, 3)development of tools and methods bringing the gap in vitro and in vivo testing, 4)efficiency of materials and product development 5)Delivery of reliable data and improved data reporting and finally development of harmonised standardised test methods that can be used in regulatory frameworks.

In native tissues, the extracellular matrix (ECM) provides not only physical scaffolding to cells, but also biochemical and biomechanical cues affecting cell behaviour. ECM mechanical properties are critical in the regulation of cell behaviour during tissue development, homeostasis and disease via mechano-transduction. Albeit biological tissues generally exhibit a time variant (i.e. dynamic) viscoelastic behaviour that changes during development, ageing and disease, to date most of mechano-transduction studies have focused on static elastic properties only. The ENDYVE project aims at engineering tissue dynamic viscoelasticity typical of pathophysiological processes in-vivo to investigate its role on cell behaviour. Focusing on cardiomyocyte maturation, the viscoelastic properties of foetal, neonatal, aged and infarcted cardiac tissue will be characterised and used to design cell culture substrates with temporally tuneable mechanical properties that initially mimic foetal viscoelasticity and then can be made more stiff and less viscoelastic during cell culture via a second-step biocompatible enzymatic crosslinking to recapitulate dynamic changes of cardiac viscoelasticity in-vitro. First, stem cell cardiomyocyte behaviour will be investigated at discrete levels of constant viscoelasticity by seeding human induced pluripotent stem cells on substrates prior to and after enzyme-mediated crosslinking. Then the effect of dynamic changes in substrate viscoelasticity will be characterised during culture. Engineering dynamic viscoelasticity is a critical step towards a better understating of cell-ECM interactions and mechano-transduction, and could lead to the development of new strategies to finely control cell behaviour, with numerous potential societal and clinical implication, such as obtaining mature differentiated cells from stem cells for drug screening in vitro, or limiting, if not preventing, fibrosis and tumour progression.

Phys2BioMed will offer excellent interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral training to a team of motivated early stage researchers (ESRs) on the application of cutting-edge physical tools for the mechanical phenotyping of cells and tissues of clinical relevance, aiming at developing novel early-diagnostic tools. The Phys2BioMed network will merge diverse competences at European level, from different fields like nanoscience and nanotechnology, physics, biology, and medicine, and will expose ESRs to the non academic and private sector. A key element of the project is the peer-to-peer collaboration of research academic institutions with industries and world-leading medical and clinical centers; these are the main actors of the global challenge against diseases, and within Phys2BioMed they will highlight unmet clinical needs, and actively cooperate with academic colleagues for developing novel diagnostic strategies. ESRs will be trained-through-research by world-leading junior and senior PIs, and will benefit of lecture courses, dedicated international schools and workshops, and topical conferences. Secondments to other nodes of the network will represent the main and more effective channel of dissemination and cross-fertilization of competences, ideas, and knowledge within the network. Besides training talented young scientists, ready to work at the boundary of diverse disciplines in the field of nanomedicine, Phys2BioMed will provide scientific and technological outcomes on biomechanics, and the mechanical determinants of diseases. Technology-wise, it will define standardized procedures for nanomechanical measurements, and the definition of the main features of new-generation instrumentation optimized for the mechanical phenotyping of clinical specimens. In the longer-term, Phys2BioMed will provide the platform and know-how to build a data bank of mechanical fingerprints of diseases, setting the ground for the development of effective early-diagnostic tools.

The FASTER-H2 project will validate, down select, mature and demonstrate key technologies and provide the architectural integration of an ultra-efficient and hydrogen enabled integrated airframe for targeted ultra-efficient Short/Medium Range aircraft (SMR), i.e. 150-250 PAX and 1000-2000nm range. To enable climate-neutral flight, aircraft for short and medium-range distances have to rely on ultra-efficient thermal energy-based propulsion technologies using sustainable drop-in and non-drop-in fuels. Besides propulsion, the integration aspects of the fuel tanks and distribution system as well as sustainable materials for the fuselage, empennage are essential to meet an overarching climate-neutrality of the aviation sector. Green propulsion and fuel technologies will have a major impact on the full fuselage, including the rear fuselage, the empennage structure as well as cabin and cargo architecture in so far as the integration of storage and the integration of systems for the chosen energy source are concerned (H2, direct burn, fuel cell). Not only do the specific properties of hydrogen necessitate a re-consideration of typical aircraft configurations, requiring new design principles formulation and fundamental validation exercises, but they also raise a large number of important follow-on questions relating to hydrogen distribution under realistic operational constraints and safety aspects. The project will explore and exploit advanced production technologies for the integrated fuselage / empennage to reduce production waste and increase material and energy exploitation with Integrated Fuselage concept selected (maturity TRL3/4) until end of first phase in 2025. An anticipated route to TRL6 until end of the Clean Aviation programme in 2030 will ensure entry-into-service in 2035.

A number of conditions, including trauma, inflammation, incontinence, overactive bladder, renal impairments, neurological disorders (like spinal cord injury or spina bifida) and cancer, require bladder augmentation. For almost a century now, the majority of cystoplasties utilize bowel segments (enterocystoplasty). This, almost a century years old, gold standard practice bears numerous risks and complications affecting the majority of patients, thus compromising the quality of life while burdening the health care systems. This has fuelled efforts towards the development of engineered bladder tissue. Advancements in bioprinting technologies are increasingly employed in regenerative medicine but mostly in smaller and less complicated tissues. UroPrint proposes the use of Laser Induced Forward Transfer (LIFT) to generate bladder tissue for autologous transplantation that would meet the biological, mechanical and functional properties of human bladder. To this end, primary urothelial and smooth muscle cells will be obtained from healthy donors and expanded in fully Good Medical Practice compliant methodologies. These will be combined with novel natural autologous scaffold material obtained from platelet lysates. Then, a novel approach in the generation of bladder transplant will be utilized, combining intestine denudation and in vivo printing during surgery using a novel prototype LIFT printer that achieved high spatial resolution (95%) single-urothelial cells.