<< Objectives >>We want to address the evolving situation regarding the management of heritage sites and artefacts, which increasingly demands the use of wider perspectives and transdisciplinary approaches able to combine solid humanistic theoretical grounds with practical fieldwork and lab training by creating a new curriculum that would prepare students for new challenges brought by the changing landscape of the field of heritage management.<< Implementation >>Apart from the work on the project outcomes itself, transnational project meetings (four virtual and five with physical attendance of the TRT members), four workshops, and a professional conference will be implemented.<< Results >>There are two main outcomes expected from this project: 1) Curriculum for a new master`s degree in “Project Manager in Archaeological Heritage”, bringing together knowledge, skills and applied technologies from several academic disciplines. 2) Online platform bringing the lab and fieldwork experiences to the students unable to participate in-vivo. As a follow-up of the project, we expect further cooperation among the partners most likely resulting in an Erasmus Mundus programme.

How can a university from a Widening Country achieve R&D excellence faster and better? The ELABCHROM project provides a twofold answer to this challenge. On the one hand, the solution we propose is not just a contingent “twinning” between various research institutions, but a long-term partnership, in the form of a university consortium that covers all branches of academic life. In this respect, Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu (LBUS - CO) has chosen as partners for ELABCHROM the University of Jyvaskyla (P1) and the University of Burgundy (P2), i.e., two of the best universities within the FORTHEM European University, in which LBUS was included in 2021. On the other hand, a viable solution is also to exploit the advantages of the regional ecosystem, which in the case of LBUS translates primarily through the status of "cultural city/area" of Sibiu. This status, corroborated with the higher degree of development of SSH research directions in the LBUS, determined the choice of the main field of ELABCHROM. Specifically, our project aims to establish, with the support of the universities from the FORTHEM Alliance, a laboratory of cultural heritage within LBUS, which will lead to an increase in the capacity to achieve excellence in research at the level of the institution, as well as to a closer connection between citizens and academia. According to ELABCHROM, LBUS will be able to bridge the gap that still separates it from other Member States universities through a series of institutional reforms (the establishment of the laboratory), organized mobilities and training of researchers and administrative staff, joint activities with P1 and P2 (common conferences, publications and applications), as well as through an exploratory research project, meant to explain Sibiu’s successful development by exploiting its cultural heritage, as well as to produce a model of regional development that can be transferred to other areas of the Widening Countries.

There is an increasing need for miniaturised, multifunctional sensors providing simultaneous access to diverse chemical & biochemical information, required in various applications. Nowadays, such information, is routinely obtained by centralized laboratories and the use of analytical techniques. Although such methods will remain important when an immediate response is not necessary, easy-to-use, rapid point-of-need sensors that can be used by non-specialized personnel or even operate in a completely automated (unattended) manner could be a game-changer in a diverse range of fields such as disease management, robotics or for the early detection of environmental threats. Nanophotonic devices that precisely control light in subwavelength volumes and enhance light–matter interactions, have opened up new prospects for sensing applications, addressing the limitations of current analytical methods in terms of sensitivity, ease-of-use and miniaturization. There are, though, challenges to be overcome. MultiLab addresses these challenges by developing a highly flexible multi-sensing platform compatible with wafer scale manufacturing that will integrate multiple sensing modalities to simultaneously detect biological, chemical, microorganism and molecular targets for medical diagnostics & IoT-based environmental monitoring. The sensing modalities integrated in the MultiLab platform are a) plasmonic augmented, Arrayed Waveguide Grating sensing on a Si3N4 photonic platform for true & scalable multiplexed detection, b) mid-IR PTS employing the same SiN photonic platform for on-chip interferometric sensing by means of MZIs including also the same plasmonic devices and optical read-out as for the PA-AWG, c) graphite-based electro-chemiluminescence sensing. The system will be demonstrated in two applications: a) IoT-enabled, early warning of harmful algae blooms in fresh water sources, b) diagnosis & prognosis of fever without an apparent source.

AMBROSIA aims to provide the foundations for a multi-sensing future-proof Point of Care Unit for sepsis diagnosis offered by a CMOS compatible toolkit and enhanced by on-chip photonic neural network technology to provide an accurate and rapid diagnosis. AMBROSIA will be investing in the established ultra-small-footprint and elevated sensitivity of integrated plasmo-photonic sensors reinforced by the well-known on-chip slow-light effect and micro-transfer printed lasers and photodiodes on Si3N4, as well as the functional processing and classification portfolio of integrated photonic neural network engines, towards painting the landscape of the next-coming disruption in sensor evolution, tailoring them in System-in-Package prototype assemblies, with the sensors being cheap disposable pluggable modules that can rapidly and accurately diagnose sepsis at the bedside in clinical environments. AMBROSIA targets to demonstrate a Point of Care Unit incorporating: i) a switchable sensor area array, with each sensor area facilitating a pluggable, 8-channel label-free plasmo-photonic sensor for sepsis diagnosis with a sensitivity over 130.000nm/RIU and a Limit of Detection below 10-8 RIU for each interferometric sensor, ii) an embedded Si3N4 photonic neural network processing and classifying at the same time the data from at least 7 biomarkers with zero-power providing in the first minutes an accurate and rapid diagnosis for sepsis, iii) Micro-transfer printed lasers and photodetectors on chip that will drastically decrease costs of both the sensing and neural network modules, and render the sensor arrays disposable.

Emerging models in biology show the major role of molecular dynamics in cell regulation mechanisms. Measurements in living cells are hampered by the complexity of the biological system: heterogeneity, large number of molecules, different spatiotemporal scales; and there is currently no microscopy device capable of addressing this wide range of dynamics. We have previously shown that fluorescence fluctuation (FCS) and single molecule tracking (SPT) measurements carried out separately demonstrate the existence of populations diffusing with different spatio-temporal scales (0.1 to 10 um2/s) but do not allow not to understand the underlying mechanisms. For this, it is necessary to develop a device coupling simultaneously these SPT and FCS measurements (2 possible options: single channel or multi-points), with analysis tools integrated into the acquisition process allowing a better exploitation of the multimodal measurements and to perform cross-analyses of these data with weak a priori. In this project, we propose to design an original approach coupling multimodal SPT/FCS instrumentation and dedicated image analysis relying on deep learning. We will develop an acquisition and quantification workflow based on multi-dimensional measurements (us to ms and 0.2 um to 10 nm). Our objective will be to apply this measurement chain to study the spatio-temporal dynamics of RNA polymerase II. This project will constitute a real breakthrough in the measurement and interpretation of molecular dynamics in cells. It is innovative for: 1) instrumentation: simultaneous FCS/SPT acquisition; 2) analysis: development of data processing and analysis methods allowing the extraction of correlated results between different spatiotemporal scales; 3) methodology: collaboration between instrumentalist, modeler and image analyzer in an organization based on the multidisciplinarity of the consortium.