Presentation of the call
NeuroMarseille institute wishes to promote scientific exchanges and encourage the emergence of new collaborative projects within Marseille’s neuroscience community. The institute constitutes a component of Aix-Marseille University (AMU) supported by AMIDEX funding. The use of funding is therefore governed by AMIDEX financial rules and subject to evaluation. In this context, NeuroMarseille institute opens this call titled “Innovative and Collaborative Research Grants in Neuroscience”, in order to promote collaboration between people involved in Neuroscience research (see the “Application procedures” tab) willing to start new innovative and high-quality projects.
Each project will be granted up to 20 k€ over a period of 12 months. This amount will be managed by one of the Partners involved in the project, who will be defined by the applicants.
Eligibility criteria
Applicants: Personnel belonging to Research Units (UMR) affiliated to NeuroMarseille can answer this call, including: Researchers (CR, MCU, DR, Pr, PU), Engineers (AI, IE, IR), as well as Post-docs and PhD students.
Projects must involve at least two Partners (researchers/teams/units) who do not belong to the same UMR. In case of a collaboration with one or more partner(s) not belonging to NeuroMarseille, the funding will only be half of the maximum allocation. In case of a collaboration involving 2 NeuroMarseille partners and one or more partner(s) not belonging to NeuroMarseille, the allocation will remain whole.
Partner 1 (see Application Form in the “Documents available for download” tab) will be the applicant and will be responsible for managing the allocated budget, and must belong to NeuroMarseille.
Research program: The research program must be particularly innovative and should not represent the continuation of an ongoing project. Priority will be given to novelty and innovation; preliminary data are therefore not compulsory. The evaluated criteria will be: the program feasibility (equipment, collaborations, personnel involved, etc…), the scientific quality of the project as well as scientific quality of the participating teams, with a special focus on their complementarity.
Eligible expenses: A detailed budget must be attached to the project proposal. Eligible expenses include: equipment, operating costs and undergraduate traineeship grants.
Application procedures
Submission: The project submission deadline is June 3, 2020, at 23:59. Applicants must use the Application Form provided by NeuroMarseille (see the “Documents available for download” tab)
Evaluation: The Scientific Committee, composed of NeuroMarseille neuroscientists with the support of national experts, will evaluate and select the projects. The evaluations will be sent by e-mail to the applicants by the first week of July, 2020.
Terms of engagement: It is mandatory to mention the support of NeuroMarseille in all scientific publications and communications in relation with the project:
“This work was supported by a grant from NeuroMarseille (#AMX-19-IET-004)”
The grantees involved in the project could be asked to present their findings during the events organized by NeuroMarseille.
Results
We received sixteen high-quality submissions reflecting the possible interconnections between labs. After deliberation of the scientific committee, the allocated budget made it possible to fund seven projects. We are pleased to announce the winning projects of this first edition :
- Paolo Gubellini (IBDM) and Abdel-Mouttalib Ouagazzal (LNC) for their project: Modulation of striatal NMDA receptor by synaptic zinc: physiological and pathological implications
- Françoise Padilla (LNC) and Fanny Mann (IBDM) for their project: 3D mapping of neuronal network remodeling in chronic arthritic inflammation: impact of sodium channel activity
- Florence Jaouen (INT) and Agnes Baude (INMED) for their project: Molecular transcriptomics: combining synaptic tracing and single-cell RNA sequencing to understand neuronal diversity
- Clément Menuet (INMED) and Jean-Charles Viemari (INT) for their project: Does oxytocin promote beneficial enhancement of cardiorespiratory coupling?
- Eric Castet (LPC) and Christophe Lopez (LNSC) for their project: Vestibular contribution to visuo-spatial attention in a virtual reality environment
- Marieke Longcamp (LNC) and Olivier Coulon & Guillaume Auzias (INT) for their project: Early cerebral constraints on writing skills in middle childhood
- Benjamin Morillon & Olivier Blin (INS) and Jennifer Coull (LNC) for their project: Dopamine network in auditory temporal attention: a double-blind random pharmacological trial with healthy volunteers