Luxembourg National Research Fund

This project will investigate Lusofonia, i.e. migrants originally from Portuguese-speaking countries (from Portugal and its former colonies), in Luxembourg, an officially trilingual country (German, French and Luxembourgish) with its own complex of migration at the border with three neighbouring countries: France, Belgium and Germany. Lusofonia can be thought of as largely an ‘imagined community’ in the sense that most of the people composing this community do not even have any form contact with each other. Thus, the community is formed by different kind of groups and people who might speak the Portuguese language, on the one hand, but they have different cultural practices, or historical and political positions on the other. Drawing on concepts and tools from sociolinguistics and postcolonial studies, which shed light on issues of migration and language, the DisPOSEG project will examine everyday workplaces interactions and encounters between groups of Lusophone migrants – Europeans, Africans and Brazilians- in Luxembourg. Its innovative dimension is to explore to what extent their migrant conditions in Luxembourg offer possibilities for and/or prevent rearrangements between former “colonisers” and former “colonised” social actors, with a special focus on their workplaces relationships.

The project addresses the tension between an individual’s right to liberty and a state’s sovereign right to control its borders. It analyses how the jurisprudence of international and regional human rights bodies and courts addresses this tension. It aims to re-assess the protection of the right to liberty of migrants, asylums seekers and refugees in Europe, by examining the EU and international human rights legal framework. Specifically, in Luxembourg, the detention of irregular migrants awaiting deportation was first established in Luxembourg in 1972 with the law concerning the entry and residence of aliens. The government implemented its first asylum legislation in 1996, and established its first immigration detention centre in 2002. With the 2017 amendment of the Immigration Law, Luxembourg inter alia extended the maximum period for the detention of migrant children and their families to seven days. The Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe expressed his concern about this development, and called – to no avail – Luxembourg’s Parliament to come up with alternative solutions to controlling immigration with respect to dignity and rights of migrants and children. My project addresses the issue of the detention of migrants and asylum seekers in Europe, by analysing the legal framework on immigration detention and juxtaposing this to Human Rights standards. The general aim is to analyse and clarify the applicable legal framework and to provide state, lawyers and practitioners with a more concrete and clear understanding of states’ obligations, including Luxembourg’s, under European Human Rights Law, and their possible liability in case they fail to do so. The specific aim is to contribute to the under researched issue of the right to personal liberty of non-nationals according to national, European and International Law.

European labor markets undergo significant dynamic changes, as the factors determining skill supply and demand evolve over time. On the one hand, technological progress motivates employers to automate tasks previously performed by workers. On the other hand, inflows of international migrants affect the available pool of skills. We expect these two interrelated phenomena to increase in importance in the coming decades, as they act as leading forces for skill mismatch, workers’ mobility, and inequality in wages. In this project, we study interactions between task automation and international migration in propagating wage and mobility effects across European labor markets. Our goal is to improve our understanding of this nexus by building and quantifying theoretical models of workers’ occupational and regional mobility. Within these frameworks, we evaluate the economic consequences of selected labor market policies (e.g., European visas for non-EU immigrants, upskilling programs in Germany, or improvements in the commuting infrastructure in the Greater Region).

Brexit, U.S. protectionist trade policies and COVID-19 are important shocks that have recently shaken the global economy. This project aims to quantify the outcomes of these shocks and develop a comprehensive general equilibrium model with realistic assumptions. The key novelty of our approach is the focus on the quality of products and mobility of labor. Using the real data, we predict the economic outcomes for world leading economies and Luxembourg. We center our analysis on the impact of the shocks on product quality and welfare and discuss their impact on Luxembourgish sectors.

From the success of “I kiss you” (1999) and the Million Dollar Homepage (2005) on the Web to the #IceBucketChallenge, the calls for a generalised blockade (especially via Facebook) which marked the beginning of the French yellow vest movement in 2019 and the popularity of the Harlem Shake on YouTube (2013), viral Internet phenomena have a massive impact. While this viral content is of particular interest nowadays, especially when it comes to the dissemination of so-called “fake news”, our research postulates that, although the platforms themselves may have changed, these phenomena demonstrate continuities and patterns through time and space, like most digital cultures. Our project therefore aims to reveal, analyse, historicise, formalise and communicate about this intangible heritage as a means of shedding light on current digital cultures.

Literature has always played a major role in the construction of national identity. As such, literary production in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg reflects a rich, multilingual and complex reality. With regard to Luxembourgish Francophonie, female authors have their works quantitatively hailed more often by critics than their male counterparts, even if they sometimes remain less known on the literary scene. The FEATHER project aims to reflect this important heritage of literature and thus participate in the development and enhancement of works of female authors from 1900 to the present day. Today the corpus is made up of 180 authors, many of whose works remain to be identified. Using the Dictionnaire des auteurs luxembourgeois and work on the archival holdings of the Bibliothèque Nationale du Luxembourg and the Centre National de la Littérature, the project will identify and analyze with precision the journeys and sacralizations of women’s works since the dawn of the 20th century.

Pollinator insects provide a particularly large contribution to both our ecosystems and our economy. It has been estimated that, globally, the economic value of pollination is worth a total of €153 billion. Alarmingly though, many studies have shown that wild pollinators are declining globally both in abundance and diversity. Understanding the factors contributing to this decline is therefore of great importance for the future of pollination. While habitat loss and fragmentation are often seen as the main causes of the problem, we do not really understand the response of insect pollinators to a changing habitat. Hoverflies, a large group of flies that feed on pollen and nectar and can frequently be seen hovering near flower, are the most important insect pollinators beside bees. In this project, we aim to use state-of-the-art genetic techniques to understand how these flies move around urban and agricultural landscapes and what features may favour or hinder their movement. The proposed project has thus the potential to make an important contribution in the design of effective habitat management practices for pollinators.

Many of us have invited Artificial Intelligence (AI) into our lives without knowing (or caring) how it works: Siri™, Alexa™, Deepl™, and Google Translate™ are just a few examples of it. Similarly, prosecutors and courts have brought in sophisticated AI to help them investigate, prosecute, and judge criminal behaviour barely knowing how it works. In doing so, they have sailed into uncharted waters. To date, no one has actually paid much attention to whether the current rules courts and prosecutors must abide by, are enough to protect human rights standards (e.g., right to privacy and data protection and to effective judicial protection) and fundamental criminal procedure principles (e.g., judicial independence and the presumption of innocence) when AI, rather than a human, finds or produces the evidence relied on. That must change: we must know that courts and prosecutors honour and respect those hard-won standards and principles. Our project is designed to find this out.Gathering highly qualified experts in criminal law, IT law, data protection law, as well as in AI and machine learning, cybernetics, ethics, and through talking with representatives of the private sector developing AI, this cutting-edge, 3-year project will examine critical questions about using AI in criminal proceedings. We will compare its use in France, Germany, Israel, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. To the extent we find that the existing rules are not able to protect existing standards and principles, we will propose innovative legal rules and principles for national and supranational bodies to ensure that judicial authorities reap the benefits of AI while still respecting human rights and fundamental principles.

There is a good understanding of know how population aging affects pension systems and the economies as a whole. However, the same cannot be said about the socio-economic aspects of population aging. Are aging societies more fair towards its members, young and old? How do aging societies decide about how to spend public money? Are aging societies more or less willing to accept immigrants in order to sustain public finances? How are aging societies voting? Do they go more for the political extremes as the old and the young have different needs? Or will they target for consensus? Are aging societies more willing to encourage women to participate more in the labor market? And if so, does this imply a change in how people view women? These are some of the questions our research project will address. Our aim is to reflect over these research questions, to make assumptions as to potential answers and to come up with quantifiable results. Having a clear answer is essential as it will allow policy makers to expand their set of reasonable policies.

“Smart cities” is a hegemonic concept in urban development and planning, as practitioners are gripped by the possibilities/implications of new technologies that can revolutionize how cities are organized and function, particularly in respect to infrastructural development, promoting efficient use of resources, and targeting sustainability objectives. Yet, what is the role of large digital corporations (LDCs)? Certainly the range of services, platforms, technologies, and innovations provided by LDCs is not only increasing in volume but also in centrality, as more and more institutions, public and private, are relying on these for essential infrastructure. This trend impacts not only the palate of technologies that the future digital city might provide, but it also challenges both urban governance and socio-political and intuitional patterns that characterize contemporary urbanity. The involvement of LDCs in urban planning is not without risks. The project, “Digital Urban Development — How large digital corporations shape the field of urban governance” (DIGI-GOV) examines zeroes in on this role of LDCs in the socio-political spatial production of contemporary digital cities, which is rather new, and teases out the implications on urban politics. Building on previous research that examined the Alphabet Inc.’s digital city project in Toronto, DIGI-GOV expands the research lines into further cities that have been challenged by the presence of LDCs – Seattle, Arlington, Bissen, and Eemshaven.

Developing a user-centered and flexible seamless multimodal mobility solution is expected to remove the obstacle to promote public transport and reduce car use. To further promote sustainable mobility, Luxembourg, like many cities in the world, expected to shift from conventional gasoline buses to full electric buses by 2025 (MODU 2.0). However, operating a fleet of electric vehicles (EV) bring additional challenges in managing electric charging operations. This project aims to develop an innovative solution, which allows electric demand responsive transport (DRT) service to be integrated into existing transit systems in order  to provide seamless multimodal mobility solutions to reduce car use and increase public transport ridership. The originality of the project is to relax fixed-route transit network constraints in the integrated EV-DRT model while considering the synchronization of EV-DRT and mass transit. The output of the project will provide a series of original mathematical models, algorithms and decision support toolboxes to assist operators and the government to optimally configure the system planning including fleet size and charging infrastructure to meet stochastic travel demand.

The MUSES [freshwater pearl MUssels as StrEam water Stable isotope recorders] project is an ambitious three-year plan to quantify the history of flowing waters. While we have measured and modelled the inputs and outputs of water to/from our streams and rivers for over a century, only a few decades ago have we realised that the isotope composition of water reveals the age of water – and that the age of flowing water (ranging from months to decades) holds the key to the solution of many environmental problems associated with climate and land use change. Here we provide an innovative contribution to the problem of determining water age history by developing new tools related to freshwater mollusc shell material analyses for subsequent reconstruction of historical stream water d18O data series of unprecedented length and temporal resolution. We aim to go beyond current understanding of bedrock geology controls on water source and flow paths by hypothesising that shifts in a catchment’s hydraulic regime (as triggered by climate change) mechanistically translate into a modification of the fraction of water travelling to the stream by fast flow paths – with the magnitude of this modification being modulated by bedrock geology.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is still a major health problem worldwide with more than 600.000 deaths per year. Bacteria in the gut have recently been suggested to be an important factor in CRC. However, it is not yet clear whether changes in bacteria are a cause or a consequence of CRC. Furthermore, external factors such as dietary habits and lifestyle have been shown to influence the bacterias in the gut. In this project, we will address two major questions. 1) We will ask whether bacterial changes in CRC are responsible for tumor initiation and progression and if yes, we will determine which bacteria participate in these processes. 2) We will analyze whether dietary regimens impact CRC outcome and which mechanisms can explain the observations. Altogether, this project will help to understand host-microbiome interaction in CRC and will allow us to move towards the development of dietary guidelines for CRC patients.

Approximately 7 000 different rare diseases have been reported, from which only 5% have an approved medication. One of the main reasons for this disproportion is that development of new drugs is less attractive for pharmaceutical companies due to the high cost to patient number ratio, for the great majority of these rare diseases. Therefore, we have invested previous efforts to develop a pipeline using simple model organisms (yeast and zebrafish) for acceleration of drug discovery for a group of rare disorders caused by mutations in the ATP13A2 gene. Mutations in this gene accelerate neurodegeneration leading to multiple symptoms such as weakness of the lower limbs, early onset of Parkinsonism and dementia. Using our pipeline, we identified about ten promising compounds which we aim to test now in two of the most relevant pre-clinical models that can currently be envisaged for this type of disease: human dopaminergic neurons and cerebral organoids (so-called “minibrains” growing in lab dishes). These models will be generated from skin biopsies of patients affected by the disease using ‘’induced pluripotent stem cell” (iPSC) technology. As our candidate compounds correspond to drugs that are already approved for other indications, positive results in our project here with the human neuronal cells and minibrains should allow for a rapid progress to clinical trials. As ATP13A2-related disorders show a large overlap with the more widespread Parkinson’s disease, another expected outcome of this project is to increase our therapeutic options for this more common neurodegenerative disease.

This project aims to offer novel treatment options for glioma patients after the standard of care has been unsuccessful. Gliomas are the most frequent brain tumours in the adult population and have largely a poor prognosis. The current treatment protocol often includes surgery, radio- and chemotherapy, nevertheless a large proportion of gliomas will recur after a variable period of time. At recurrence, the tumours have evolved and display molecular and functional differences compared to the original tumour. Therefore it is important to study not only the primary tumour tissue, but also the recurring tumour.
In this project we will compare the drug response of primary and recurrent gliomas, using a large panel of clinically approved drugs. This high throughput screen performed on patient-derived tumour tissue, will provide information on treatment efficacy for the tumour of a given patient at a specific point in time. A key aspect of this project is that we will be able to validate our findings in unique patient-derived cancer models in the lab, in support of the clinical application of this this personalized approach to become applicable in the clinical setting.

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia is the most common type of blood cancer in adults over 65 years-old in western countries. Despite recent advances in the standard of care, no curative therapy is available yet. In this project, we will investigate how small vesicles released by leukemic cells within the tumor favor cancer development and progression. We will analyze their content with multiples techniques and study the role of these constituents on the healthy environment in the organs. We will conduct most of the experiments in vivo, using murine models, to reconstitute as close as possible the situation observed in patients with cancer. This project will identify new targets for the development of innovative therapies.

Older people suffer more often from acute and chronic pain than younger and middle-aged adults. At the same time, the treatment of pain is insufficient for this group. For instance, the application of painkillers is complicated by the interaction with additionally consumed medicines and by changes in the aging body, altering their effectiveness. Hence, non-pharmacological pain treatments are a promising option for the older population. So far, it is unknown whether these interventions are similarly successful in older compared to younger adults and whether they are influenced for example by age-related changes in cognition, such as a poorer short-time memory or a shorter attention span, or by situational factors such as stress and lifestyle factors as disrupted sleep or physical activities. The current project aims to address this question. We will investigate whether interventions, such as the distraction form pain, a sham treatment, creating positive expectations and beliefs of pain relief, or pain relief via hypnosis, are still effective in older compared to younger adults and whether stress and other lifestyle factors as well as reduced cognitive ability have an impact on this. To better understand the underlying mechanisms, we will record the neural activity during the pain reduction treatments with the so–called electroencephalogram (EEG). The results will help to adapt psychological pain management interventions to the specific needs of older adults.

Cardiometabolic diseases (CM) are one of the leading causes of premature death worldwide and a major contributor to health disparities. CM diseases have various intertwined causes such as physical inactivity, unhealthy diet, obesity, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia and metabolic syndrome.
The dramatic increase in CM diseases over recent decades is most likely to be related to changes in the socio-economic and physical environments.
Changes have resulted in the dramatic development, although socially patterned, of motorized transportation, increased fast-food consumption, sedentary occupations and leisure activities, which together constitute a breeding ground for CM-related disorders. The role of environment remains poorly understood at the population level and is barely tackled by public health interventions. MET’HOOD is a longitudinal study aiming at investigating, for the population of Luxembourg country, the effects of the socio-economic and physical environmental characteristics of residential neighborhoods, on behavioral CM risk factors, namely physical activity and diet, and the metabolic syndrome. Based on an interdisciplinary approach bridging concepts and methods from health geography and social epidemiology, and with the support of local stakeholders, the project will contribute i) to provide policy-relevant evidence on the influence of specific environmental characteristics on CM risk factors, and ii) to shed light on the role of neighborhood interventions in tackling social disparities in CM risk profiles.

Socioeconomic conditions have a significant impact on health and disease. Despite considerable effort, these socioeconomically associated health disparities represent a substantial economic burden and psychosocial challenge. In many cases living in poor socioeconomic conditions represents a major contributor to both acute and chronic care expenditures. Accelerated immunological ageing, the natural decline in immune functioning with age may be the key to understanding these health disparities. we have assembled a highly interdisciplinary team that brings the TwinLife sociological cohort together with an economist, a psychologist and an immunologist/epigeneticist. By addressing not only the biology, but the socioeconomic environment we hope to gain a deeper understanding of how our social environment affects out health. Our goal is to inform public policy, and in the longer-term influence community-based prophylactic approaches to intervention, eventually allowing health disparities based on socioeconomic status and their associated costs to be reduced.

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a blood cancer affecting a subsets of white blood cells (B lymphocytes),mainly in the elderly (> 65y). Despite recent advances in the standard of care, there is still no curative therapeutic option. Following our characterization of the disease in a mouse model of CLL, we identified a specific type of immune cells as important for disease progression. This project will now analyze the lymph nodes of CLL patients and characterize specific cell types with new screening techniques to identify novel candidates potentially targeted by therapy. Our findings and observations will be confirmed in mice in which the functions of these cells will be studied more deeply. Innovative combination therapies will finally be tested in mice. We believe that this project will reveal new options for patient stratification and treatment.

Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease (AD and PD) are the most prevalent diseases caused by the loss of nerve cells. In our ageing society, it is expected that the number of cases will increase even further in the next years. Both pathologies have a huge socio-economic impact, creating an urgent need to investigate new strategies to halt them. Whilst AD is defined by the loss of memory and an inability to perform daily functions, PD is a motor disorder characterized by involuntary shaking, stiffness, slow movement and balance problems. Both diseases share features such as aggregated proteins and defective mitochondria, which are the cellular compartments providing energy. In addition, inflammation has emerged as a common molecular property of the neurological disorders.

In this project, we want to investigate if AD and PD have a shared molecular mechanism. We will test if the observed inflammation in the brain is the result of the interaction of aggregated proteins and molecules originating from dysfunctional mitochondria. Moreover, we suspect that the inflammatory reaction attacks the patients’ nerve cells, which subsequently degrade. To explore this aspect, we will use innovative stem cell technology that will allow us to simultaneously investigate nerve and immune cells from AD and PD patients.

Where the meaning of symbolic numbers (e.g., Arabic numerals, number words) comes from is a centuries-old question, which also has been hotly debated in the field of numerical cognition. Models of number development suggest that children rely on innate pre-verbal number representations to learn the meaning of small numbers (up to 4). To learn the meaning of larger numbers (> 4) young children make use of semantic inductive procedures, that is they somehow become able to transfer their knowledge for small numbers to larger numbers. However, the exact mechanisms underlying this semantic induction remain yet to be determined. In the current project, we put forward linguistic combinatorial and recursive rules as the main mechanisms, driving the semantic inductive procedures. To systematically examine this hypothesis, we make use of neuro-cognitive, behavioural and training studies in young children (aged between 2.5 and 9 years old).

Because of globalisation and as a result of migration, many families nowadays need to find ways to learn new languages and maintain their mother tongues. Many of migrant families use digital media to support the learning of languages, as well as literacy skills, such as reading and writing. However, at the moment, we do not know in detail how this is accomplished and what digital media they use. The recent COVID-19 outbreak showed that it is very important to understand how digital media are and can be used for learning. In the project DigiFam we will investigate how adults and children in migrant families in Luxembourg make use of various digital media to learn languages and literacy. Our findings will be useful for migrant families for making informed decisions about the use of particular media for language and literacy learning. The policy makers and teachers will also be able to make use of our findings to draw on children’s resources and effectively use digital tools in language and literacy learning at schools, this way preparing the children for the demands of modern societies.