No.

61 – July 2009

European Commission

the magazine of the european research area

ISSN 1830-7361
Plasmas
On the edge of matter
Genetics
Genes that keep us in bed

scientific collaboration

symphony
© Michel Vanden Eeckhoudt

of excellence
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 1 24/08/09 07:39
 research*eu is the European Union’s research magazine, written by independent professional journalists,
which aims to broaden the democratic debate between science and society. It presents and analyses projects,
results and initiatives through which women and men are making a contribution towards reinforcing
and uniting scientific and technological excellence in Europe. Published in English, French, German and Spanish
with ten issues per year, research*eu is edited by the Communication Unit of the European Commission’s
Directorate-General for Research.
research*eu

Editor in chief
Michel Claessens
Can mobiles damage your health? Language version proofreaders
editorial
Julia Acevedo (ES), Gerard Bradley (EN),
Régine Prunzel (DE)
Mobile phone addicts might do well to slow down a bit. In the wake of the European
GSM standard, the media have been full of tales of migraines or even tumours said to be General coordination
Jean-Pierre Geets, Charlotte Lemaitre
caused by chronic mobile phone use. (And here I am not referring to the faintness liable
to come over us when faced with the phone bill…) Editorial coordination
The article on page 38 describes Interphone, the widest-ranging epidemiological Jean-Pierre Geets

study in the world on the health risks of mobile phones. Whilst awaiting the final results, Editorial adviser
the only conclusion we can come to at present is that no conclusions can be drawn. Caution is called for. The data Didier Buysse
point to a possible long-term increase in certain tumours among regular users. The problem is that it is hard to Journalists
find people who have been using mobile phones intensively for more than 10 years. Audrey Binet, Didier Buysse,
Kirstine De Caritat, Frédéric Dubois,
As a direct consequence, the famous precautionary principle is being ramped up. Suddenly parents are refusing Sandrine Dewez, Elisabeth Jeffries,
to let their kids use mobile phones and users are adopting earphones. That is because one thing, at least, is sure: now Marie-Françoise Lefèvre, Christine Rugemer,
Yves Sciama, Mikhaïl Stein, Julie Van Rossom
there is reasonable doubt that the mobile phone is completely harmless. The merit of the precautionary principle is
that, once harmful effects have been ascertained, it compels research to be conducted into the risks and brings this Translations
technical and scientific controversy into the public arena. Andrea Broom (EN), Martin Clissold (EN),
Silvia Ebert (DE), Michael Lomax (EN),
In other words, the precautionary principle encourages action. It also reminds us that, like Monsieur Jourdain Consuelo Manzano (ES)
in Molière’s play ‘The Bourgeois Gentleman’, without being aware of it, we take precautions when we manage and
Graphic design
assimilate the sometimes imperceptible risks of everyday life, even though our relationship to risk is to some Gérald Alary (project manager),
degree irrational. François Xavier Pihen (layout),
Christopher Moloughney (production
coordination and follow-up),
Michel Claessens Daniel Wautier (proofreading FR),
Richard Jones (proofreading EN),
Editor in chief Sebastian Petrich (proofreading DE),
D. A. Morrell (proofreading ES)

Illustration search
The opinions expressed in this editorial and in the articles in this Christine Rugemer
issue do not necessarily represent the views of the European Commission.
Web version
Charlotte Lemaitre

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 CONTENTS

4 In brief
Zeitgeist.

Transport
SPECIAL REPORT Health 29 Fuelling the cars of tomorrow
SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION 12 An unprecedented public-private
The advent of electric cars is calling for
a quantum leap in battery development.
partnership
SPECIAL REPORT Is this a daydream?
SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION Facing the declining competitiveness
The cattle egret relieves large mammals of their parasites
in exchange for its daily bread and the cleaner wrasse patiently
waits for the shark to hold open its jaws to provide it with a slap-up
meal. Flowers unfold their most dazzling colours to attract insects,
of the European pharmaceutical industry,
which in turn disseminate pollen while feasting on their nectar.
Nature provides no shortage of examples of such mutually
beneficial interactions. They gradually become established
throughout evolution, quite simply because they improve the
lives and performance of each beneficiary. Humans are no
exception to this rule. The brown rat, which is so partial the “Innovative Medicine Initiative” aims
Genetics
to household refuse, plays a major role in keeping sewage
systems clean. Many more such mutually beneficial relation-
ships are forged between people, in the guise of concepts like
collaboration, cooperation or partnership.
to speed up the development of new
Symphony of excellence
In the world of research, collaboration has become a prerequisite
remedies.
for excellence. It is vital to share knowledge and technology,
pool resources, develop specialisations and link disciplines if
we wish to raise innovation to a high enough level to meet the
challenges of the centuries to come. Indeed, this will require far
more than the resources of a single laboratory or even an entire
country. Researchers shoulder a huge burden of expectations:
to understand climate change, resolve the energy crisis,
anticipate food shortages and pandemics and preserve
Nuclear fusion
biodiversity. Fortunately, the science world is not lacking in
virtuosos. Pooling their skills means that these talents are not

14 ITER emerges from the earth

© Shutterstock

just accumulated, they are multiplied. And this changes the

score entirely.

6 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 7

The most ambitious international scientific

collaboration to date.
32 Genes that keep us in bed
Interview North-South axis Why is it humans spend one third of their
lives sleeping? To answer this question,
8 Forming independent islands 16 A developing cooperation
the experts hunt down sleep genes
On the nature of scientific collaboration For the EU, socio-economic development
in the fruit fly.
according to physicist Robert Aymar, former of its southern partners also requires
director-general of ITER and of CERN. scientific collaboration.
Pollution
Enterprises Projects
10 Cooperation with a human face 18 Together, we are more intelligent
More attention is given to the participation Science research means, first and
of small- and medium-sized enterprises foremost, cooperation. Proof from five
in the Seventh Framework Programme. European examples.
An overview of progress to date.
20 In brief
European news.
35 Nuclear waste: an insoluble question?
Research under the microscope.
While several European countries relaunch
their nuclear programmes, the question of
waste remains. Maybe for a long time.
Portrait Physics of plasmas
22 Ali Saïb’s El Dorado
Health
Nothing about Ali Saïb’s university career 38 What’s to fear about mobile phones?
was predestined. Born under a good star, Does mobile phone use promote cancer?
or capable of profiting from opportunities We look at Interphone, the widest ranging
to forge his own destiny. study to date on this subject.

40 In brief
Human sciences Science at your fingertips. Teaching corner.
24 Modern-day ethnologists 26 On the edge of matter Publications. Young researchers. Opinion.
Anthropology is evolving and raising new Spotlight on plasmas, this fourth state
issues. Explanations from Anne-Christine of matter that fascinates so many chemists Image of science
Taylor, head of the research and teaching and physicists.
44 CHIK colours
department at the Quai Branly Museum.

research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 3

research_eu_61_EN_090826.indd 3 26/08/09 10:19

 IN BRIEF
ZEITGEIST
Appearances
matter
When a female Gouldian finch
(Erythrura gouldiae) mates, the sex
of her eggs will depend on… what
her partner looks like. In Australia,
there are two varieties of Gouldian
finch: one with a black head and
the other with a red head. Experi-
ments have shown that, although
© Shutterstock
the two varieties are of the same
species, they are genetically
incompatible. When the father
and mother have the same
head colour, the female hatches
a roughly equal proportion of
female and male offspring.
But if the parents have different-
coloured heads, the female will
deliberately produce more than
80 % male offspring. This increases
their chances of survival because
daughters resulting from geneti-
cally incompatible pairings have
a much higher mortality rate
than sons.
To test the influence of future
Gouldian finch mothers on
the gender of their offspring,
researchers from Macquarie
University (AU) came up with the
idea of dyeing their suitors’ heads.
The results of the study published
4 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 4
grow to be queen successors,
known as secondary queens,
which remain in the termite
shocks, their fear eventually
subsides. However, mice lacking
the gene coding for metabotropic
colony and mate with the king. glutamate receptor 5 (mGluR5) are
This is what Japanese and unable to shake off their fear of
American researchers have the now harmless tone. Further
in Science show that when a
female believes she is mating
revealed in a study published experiments confirmed the
in Science magazine. inability of these mutants to carry
with a male of the same species,
The advantage of this dual mating out tasks that required them to
she produces a more or less
system is that it avoids inbreeding, ‘unlearn’ what they had just
equal number of daughters and
where the king, which lives longer learned. The researchers believe
sons. So the sex of the brood
than the queen, would effectively that a similar mechanism might
depends not on the male’s true
mate with his own daughter, be perturbed in PTSD sufferers
genetic characteristics but on
as happens with other termite and that mGluR may provide
the female’s perceptions of them.
species. Parthenogenesis enables a potential target for new
A real case of judging by
the primary queen to pass on therapeutic treatments.
appearances…
her entire genome through her
female successors and, in so doing, www.jneurosci.org
www.sciencemag.org
to preserve the colony’s genetic
diversity.
Like mother, The Amazon
like daughter www.sciencemag.org is gasping
In 2005, the Amazon forest seems
Sexual or asexual reproduction? Learning to have swapped its legendary
Termite queens from the species
to unlearn status as a carbon sink for the
Reticulitermes speratus use both
less praiseworthy one of carbon
mating systems. Most of the
Victims of post-traumatic stress dioxide (CO2) emitter. According
young males and females
disorder (PTSD), an anxiety to an international study published
produced from sexual mating
disorder that can develop after in Science magazine, the Amazon
exposure to a terrifying event or forest, known as the lung of the
ordeal, would pay dearly to rid Earth, which normally absorbs
themselves of their fear memories. some 2 billion tonnes of carbon
While many scientific studies focus dioxide per year, actually emitted
on the molecular mechanisms nearly 3 billion tonnes in 2005,
for learning and memorisation,
to tackle PTSD scientists need to
address the ‘unlearning’ process.
© Courtesy Kenji Matsuura
Researchers at the Salk Institute
for Biological Studies (US) have
discovered that a receptor for
glutamate, the most prominent
neurotransmitter in the central
nervous system, plays a key role
with the colony’s king will become in the unlearning process.
the hive’s workers and soldiers, They made this discovery in
while the female larvae resulting experiments where they trained
from parthenogenesis (asexual mice to fear a tone by coupling it
reproduction in females without with an electric shock to the foot.
fertilisation by a male), which are They found that if, following this
© Shutterstock
genetically identical to their fear conditioning, the mice are
female parents but have no genes repeatedly exposed to the tone
in common with the king, mostly without receiving any electric
24/08/09 07:39

so releasing an extra 5 billion
tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere.
This extra CO2 is thought to be
a direct consequence of the drought
that struck the Amazonian region
in 2005, killing many trees. Since
nothing is lost nor gained but
everything converted, the multi-
tude of bacteria, fungi and animals
feasting on the dead trees
released CO2 in the process.
Setting aside the effect of
a drought in a specific year,
the authors of the study stress
the fragile nature of the rainforests’
carbon sink capacity.
www.sciencemag.org
Shrinking shells
In spite of their small size, together
foraminifera represent an enormous
biomass and play a key role in
fixing carbon dioxide in the
oceans. To protect themselves,
these single-celled organisms
secrete calcite, forming a test
(a sort of mineral-rich shell pierced
with holes).
In a study published in Nature
Geoscience, Australian researchers
uncovered a link, in a 50 000-year-
long record obtained from
a Southern Ocean marine
© Shutterstock
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 5
sediment core, between higher
atmospheric carbon dioxide and
low shell weights in planktonic
foraminifera called globigerina.
They compared the shell weights
of globigerina collected from
sediment traps in the Southern
Ocean with the weights of shells
preserved in the underlying
Holocene-aged sediments.
The results revealed that the shells
of modern globigerina weigh
between 30 and 35 % less than
those of their ancestors. This
reduced calcification is thought
to have been caused by ocean
acidification arising from high
atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.
It is unclear whether reduced
calcification will affect the survival
of this and other species of
foraminifera, but a decline in their
population could jeopardise the
oceanic uptake of atmospheric
carbon dioxide.
www.nature.com
Local warming
Since 1980, the tropical North
Atlantic has been warming by
an average of a quarter-degree
Celsius per decade. Although
global warming may have
IN BRIEF
contributed to this rise, it is far
from the only cause. A study by
Rapid recharge
American researchers from the
In a communication society where
University of Wisconsin–Madison
the mobile phone is king, running
and the National Oceanic and
out of battery can be a real source
Atmospheric Administration
of stress. For the more farsighted
(NOAA) shows that the local
among us who have remembered
reduction in wind-borne dust and
to bring along their charger, all
volcanic emissions from Africa has
they need is a hefty dose of
also played a major role because
patience while their battery
these airborne particles reduce
recharges itself. Now, though,
the amount of sunlight reaching
advances by researchers at
the ocean, keeping the sea
the Massachusetts Institute
surface cool.
of Technology (MIT) (US) could
The researchers arrived at this
soon slash this waiting time.
conclusion by combining satellite
Like all batteries, lithium-ion
data of dust and other particles
batteries comprise two electrodes:
with existing climate models
an anode and a cathode. It is
to evaluate the effect on ocean
the movement of lithium ions
temperature. According to their
calculations, the decline in airborne
between the two that creates the
electric current, and the faster the
particles above this part of the
ions travel, the faster the battery
ocean is responsible for two thirds
is recharged. The researchers
of the rise in its temperature in
found that lithium ions can travel
recent years. Global warming and
very quickly through battery mate-
reduced sunlight-screening from
rial but only through tunnels
these airborne particles would
accessed from the surface.
appear to work together to raise
If a lithium ion at the surface
the temperature of these Atlantic
waters, causing a growing number
is not directly in front of a tunnel
entrance, it is unable to travel
of hurricanes, which thrive on
there. The MIT scientists have
warmer water.
created a new surface structure
that allows the lithium ions to
www.sciencemag.org
move quickly around the outside
of the material, much like a ring
road around a city. As a result,
the new batteries recharge
100 times faster! We shall have to
remain patient for a while longer
though, because it is not planned
to market this new system for
another two to three years.
www.nature.com
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 5
24/08/09 07:39
 SPECIAL REPORT
SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
The cattle egret relieves large mammals of their parasites
in exchange for its daily bread and the cleaner wrasse patiently
waits for the shark to hold open its jaws to provide it with a slap-up
meal. Flowers unfold their most dazzling colours to attract insects,
which in turn disseminate pollen while feasting on their nectar.
Nature provides no shortage of examples of such mutually
beneficial interactions. They gradually become established
throughout evolution, quite simply because they improve the
lives and performance of each beneficiary. Humans are no
exception to this rule. The brown rat, which is so partial
to household refuse, plays a major role in keeping sewage
systems clean. Many more such mutually beneficial relation-
ships are forged between people, in the guise of concepts like
collaboration, cooperation or partnership.

Symphony of
In the world of research, collaboration has become a prerequisite
for excellence. It is vital to share knowledge and technology,
pool resources, develop specialisations and link disciplines if
we wish to raise innovation to a high enough level to meet the
challenges of the centuries to come. Indeed, this will require far
more than the resources of a single laboratory or even an entire
country. Researchers shoulder a huge burden of expectations:
to understand climate change, resolve the energy crisis,
anticipate food shortages and pandemics and preserve
biodiversity. Fortunately, the science world is not lacking in
virtuosos. Pooling their skills means that these talents are not
just accumulated, they are multiplied. And this changes the
score entirely.

6 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 6 24/08/09 07:39

 excellence
© Shutterstock

research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 7

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 7 24/08/09 07:39

 INTERVIEW
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
Back in 1994 Robert Aymar
was placed in charge of
ITER (1), the giant inter-
national project researching
nuclear fusion. He was later
appointed Director-General
of CERN, the European
Organization for Nuclear
Research, a position he held
from 2004 to 2008. This
plasma physicist, with major
scientific project experience,
draws lessons for us from
his various collaborations.
© CERN
8 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 8
Forming i
What are the issues that entice people like you
to promote and organise scientific collaboration?
From the researcher’s perspective there are
two issues, the relative importance of which
may vary according to the topic, context and
the general environment: the equality of mem-
bers and desire for excellence in the work
undertaken through collaboration. Individuals
working together, of course, see each other as
equals, and knowledge sharing leads to greater
equality. By partnering with peers, they are
better able to measure the quality of their own
work and this encourages excellence.
At the political level, or when managing
a scientific body, when the importance of a par-
ticular objective is recognised and a strategy is
defined in order to achieve it, it is possible to
suggest, to change the establishment of colla-
borations or simply to ensure their funding. The
challenge is to make sure not to transform these
incentives into purely bureaucratic management.
In human terms, what are the main challenges
you have had to face in implementing the major
projects you have managed?
When people who are going to work toge-
ther come from very different cultures, one of
course has to verify not only that they are pro-
fessionally competent, but that they also per-
sonally support the common project. But the
first real challenge is to ensure the absence of
nationalism. The future partners need to share
Robert Aymar: “Between
cooperation and competition,
we play on words. I use the term
collaborative competition to
describe a situation in which, once
the strategy has collectively been
decided upon, we are not hung up
on the fact of the earlier competition.”
24/08/09 07:39

g independent islands
a common vision of the future and form an
independent island, free of the prejudices or
pre-existing hierarchical elements in their
home environments. Without a set of shared
core values like rigour, intellectual honesty,
humility, openness and the famous thirst for
knowledge, your collaboration will not work.
All you will have is a juxtaposition of paid indi-
viduals, without the synergy necessary for the
effective completion of the project.
Equally fundamental is a common strategy.
In any joint venture, not everyone has the same
level of responsibility, age or imagination; in
short, not everyone carries the same weight.
But ultimately the effectiveness of the project
will be measured by the quality of the link
between different project members. The actual
physical distance between the workstations is
irrelevant, provided there are sufficient face-
to-face contacts. During my career I have come
across individuals who had never personally
committed to this common strategy. The sim-
plest thing then is to remove them.
Aren’t a lack of nationalism and shared
strategy unique to particle physics, where
collaboration is culturally rooted in the very
special history of atomic research?
On the contrary, I believe these attributes
are prerequisites for any international scientific
collaboration to succeed. They provided the
critical basis for the Convention that led to the
creation of CERN in 1954. Today, in an experi-
ment such as the LHC (Large Hadron Collider),
we have 2 000 researchers working in a demo-
cratic, non-hierarchical framework, where
leaders are elected.
How do they manage to spend 20 years pre-
paring an experiment and another 20 years
running it? This is because everyone agrees to
explore everyone else’s ideas, with a single cri-
terion which is in everyone’s common interest:
the greatest likelihood of the success of the
experiment. There is an initial competition for
ideas, but then collaboration carries the day
with everyone signing up to a collective deci-
sion to move towards a single strategy.
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 9
Isn’t there the danger of this competition
proving demeaning or demotivating for researchers
who have invested heavily and whose work is
ultimately not selected?
Demeaning, I do not think so. If, in a given
framework, democratic judgement gives diffe-
rent rankings to the various proposals, we are
not talking of value judgements where one
idea is good and the other bad. Between com-
petition and collaboration, we are in fact playing
with words, because the contribution of each
member is to critically analyse all proposals.
Personally, I use the term ‘collaborative com-
petition’ to describe a situation in which, once
the strategy has been collectively decided
upon, we are not hung up on the earlier com-
petition. This process takes time, but it gener-
ates synergies that increase the efficiency of
research. It’s very different from the law of the
market where the winner crushes the loser.
Sometimes, a minority among those who
fiercely support a vision that is ultimately not
accepted may become demotivated. They will
leave the project and join another collabora-
tive venture. We should not give the idea that
all projects will last forever; competition also
exists in overall funding.
Does scientific collaboration change
in nature when it crosses the traditional divide
between basic and applied research?
If the objective is the market, which presup-
poses profit from success associated with a
minimum of technical secrets, we leave behind
the framework of scientific collaboration to
which I have just referred. The two approach-
es are totally different in nature. Take for exam-
ple the deciphering of the genome. For some,
it is a heritage of humanity, the understanding
of it is simply knowledge. For others, there is
the prospect of bringing certain applications
to market for financial gain. Two approaches
which are, to say the least, irreconcilable.
There are, however, particularly in Europe,
many industrialists who, starting out from the
results of basic research, team up with
researchers in a framework of technology
INTERVIEW
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
transfer to develop or improve a process that
could generate profits. If they attach to this col-
laboration values that go beyond mere eco-
nomic self-interest, this is not, totally in my
view, a scientific collaboration, but rather a
desire to continue a strategy that has already
begun and bring discipline and innovation to it.
This collaboration is still well away from the
frantic race for profit, which, as the phenome-
non of stock market bubbles shows, often pre-
vails on the market.
Does the European Research Area offer
a propitious framework for scientific
collaboration?
The history and culture of Europe are closely
linked to the development of science, at least
since the 17th century. Training for the benefit
of all is of very good quality in this part of the
world, with publicly funded schools and uni-
versities. States have developed here through
power struggles. This has created a diversity of
values and approaches which are now an asset
for European science. But the division of
Europe into many small countries, each with
the same attributes of sovereignty, is also an
obstacle. Scientific issues have reached a level
of complexity where it has become necessary
to share analysis and varied skills in diversified
initiatives involving large numbers of people.
In each subject area, effectiveness calls for
a critical mass, the size of which varies depend-
ing on the discipline, the technology involved
and the particular project. In practice, this criti-
cal mass is inaccessible to most of our countries,
which are too small to have the sufficient
human or financial resources to tackle as wide
a range of topics as a much larger country.
To achieve the necessary critical mass, the only
effective solution in Europe lies in effective
cross-border collaboration. This comes easier
to scientists than to politicians.
Interview by Sandrine Dewez
(1) See “ITER emerges from the Earth” on page 14.
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 9
24/08/09 07:39
 ENTERPRISES
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
© Shutterstock
European projects are an opportunity
for SMEs to work with major partners,
such as multinationals.
10 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 10
The specific measures for
small and medium-sized
enterprises (SMEs) under
the Seventh Framework
Programme for Research and
Technological Development
(FP7) seem to be bearing
fruit. Initial results of
increased participation,
promising partnerships,
projects realised and jobs
are a boost to the world
of European SMEs and
to all those that revolve
around them.
“T
he impact of FP7 on SMEs is
clear to see! We are witnessing
unprecedented interest and
participation,” explains Imelda
Lambkin of the Irish National Contact Point
(NCP). This is certainly encouraging news when
you consider that 99 % of all businesses in the
EU are SMEs and that they provide some 75 mil-
lion jobs. As such, they are an essential resource
in meeting Europe’s knowledge objectives.
This is only the case, however, if they are
able to overcome the many obstacles along the
road to funding under the framework pro-
grammes for research. FP7 has learned the les-
sons of the past and adapted conditions of
access and budgets to bring them as closely
into line as possible with the specific needs
and nature of these businesses. Under the
Cooperation-specific programme, for example,
cofunding is available for up to 75 % of research
costs, an increase compared with FP6, and at
least 15 % of funds are reserved for SMEs.
In the field, however, the reality is above all
human. “Human relations are crucial factors for
success and must be in place well before the
Commission launches any calls for projects,”
Cooperati
stresses Kostadin Kostadinov of the NCP for
Bulgarian SMEs. An engineer and professor of
robotics, he is very familiar with the world of
SMEs, having himself created a number of spin-
offs. “SMEs need to be active within interna-
tional networks of SMEs as it is there that they
can meet possible future partners. The net-
works set by the Commission, such as the
Enterprise Europe Network (EEN), launched in
2008, or, in the field of health, the SMEs go
Health initiative, are opportunities that must be
seized. But that is not enough. The R&D activi-
ties of SMEs must be closely linked to academic
research as this provides major potential for
innovation.” Imelda Lambkin also stresses that
“in Ireland – but it is true elsewhere also – SMEs
that participate successfully in calls for offers are
often spin-offs originating in university labora-
tories with strong links between private-sector
researchers and university researchers”.
Visionary bosses
Michel Ganoote of the French NCP believes
that “participation in European financing requires
business managers to have a strategic vision,
set their sights firmly on excellence and co-
operation, choose their partners carefully and
devote a lot of time to the project… In other
words, their participation should be seen as
a medium- or long-term investment.”
Competition is keen, which is why candi-
dates need all the help they can get. “The EC
has set up several networks and knowledge
bases and SMEs should make full use of these.
At the same time, more experienced partners
that have already won European funding are
also a valuable source of information,” continues
Michel Ganoote. “They should also not hesitate
to bring in specialised consultants that are fami-
liar with the procedures, know the jargon and
can help draw up the application.”
Rallying points
But where to begin? For online aid, the Com-
mission has a specific portal dedicated to SMEs,
known as SME TechWeb. This guides SMEs in
24/08/09 07:39

tion with a human face
taking their first steps through the procedures
of European financing. But there is no substitute
for human contact, and one of the key players in
the participation of SMEs is the network of
National Contact Points. These are national struc-
tures based in and financed by FP7’s 27 Member
States and Associated States. The NCP staff is the
interface and interlocutor for any SME consid-
ering participating in a transnational project.
The organisation varies from one country to
another, but the mission is the same: to offer
immediate individual support to candidates in
their mother tongue. The NCPs operate pro-
actively, offering guidance, practical informa-
tion and aid with all aspects relating to
participation in FP7. “When we are unable to
offer personalised coaching ourselves, we are
able to make the link between the SME and
a more local structure, such as an innovation
transfer agency. Through contacts between
NCPs we also act as a relay between countries,”
explains Kostadin Kostadinov.
Michel Ganoote would like to see increased
and more integrated training for NCP staff. “We
need better integration of the national funding
possibilities open to SMEs, to coordinate more
effectively with the other NCPs at European
level, and to be more effective at explaining
Europe to the SMEs and the SMEs to Europe.”
Imelda Lambkin also acknowledges that
“SMEs need more assistance than other types
of partners. Ideally, we should be able to indi-
cate the best financing for their project, by explor-
ing, and sometimes combining, European funds
and national funds. When setting up a project we
endeavour to use all the information gathered,
often over a period of several months, to the
best of our ability. Especially if the request for
funds has failed.”
She also stresses the quality of the proposal
evaluations by the Commission experts. “They
are always well argued and this makes it possi-
ble, if necessary, for the consortium to rework
the weak points in the proposal so as to submit
it again for the next call for participation,”
explains Michel Ganoote.
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 11
What benefits for SMEs?
For an innovative SME, access to European
funding offers much more than a financial con-
tribution alone. A genuine quality label is
therefore needed, “that should be capitalised
on much more than it is,” remarks Michel
Ganoote, “in particular in contacts with nation-
al and regional innovation agencies and when
supplementing European funding with other
aid that may be available.” In addition to fund-
ing their activities, “European projects are also
an opportunity for SMEs to work with major
partners, such as multinationals,” adds Imelda
Lambkin. “This is not something that is neces-
sarily available to them outside of this context.
Yet in some fields, such as aeronautics, coop-
eration of this kind is simply essential.”
The limited resources available naturally
force some difficult choices and many good
projects must ultimately be rejected. Those
active in the field believe that this is another
major potential source of innovation that
Europe could exploit by using specific tools
such as the ERA-NET national and regional calls
for proposals, which are complementary to the
FP7 calls, if it does not want to lose out on the
wealth the SMEs represent.
Kirstine de Caritat
National Contact Points (NCPs)
http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/
get-support_en.html
SMEs go Health
www.smesgohealth.org
Enterprise Europe Network
www.enterprise-europe-network.
ec.europa.eu
SME techweb
http://ec.europa.eu/research/
sme-techweb
ENTERPRISES
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
Tripping on a carpet
Y
ou trip on a carpet, slip on a wet floor, and
most of the time get up and think no more
of it. But with advancing years such falls
can have serious effects, including fractures,
wounds and complications such as infection. In
Europe it is estimated that 30 % of people over 65
have at least one fall a year.
VIGILIO, a French SME that develops innovative
telemedical solutions, is currently coordinating
the European project FallWatch. A consortium of
12 partners is seeking to develop, by 2010, a min-
iature intelligent fall detector for persons of risk
age, known as the Mini’Fall®.
“Putting together the proposal is a genuine
investment,” explains Jean-Eric Lundy, CEO of
VIGILIO. “It requires a clear vision of what you
aim to do and how to do it. Our NCP put us in
contact with a consultancy company that helped
us prepare the proposal.”
Identifying the partners of the future consor-
tium and spending time with them in forging
a shared and coherent vision are other key ingre-
dients. “This preparatory work, the creation of
a project dynamic, must be done before the
Commission launches the call,” says Jean-Eric
Lundy. “This stage requires considerable time. It
is illusory to regard European money as easily
obtained support. The competition is fierce.”
Another lesson learned along the way is not
to become discouraged. “When we first submit-
ted a proposal we fell just short of the mark. But
the specific and pertinent comments from the
Commission helped us improve some of the
details and, six months later, we made the grade!”
The future Mini’Fall B3
© Courtesy Vigilio
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 11
24/08/09 07:39
 HEALTH
An unprecedented
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
public-private partners
A decade ago, 70 % of new medicines came from Europe.
Today the figure has fallen to 30 %. To stem this worrying
decline, the Commission and federation of pharmaceutical
industries have decided to pool the research needed to speed
up sector innovation.
T
wo figures sum up the structural
difficulties of the pharmaceutical
industry. Since 1995, expenditure on
research and development in the
sector has increased by 80 %. Yet at the same
time the number of new medicines marketed
has fallen by 40 %. “This fall is due to a combi-
nation of scientific, regulatory and economic
factors,” says Arthur Higgins, President of the
European Federation of Pharmaceutical Indus-
tries and Associations (EFPIA). “Our companies
are working to meet these challenges but it is
clear that their efforts alone will not be enough.”
This is why the EFPIA welcomed with enthusi-
asm the idea launched by the European Com-
mission in 2007 for a new form of public-private
partnership to boost the declining competitive-
ness of Europe’s pharmaceutical industry.
The aim of this Innovative Medicines Initia-
tive (IMI) is not to come up with new medi-
cines but to develop the tools, methods and
know-how to facilitate future innovation. The
road from a promising molecule to a medicine
is long and full of obstacles, with fewer than
6 % of molecules at the preclinical development
stage – that is, being tested on animals or cell
cultures – finding their way, a decade later, into
a pharmacy. There are three main reasons for
this low success rate: the discovery of unex-
pected toxicity during the preclinical trials; the
12 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 12
appearance of undesirable side effects during
the phase I clinical trials – designed, in accord-
ance with the Hippocratic precept of primun
non nocere, to establish tolerance to the med-
icine among healthy human subjects – and,
finally, insufficient effectiveness on patients
during phase II and III clinical trials.
A strategic agenda
For each of these obstacles, the IMI’s strate-
gic research agenda identifies promising ave-
nues for research. To improve the predictability
of toxicity, there is a need to develop databas-
es that make it possible to link the undesirable
effect of a molecule to the detail of its chemical
structure, or biological markers that reveal
quickly any problem that would only be appar-
ent clinically several years later. To better under-
stand the possible effectiveness of a molecule
in combating one of the IMI’s five priority
illnesses – cancer and cerebral, metabolic,
inflammatory and infectious diseases – it is vital
to identify cell models for the illness that per-
mit the in vitro testing of a molecule’s effect,
this also making it possible to reduce the use
of animal experimentation, a cause to which
the Commission and the EFPIA are committed.
A brief look back over recent decades
reveals what can be expected of this upstream
research. In the early 1990s, 40 % of molecules
were rejected along the way because the test-
ing phase revealed they were blocked by the
body’s protective barriers or degraded by the
immune system. Today these problems of bio-
disponibility are the cause of just 10 % of rejec-
tions. This is due to the progress made in
modelling that makes it possible to determine
in advance whether or not a molecule will be
able to reach its target organ.
An original structure
All the parties involved in the medicine
chain were thus invited to take part in the IMI.
In addition to around 2 100 EFPIA member
companies, this included academic research
centres, innovative small and medium-sized
enterprises (SMEs), patients’ associations, hos-
pitals and the government agencies that grant
marketing authorisations. To enable such
diverse institutions to work together, an origi-
nal legal structure was needed: the Joint Tech-
nological Initiative.
This Joint Technological Initiative is co-piloted
by the Commission and the EFPIA, each inject-
ing a billion euros into the IMI during the 2008-
2013 period. “The Commission is responsible
for setting up and launching the IMI joint
undertaking until it acquires the operational
capacity needed to implement its own budget,
which is planned for the third quarter of 2009,”
explains Alain Van Vossel, IMI interim execu-
tive director. The two institutions are jointly
represented on the Governing Board that man-
ages the IMI and that is responsible for issuing
calls for proposals. The latter are structured
around four strategic pillars: forecasting the
toxicity of molecules, predicting their effective-
ness, improving knowledge management – in
particular through the databases – and deve-
loping training of the highly skilled workforce
24/08/09 07:39

rship
needed by an industry that employs 500 000
people in Europe.
A unique procedure
To understand what is unique about the IMI
you have to look at the original procedure for
the calls for proposals. Only consortiums of
public research institutes and innovative SMEs
can respond and not companies seeking to
benefit from the creativity of their partners.
Experts appointed by the Governing Board
examine the proposals and the best are sub-
mitted to a group of EFPIA companies interest-
ed in the subject. A second consortium is then
created that formulates a final proposal in
which research producers and their potential
users are closely involved. After a further eval-
uation it is then this consortium that receives
IMI funding. So as not to distort competition
through direct aid to companies, there is a strict
separation between public funds allocated by
the Commission – which goes to public
research bodies and innovative SMEs only –
and private money from the EFPIA companies
in the form of equipment, personnel and infra-
structure.
Setting up projects supported by the IMI also
required an imaginative legal approach to
resolve the delicate question of the intellectual
ownership of the research results. This was
essential in persuading normally competing
companies to pool their efforts. It was thus nec-
essary to refine the legal notion of the research
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 13
‘background’ of Seventh Framework Pro-
gramme projects to support the use of highly
confidential information that the companies
make available to their partners. It was also
decided to allow each consortium a large meas-
ure of autonomy in determining the manner of
sharing ownership of the research results.
Could this complex operating method in
itself prove to be an obstacle to scientific crea-
tivity? It is too early to say. The IMI has already
selected around 15 proposals submitted in
response to its first call in May 2008, and the
consortiums that will share the first €300 mil-
lion should be set up in the summer of 2009.
The two wise men charged with ensuring the
transparency of expert appraisals and that there
is no abuse on the part of the industrialists –
which are both judge and party due to their
participation on the IMI Governing Board –
have already judged the organisation of the first
call to be “well conceived and mature”. These
are much appreciated words of encouragement
for this unique and audacious public-private
partnership.
Mikhaïl Stein
Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI)
www.imi-europe.org
European Federation
of Pharmaceutical Industries
and Associations (EFPIA)
www.efpia.org
HEALTH
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
© Shutterstock
Fewer than 6 % of molecules
at the preclinical development
stage (tested on animals or cell
cultures) find their way, a decade
later, into pharmacies.
The premises
of the IMI
T
he reason European pharmaceutical
companies have agreed to pool their
pre-competitive research is that they
realised the usefulness of such an approach
with the Innovative Medicine for Europe
(InnoMed) project, between 2005 and 2008.
This consortium of 14 universities, 16 compa-
nies and 8 SMEs with a joint budget of €18
million set itself the goal of working together
on two subjects: the description of biomark-
ers making it possible to monitor the progress
of Alzheimer’s disease in man and in animal
models; and the creation of databases with
a vast quantity of information on the toxicity
of molecules generated using techniques
originating in genome sequencing. It is the
success of this initiative that convinced the
Commission and the industry to act on a larg-
er scale.
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 13
24/08/09 07:39
 NUCLEAR FUSION
ITER emerges from the ea
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
The most ambitious
international scientific
cooperation project in history
is taking shape in the south
of France. We take a look
at an extraordinary
technological and
institutional device.
I
t is a vast flat rectangle over a kilometre
long and some 500 metres wide, the size
of 60 soccer pitches. From the air it
resembles a huge yellow gash cut out of
the forest that stretches to the shores of the
Mediterranean, 60 km away. We are in Cadarache,
in the south of France, at the site that over the
next decade will see the construction of ITER
(International Thermonuclear Experimental
Reactor), the biggest international scientific
device in the world. At the centre of the plot,
Start-up of the ITER site in Cadarache.
14 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 14
levelled out to millimetre precision by an army
of mechanical diggers, a gaping hole is ready
to receive the reactor.
100 million degrees
The aim of ITER is to check the “scientific
and technical feasibility of nuclear fusion as
a new energy source.” In practice, this means
maintaining over 400 seconds a fusion reac-
tion at a temperature of close to 100 million
degrees, in 840 m3 of plasma (1) (an ionised
gas), to arrive at a power 30 times greater than
ever achieved by the most powerful reactor to
date, JET. The environment will be packed with
sensors to obtain a maximum of experimental
data that, a few decades from now, will make
it possible to build an industrial reactor. This
reactor would be able to produce abundant
quantities of clean energy, as fusion consumes
very little matter and, above all, creates virtu-
ally no radioactive waste.
The technological challenge is nevertheless
huge: our understanding of how plasmas
behave at such staggering temperatures is any-
thing but complete and the materials are often
© ITER
subject to impressive constraints, in particular
in terms of neutron bombardment. It is a chal-
lenge currently beyond the capacity of any one
country. This is why, in 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev
proposed to Ronald Reagan that they should
work together on nuclear fusion. After many
twists and turns, it is this proposal that resulted
in the present ITER project, piloted from the
start by the EU and now including seven part-
ners: Europe, the United States, China, Russia,
India, Japan and Korea. Together these part-
ners represent more than half the world’s pop-
ulation and the most markedly contrasting
cultures. What is more, ITER has every chance
of further expanding as a number of nations
have expressed their interest in participating
as ‘associated countries.’
“Previously, we were already very proud at
having succeeded in building an international
project such as the LHC (Large Hadron Collider)
in Geneva, but that only involves the governing
bodies of the European partners. With ITER we
are talking about much larger sums of money
and, most importantly, a truly global project!”
says Neil Calder, head of communication at
ITER, who himself spent many years working
at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear
Research), the body responsible for the LHC.
Physicist Michel Chatelier, who for a long time
managed Tore Supra, ITER’s little brother,
believes that to be successful, the project “will
require as much capacity for human and organ-
isational innovation as scientific capacity.”
Global giant
So how will this extraordinary global device
work? The project, initially costed at €10 bil-
lion (approximately €5 billion to build it and
€5 billion to operate it), is scheduled to be
spread over 35 years: 10 years to build it,
20 years for the experimentation, and five
years to dismantle it. Europe is providing 45 %
of the funding, the balance being shared equally
between the other partners. The project’s gov-
erning body, known as ITER Organization, is
headed by the ITER Council that is made up
of around 100 top-level scientists and political
24/08/09 07:39

earth
representatives from each of the partner coun-
tries. This ITER Council meets twice yearly to
take major decisions. Kaname Ikeda of Japan
is head of ITER Organization.
One of ITER’s unique features is the impor-
tance of the concept of contributions in kind.
Each partner is responsible for supplying a part
of the reactor components, for the purpose of
which seven domestic agencies have been set
up. “But, in a way, we chose to do this in the
most inefficient way possible,” says Neil Calder
with a smile. Most of the components are in
fact the result of cooperation between three or
four domestic agencies, the idea being to share
the technological learning process as much as
possible. In some cases each agency submits
which is the best. In other cases each contrib-
utes its skills and an appropriate project is then
developed. The desire to circulate knowledge
therefore takes precedence over the desire to
optimise the effort, which is not without merit.
This method of task sharing of course implies
a huge amount of interaction. The Cadarache
site is the scene of constant videoconferences,
incoming and outgoing e-mails, and a steady
stream of arrivals and departures. But things
are moving forward and the prototypes of parts
that arrive for evaluation are already starting to
fill the building aisles. The European agency,
known as Fusion for Energy (F4E), is of course
the biggest as Europe is financing 45 % of the
project. It is involved in making nearly all the
reactor components, especially the giant super-
conducting coils. Its headquarters in Barcelona
is likely to have a staff of about 300 within the
next year or two.
Plural construction identity
The day-to-day reality of being involved in such
a project is fascinating. When Kaname Ikeda
arrived in Cadarache in 2007, with a team of half
a dozen people, there was almost nothing there.
The prefabricated buildings progressively
emerged from the earth as the site developed
to accommodate the first 100 employees over
the next year. Today that number has increased
to 300, still housed in prefabricated buildings
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 15
while awaiting the permanent buildings to be
provided by the French over the next two to
three years. Soon there will be 1 000 people
working at ITER, with about 30 nationalities
represented. “Most of the international organi-
sations, the ESA (European Space Agency) or
CERN, for example, are now over 30 years old
and have a genuine common culture, whereas
we still have to build our identity,” stresses Neil
Calder. “We bring together countries that have
never worked together before and people who
do not have the same dress codes, the same
relationship to the hierarchy or work, who do
not conduct meetings in the same way, who
express themselves differently. We are going
to have to invent a model in which everybody
can feel comfortable and work efficiently. That
is a formidable challenge!”
Fortunately, the ITER participants are bound
by the belief that they are working on a mis-
sion of huge importance to society, at a time
when the greenhouse effect and the energy cri-
sis are bringing ever more perilous dangers for
mankind. It is this conviction that should ena-
ble them to overcome the inevitable crises and
difficulties. “In a common project such as this,”
© ITER
© ITER
a b
notes Michel Chatelier, “you cannot hope to
have made the right choices at first attempt. You
must be able to make changes along the way.”
What is more, negotiations are continuing on
many aspects of ITER governance. The way of
managing intellectual property remains largely
to be defined, while the issue of the right to
patent the technologies generated will certain-
ly be hotly debated. It is a context that Neil
Calder sums up by remarking “at root,
the project is still in its adolescence, with all the
difficulties that the move to maturity will bring.”
It is a difficult stage in ITER’s development, but
one marked by youthful enthusiasm.
Yves Sciama
(1) See “On the edge of matter” page 26.
NUCLEAR FUSION
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
Caring for the new
arrivals
I
n order to better welcome personnel arriving
at the site, ITER-France, a subsidiary of the
CEA – Atomic Energy Commission (FR) – that
is responsible for preparing the site, has opened
the Welcome Office. This assists new arrivals in
finding accommodation, completing the admi-
nistrative formalities (driving licences, residence
permits, etc.) and also offers French lessons for
those who are interested. The office recently
hired a team to present the cultural specificities
of the different participating countries as a
means of improving cohabitation while avoiding
any faux pas and misunderstandings. An inter-
national school for the site employees has
already opened its doors. Once the site is oper-
ating at full capacity this should have around
1 000 pupils aged between 5 and 18 and pay par-
ticular attention to ensuring that they are able to
easily return to their national education system
at any time.
© ITER
c
It is customary, in the case of major public works,
to make sure that certain sites do not contain
any archaeological treasures. From left to right:
preparatory explorations (a), archaeological digs
around a former glassworks (b) and a tomb of
a late antique necropolis (c) maintenance along
a minor road where the hydraulic networks are
installed for managing the water coming from
the ITER site.
ITER
European Union and six other
countries (CN-IN-JP-KR-RU-US)
www.iter.org
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 15
24/08/09 07:39
 NORTHSOUTH AXIS
A developing
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
cooperation
Europe regards technology
as crucial to socio-economic
growth. It is an approach
that the EU would like to see
transposed to development
policy.
E
radicating hunger in poor countries,
reducing child mortality, ensuring
environmental sustainability: five of
the eight Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs) imply a direct contribution by
science. Since the MDGs were signed in 2000,
technology has increasingly come to be regard-
A geological research project on Mali’s mining sector under the EU-financed Sysmin programme.
This study resulted in the production of a geographical information system (GIS) that includes geological,
geochemical and geophysical maps of formations dating from the Birimian age – 2 400 to 1 300 million
years ago – in the south of the country.
© BRGM
16 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 16
ed as key to socio-economic development. This
is true both within northern countries, where
the ‘Knowledge Society’ is promoted as the
economic model to follow, and in the south,
where strengthening research capacities would
help populations develop their own solutions
designed to meet their own needs.
A new research model
What is more, it is often in terms of the
relationship between development level and
research capacities that the difference in growth
between China and India on one hand and sub-
Saharan Africa on the other is explained. “There
is no doubt that the economic success of China
and India is based largely on investments in
higher education and strengthening research
capacities,” declares Kees Stigter, President of
the International Society for Agricultural Meteo-
rology (INSAM), who has spent the past 30 years
visiting research institutes and universities in
the developing countries as a guest professor.
The belief in the crucial role of research in
improving socio-economic conditions in Africa
is one that is gaining ground both within African
organisations and among European donors.
The African Union (AU) and the New Partner-
ship for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) pos-
sess a department dedicated specifically to
science and technology. Similarly, the new
Africa-EU Strategic Partnership includes a com-
ponent devoted to science, the information
society and space, while the European Com-
mission’s Seventh Framework Programme for
Research (FP7) includes a section devoted to
international cooperation that has been
reformed to promote scientific cooperation with
the southern countries.
A partnership logic
But to exploit science’s potential for develop-
ment to the fullest, there is a need for improved
coordination between scientific cooperation pol-
icy, foreign policy and development aid pro-
grammes. “Previously, development was seen
as simply building roads, hospitals and schools.
But it is clearly more complicated than that. The
transfer of technology cannot be achieved at a
stroke. It is first necessary to create a different
relationship between research and development,
placing science in the service of populations,”
states Jean-François Girard, President of the
Institut de recherche pour le développement
(IRD) (FR). “Establishing closer contacts between
European officials responsible for scientific
research and those charged with development
cooperation is proving particularly difficult.
It involves a certain hybridisation of two very
different cultures that must adjust for their mutu-
al benefit.”
24/08/09 07:39

© BRGM
The European and Developing Countries
Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP) (1) reflects
this new approach to scientific cooperation
between North and South. Launched in 2003,
this project aims to organise, in Africa, clinical
trials for treatment to combat Africa’s three
most fatal diseases: AIDS, malaria and tuber-
culosis. The EDCTP is guided by a partnership
logic, as promoted by the MDGs. The principle
consists of concerted action by the donor and
beneficiary countries when implementing aid
actions. Although it is the EDCTP General
Assembly – made up solely of European rep-
resentatives – that alone determines the
project’s general strategy, all members of the
other decision-making bodies are drawn from
both sides of the Mediterranean.
AEGOS and GÉANT2
The African-European Georesources Obser-
vation System (AEGOS) (2), launched in February
2009, is another reflection of the EU-Africa
research partnership. “AEGOS aims to develop
a pan-African infrastructure and interoperable
services concerning Africa’s mineral, hydro-
geological and geothermal resources,” explains
Marc Urvois, project coordinator for the Office
of Geological and Mining Research (BRGM)
(FR). “The aim is to support the sustainable
management of geological resources. AEGOS
will make it possible, for example, to deter-
mine whether or not operating a mine places
excessive pressure on local water resources,
thereby harming the environment or popula-
tions. The system will also be very useful for
the joint management of cross-border water
tables.” As in the case of the EDCTP, African
researchers are actively involved in the AEGOS
project. “Each working group is headed by an
African and a European researcher. The African
partners take ownership of the work pro-
gramme and contribute actively to the joint
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 17
© BRGM
activities. We are also involved in strengthen-
ing training capacities in association with the
universities and schools of geology to ensure
the system continues to function at the local
level,” explains Marc Urvois.
The low Internet coverage is a handicap for
researchers in Africa. This is a digital divide
that limits data exchanges and thereby acts as
a brake on research. In January 2009 the Euro-
pean Commission announced the connection
of the UbuntuNet Alliance, an association of sev-
eral National Research and Education Networks
– NRENs – to GÉANT2, its European equiva-
lent. GÉANT2, which already has an Asian
(TEIN3 – Trans-Eurasia Information Network),
Latin American (ALICE – America Latina Inter-
conectada Con Europa) and Mediterranean (i)
extension, is a vast virtual network enabling
around 20 million researchers to exchange
information in Europe alone. “We are current-
ly carrying out a feasibility study to determine
how to finance the project,” explains Cathrin
Stöver of DANTE (Delivery of Advanced Net-
work Technology to Europe), the GÉANT2
management body. “For the moment, the African
partners lie mainly in East and Southern Africa,
but it is probable that the NRENs in West Africa
will join the project.”
Rooted in the field
All these developments should not make us
lose sight, however, of the essential frailty of
North-South scientific cooperation. “The new
technologies possess a vast potential for the
development of research, but the most funda-
mental is to respond to the immediate needs
of populations,” stresses Kees Stigler. ‘Too often,
scientists have imposed technologies developed
in a way that is totally impenetrable to local
realities. It is often wiser to improve traditional
techniques rather than to propose radically
innovative solutions, as not only do these risk
NORTHSOUTH AXIS
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
© BRGM
Hassai is one of the gold deposits discovered
by the Office for Geological and Mining Research
(BRGM) in 1984 in Ariab Province (Sudan).
An innovative project for processing the mineral
by means of bulk lixiviation was set up at this time
and the first ingot was cast in 1987.
being badly received by those concerned but
they could also prove inapplicable in the field.”
There is therefore a need to free African sci-
entists from the isolation of their laboratories
and to open up the debate between science
and society. It is a challenge that European
research is also seeking to meet. “The future
of the planet is being decided on two flanks:
the sustainable management of resources and the
co-existence of peoples,” concludes Jean-François
Girard. “This second flank requires the estab-
lishment of active relations between North and
South, without which the future looks very
bleak.”
Julie Van Rossom
(1) See “Helping Africa or using Africa?”, research*eu n°59,
March 2009, p. 13.
(2) See “Improving our distance vision”, research*eu geosciences
special issue, September 2008, p. 34.
African-European Georesources
Observation System – AEGOS
22 partners – 18 countries (BE-BF-CZ-
DE-ET-FR-FI-GH-GN-NL-PT-PL-SN-TZ-
UG-UK-ZA-ZM)
www.aegos-project.org
UbuntuNet Alliance
www.ubuntunet.net
GÉANT2
www.geant.net
The international society for
agricultural meteorology – INSAM
www.agrometeorology.org
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 17
24/08/09 07:39
 PROJECTS
TOGETHER, WE ARE
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
MORE INTELLIGENT
In many ways and in the most specialised fields,
EU research policy is focusing on cooperation
in the service of excellence. This strategy is causing
European and international players to coordinate
their abilities in the interests of better innovation.
Here are some examples.
An enlightened
Europe
A diode is a semiconductor
electronic component consisting
of two layers of materials between
which electrons can flow in one
direction only. During this transfer
of electrons, and subject to certain
conditions, an energy charge is
emitted in the form of photons.
The properties of light-emitting
diodes, commonly known as LEDs,
© P.Visser/OLLA project
18 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 18
exhausted. Thus, two European interconnecting computers
projects are currently bringing so as to share their processing
together scientists and indus- capacity. This gave rise to the
trialists at the leading edge of
these fields. The WWW.BRIGHTER.
concept of the grid, a term used
traditionally in English to refer to
EU consortium is seeking to an electricity network to which
increase the strength and anybody can connect without
photonic sensitivity of laser having to bother about the power
diodes, in particular in medical station that produces the current.
imaging technologies and in By developing an arsenal of
telecommunication networks. technological compatibility
Another project, OLED100.eu, (and standardisation) solutions,
is working on the emerging the grids serve to make available
technology of organic LED diodes and exploit the unused working
with a view to developing a new capacity of thousands of auto-
generation of TV and computer nomous computers located all
screens with increased energy over the world.
are already very much a part of the
technological environment. They
performances. The EU understood immediately
the importance of this disseminated
are used to illuminate the keys or
www.ist-brighter.eu computing capacity. In 1993 it
indicators on countless electronic
www.oled100.eu
or electrical devices and also –
thanks to the invention of laser
diodes – to form the reading and
engraving heads of audiovisual
Web calculating
or computer discs.
Science can take giant steps
These two functions of LED
provided it has the means, among
technologies – generating light
which data processing resources
and processing or converting
© Courtesy of CityDance Ensemble/Paul Emerson
are particularly important.
optical signals – are areas of
Twenty years ago, when a handful
research that are far from
of researchers at CERN (European
Organization for Nuclear Research)
invented the Internet, it was to
meet the need for research centres
to exchange information and data.
We all know what resulted:
remarkably open in its design,
the invention spread to all areas
of society. The Mountain, choreography by
But science’s appetite for data Jason Garcio Ignacio, is based on
processing goes beyond commu- the sonority of volcanic seisms.
nication. The vast mass of know- The rumblings are captured using
ledge means that research comes techniques developed by Domenico
up against another constraint: Vicinanza, an artist and engineer
calculation and information involved in the DANTE project.
processing capacity. The capacity
of science centre computers is backed the creation of the DANTE
increasing all the time and many (Delivery of Advanced Network
of them are now equipped with Technology to Europe) platform,
‘supercomputers’. This demand based in Cambridge (UK). This first
for calculating power is indeed worked on setting up the present
such that in the 1990s a new shared system between national
idea gained ground, that of research and education networks
24/08/09 07:39

in Europe, known as GÉANT2.
This stretches from the Atlantic to
the Black Sea. However, in the age
of globalisation, Europe has also
sought to be a pioneer in inter-
continental grids. TEIN3 (Trans-
Eurasia Information Network)
covers the interconnection of
Chinese, Indian, Australian and
South-East Asian networks.
EUMEDCONNECT3 has been set up
in North Africa and the Middle
East, while ALICE (America Latina
Interconectada Con Europa)
provides access to CLARA,
the South American grid.
www.dante.net
Something very
new on our plates
As far as proteins, lipids, glucides
and other molecule families in
food are concerned, consumers
© Shutterstock
are aware of their presence as the
content is displayed on all edible
industrial preparations. This
enables consumers to dose, albeit
approximately, the different
energy sources that their body
cells metabolise. Over the last
decade or so, biochemists have
been exploring other dietary
fields. In so doing they have
revealed the action of many other
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 19
PROJECTS
The international project META-
SPECIAL REPORT SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION
PHOR, for example, is seeking to
Nurturing
identify, in the very short term, European
the nutritional properties, due to
their metabolite content, of the
citizenship
world’s major crops. Its 22 partners
If there is one field in which the
(universities, agricultural institutes,
social and political sciences are
agro-foodstuffs industries) are
currently facing a huge challenge
currently focusing on rice (one of
it is surely that of the ‘crisis of
the partners is the International
governance’. To explain this
Rice Research Institute – IRRI,
© Shutterstock
phenomenon, it is customary
based in the Philippines), broccoli
to point to the effects of globa-
and melons.
lisation. Yet governance is also
an issue that is closely associated
www.meta-phor.eu
with the increased power of an
increasingly complex and open
Sensing danger civil society, one that is laying
claim to its right to participate and
In the age of wireless devices, exercise control. This dual theme
strategies to protect against is central to the reflections of
urban, industrial or environmental CINEFOGO (Civil Society and New
disasters are focusing on the Forms of Governance in Europe),
potential of preventive weapons the new European network of
as represented by interconnected excellence and an example of
sensors. The 11 partners in the intensive cooperation in the field
Winsoc (Wireless Sensor Networks of socio-economic research.
with Self-Organization Capabi- Since 2004 some 200 researchers
lities for Critical and Emergency with the CINEFOGO network –
© Shutterstock
Applications) project are currently coordinated by the University
developing the methodology for of Roskilde (DK) – from 45 partner
a new form of sensor network institutions throughout Europe
inspired by the architecture have been comparing their
molecules, secondary metabolites
of biological systems. analyses and exchanging data
that influence living cells in other
Three types of risk are being on their work.
ways than the global processes
studied: landslide forecasting Specifically, CINEFOGO is creating
of the metabolism. Just as one
and protection, detection of gas a database of ideas, knowledge
speaks of the genome when
leakages of all kinds, and tempera- and practice on the ways in which
exploring DNA, so today scientists
ture monitoring to predict or citizens participate (or could
are becoming interested in the
detect fires in a given area. Major participate) in social and political
metabolome. This neologism
companies, academic and private governance. The field of research
refers to the set of metabolic
research centres, SMEs and risk extends to questions such as
intermediates: the hormones
prevention managers are all nourishing the democratic debate
and other molecules of the signal
contributing to Winsoc. The and democratic organisation,
as well as the secondary meta-
project therefore represents an the ‘welfare state’ and social
bolites than can be found in
alliance between very high-level protection, family and gender
a biological sample.
expertise (in sensor technologies, policy, responses to the immigra-
In addition to these fundamental
information and communication tion problem and the fight against
aspects, this new field of research
network management, etc.) and social exclusion.
is very interesting in terms of
the field knowledge of security
identifying data on the role played
practitioners. www.cinefogo.org
by these multiple molecular
compounds in terms of health
www.winsoc.org Didier Buysse
benefits and illness prevention.
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 19
24/08/09 07:39
 IN BRIEF
EUROPEAN NEWS
LOHAFEX flops
In the previous issue of research*eu
we announced the launch of the
Indo-German LOHAFEX project,
the aim of which was to determine
if the potential of oceans to
sequester atmospheric CO2 could
be catalysed artificially by adding
iron sulphate. The first results of
this expedition – one that incurred
the wrath of environmental
protection organisations and
certain sections of the scientific
community – are disappointing
© Philipp Assmy/Alfred Wegener Institute
Plankton three weeks after iron
fertilisation.
if instructive. As expected, the
project did generate an algal
bloom, but not of the micro-algal
variety that had been hoped for.
Previous fertilisation operations
had resulted in an increase in
diatoms, micro-algae with the
particularity of having a protective
wall known as a frustule. However,
as the northern waters of the
Austral Ocean, site of the LOHAFEX
experiment, are naturally poor
in silicic acid, the principal element
needed for the formation of
this diatom frustule, this variety
of micro-algae was unable
to proliferate.
Diatom blooms are more effective
at fixing atmospheric CO2 because
they are much larger than those
of other types of vegetal plankton.
In addition, diatoms are not con-
sumed by the neighbouring fauna
20 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 20
(zooplanktons, fish, shellfish, etc.)
and sink to the seabed due to the
weight of their shell, thereby
optimising the CO2 fixing process.
www.awi.de
Virtual virtuosos
Constant practice is the only way
of developing perfect command
of a musical instrument. The
problem is that it is very difficult
to have a teacher on hand all the
time to correct any false notes.
Now, a computer programme
developed by the European project
Vemus – Virtual European Music
School – offers a solution. This
virtual academy of music
is intended for beginner – or
intermediate – level students of the
flute, recorder, trumpet, saxophone
and clarinet. There is a choice of
three learning scenarios. Individual
practice enables the pupil to play
alone in front of a computer that
corrects him when he makes
a mistake. Alternatively, distance
learning links a teacher to a pupil
via the Internet. Finally, during
conventional music lessons the
teacher is able to connect with
several pupils to give them
a lesson at the same time.
The user can add the score
he wants to work on and the
developers say that new instru-
ments can be added easily to the
system provided they are mono-
phonic, as the operation is more
complex for polyphonic instru-
ments (piano, guitar, etc.). The beta
version of Vemus is available in
several languages and can already
be downloaded free of charge via
the project website.
www.vemus.org
GOCE in orbit
The European satellite GOCE
(Gravity field and steady-state
Ocean Circulation Explorer) was
launched Tuesday 17 March from
the Plessetsk base 800 km north
of Moscow. This first of the Earth
Explorer missions under the Living
Planet Programme launched by
the European Space Agency (ESA)
in 1999, aims, among other things,
to study one of nature’s most
fundamental forces: the Earth’s
gravitational field.
During its 20 months in orbit, this
Earth explorer will gather valuable
data on the Earth’s atmosphere,
biosphere, hydrosphere, cyrosphere
and interior. This information
should prove particularly useful
in advancing research on oceanic
circulation and sea-level change.
This will in turn permit a better
understanding of the effects of
© ESA
human activity on these processes
that are influenced by global
warming. The GOCE’s measure-
ments of the static gravitational
forces will provide oceanographers
with a more accurate picture of
the Earth’s reference surface area
– the geoid – that is necessary for
assessing average sea levels and
currents.
www.esa.int
Code name:
BPH-715
Indicated for the treatment of
osteoporosis, bisphosphonates
(BPH) recently revealed potential
in treating cancer and an ability to
boost the immune system. Clinical
trials showed that when molecules
of this kind are associated with
hormonal therapy the risk of
a recurrence of breast cancer
in pre-menopausal women is
reduced significantly. The problem
is that the most frequently used
bisphosphonates combine with
bone minerals and this restricts
their action in other tissues.
A team of researchers from
Europe, the US, Taiwan and Japan
has developed a new compound,
known as BPH-715, which has
proved particularly effective
in inhibiting the growth and
invasiveness of tumours
reproduced on cell cultures.
When subsequently tested on
mice, BPH-715 revealed not only
its effectiveness in killing tumoural
cells in these rodents, but a very
low affinity with the bones.
The results of this study are
published in the Journal of the
American Chemical Society.
The authors believe that this
new medicine would be 200 times
more effective in combating
cancer than substances subjected
to clinical trials recently and would
activate more T gamma-delta
lymphocytes, the immune cells
involved in eliminating tumours.
http://pubs.acs.org/
journal/jacsat
Implanting
a single embryo
Since 1978, the year of the first
test-tube baby, more than
3.5 million children have been
born worldwide as a result of
assisted reproduction. To increase
the chances of success for inter-
ventions of this kind doctors
implant several fertile ovules into
24/08/09 07:39

the uterus of the future mother.
However, Finnish researchers
showed recently in the journal
Human Reproduction that these
multiple implants bring no better
results than implanting a single
embryo.
© Shutterstock
To arrive at this conclusion,
scientists monitored the pregnan-
cy of women having received two
embryos and others who received
just one embryo implant. The birth
rate was 42 % for a single implant
and 37 % for a multiple implant.
At the same time, multiple births
are often associated with health
problems for the mother as well
as an increased risk for babies
born prematurely or of insufficient
weight.
http://humrep.oxfordjournals.org
Nano regulation
They are so small that they are
invading our lives almost unbe-
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 21
known to us, despite the media
and scientific ruckus they often
create. Nanotechnologies are
already a part of our everyday
lives, whether in the ultrafine
sunscreens that contain nano-
particles of titanium dioxide or
the lipsticks that last longer due
to their zinc oxide nanoparticles.
At present, there is nothing
to inform the consumer of the
presence or absence of nano-
particles in the products they
purchase and few independent
studies have checked for the
effects these microscopic
ingredients could have on health.
The European Parliament now
seems determined to make up
for this lack, at least for cosmetics.
A new resolution was adopted
in March to render obligatory,
from 2012, the labelling of
products containing nano
ingredients. A new evaluation
procedure will also apply to ensure
that cosmetics present no health
risks before they are made
commercially available. Yet some
loopholes remain. The labelling
obligation applies solely to
products marketed after 2012,
for example, and then only to
insoluble and bio-persistent
nanomaterials.
www.europarl.europa.eu
IN BRIEF
RESEARCH UNDER
THE MICROSCOPE
What is the use
of scientific meetings?
Under the title “Meetings that changed the world”,
Nature magazine published a series of six articles,
one for each of six scientific meetings that have gone
down in history. Among them are the 1951 Paris meeting that
gave rise to CERN, the famous 1975 conference in Asilomar (California)
on combinant DNA, and the meeting that launched the ‘green revolution’
in agriculture.
By way of conclusion, the magazine offered its readers a number of
reflections on the subject of scientific meetings. It stressed that meetings
such as the ones mentioned above have, in terms of their ambitions
and success, undoubtedly played an important role in the progress
of knowledge. But is this true of them all? Are scientific meetings
really necessary?
Scientists love to meet. Nothing gives them more pleasure, except
perhaps winning the Nobel prize! As to the prospect of sitting down in
the company of their peers, jackets off, in the semi-darkness of a seminar
room where a PowerPoint presentation flickers… it is enough to send
them into rapture. Today, rapid air and rail transport enables them to
indulge this passion to their heart’s content. In turn, research bodies
organise conferences and symposiums with ever-increasing frequency.
So for a long time to come we can be sure of observing, in the queue
for baggage check-in, ever more examples of this particular species of
traveller, researchers making their way to a conference. Most of them
middle-aged males, slightly greying and rather corpulent, dressed in
a tergal jacket over a crumpled shirt, their laptop suspended from their
left shoulder and the right arm clutching a travel bag full of papers.
On the basis of an analysis of the purpose of scientific meetings,
whether official or veiled, as well as of the motivations, avowed or
unavowed, of the organisers and participants, Nature offered an answer
to the question that is full of common sense: yes, scientific meetings
are useful, but on this subject too careful thought is needed.
Michel André
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 21
24/08/09 07:39
 PORTRAIT

Ali Saïb’s
Ali Saïb lives, communicates,
researches and teaches viruses.
Some will say he was born
under a lucky star. Perhaps –
if that lucky star is not only
symbolic of a destiny but
also of the intelligence and
determination that forge it.

A
t the age of 10, Ali Saïb lived on the
northern outskirts of Marseilles. At
the weekend he worked at the
markets and at night as an appren-
tice baker. Thirty years later, Ali Saïb is director
of research and chair of the biology department
at the National School of Engineering and
Technology (CNAM) (FR). In addition to the
CNAM he also teaches at the University of Paris
7 (FR) and heads a research team in virology
with the support of various scientific bodies.
With an impressive list of distinctions and pub-
lications to his credit, his curriculum vitae could
not fail to interest the promoters of the Talents
des cités prize (1) that he was awarded in 2002.
He says, “I never mention this prize because I
do not like this notion very much of being sin-
gled out as in some way exemplary. Rather than
attracting attention in this way, which can be
deluding, I prefer work that can serve as a ref-
erence without making a big show of it.”

The reality of viruses

Ali Saïb believes in working and networking.
Back in the early 1980s there was not yet much
talk of AIDS. But it existed and was moreover
© Christine Rugemer

present in the neighbourhood where Ali lived.

Ali Saïb, “You must be able to learn,

unlearn and relearn.”

22 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 22 24/08/09 07:39


s El Dorado
“This was the first detail. I use this word delib-
erately to speak of very particular points of
apparently minimal importance that later have
a major influence on the life of an individual.”
At the same time, another ‘detail’ emerged dur-
ing an English lesson when the teacher was
working with his pupils on translating scientific
articles, including on the subject of HIV
sequencing. “In these so-called problem schools
some teachers do a marvellous job in identify-
ing potential.” It was in this way that the teen-
age Ali Saïb came into contact with the world
of virology, with this ‘scientific El Dorado’ that
has fascinated him ever since.
After that it all went very quickly, from uni-
versity (biology, genetics, cancerology) to
research, the leadership of research teams and
appointment as a university professor. “Biology
is fascinating because it is concerned both with
the reasons for life and the mysteries of death.
As to viruses, we are still not sure whether they
should be classed as inert or living entities, and
they could even be both at the same time.
When present inside a cell, viruses are able to
express their full potential, whereas they seem
to be totally inert when outside a cell. They are
truly fascinating. Genuine disruptors of the
genetic information of the whole kingdom of
life as well as genuine accelerators for evolu-
tion.” For Saïb the researcher, “the quest for
knowledge and pleasure are essential in this
job. If you find that the pleasure has gone out
of it then it is time to change direction.”
The team headed by Ali Saïb is looking at
how retroviruses hijack a cell mechanism in
order to move, needing to reach a cell nucleus
and penetrate its genetic patrimony in order to
multiply. Although this is in the realms of fun-
damental research, for this virologist the divide
between fundamental and applied research is
not so clear-cut. “In the life sciences, I see rather
a continuum between these two aspects. Our
research can be regarded as either fundamental
or applied, depending on the point of view
you adopt. The research is much more applied
than in other kinds of research that lies fur-
ther upstream. I would also not impose a clear
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 23
divide between private and public research.
They both have common denominators.
Although a financial return is vital in the former
case, everybody also knows that the latter is
impossible without funding, that research direc-
tors have to respect deadlines and business
plans and have become genuine fundraisers.”
Visible – or unforeseeable – implications
While it is relatively easy to attract the inter-
est of investors when combating cancer or
Alzheimer’s, for example, it is much more diffi-
cult to raise capital when working on viruses
that are not harmful to man – the case for a large
majority of them – or on the nocturnal activi-
ties of ants! “This is a very damaging situation
because, when a researcher abandons one field
for another where capital is available, it is his
entire expertise in a very particular field that
is lost. The question needs to be asked. Must
every researcher, or every laboratory, be in part
involved in tackling the major issues of the day?
Perhaps. But the public authorities must then
understand the vital need to support projects
that lie a long way upstream.”
This is a question that affects directly the
relationship between science and society. The
participation of civil society in the strategic
choices of research is an idea that is gaining
ground in Europe. But it does not take much
imagination to realise that everybody is going
to give priority to approving funding that relates
to a field of interest to them, whether it be health,
social issues or environmental protection.
“The job of scientists is also to transmit the
fundamentals – the basic knowledge – to the
general public so that people are able to par-
ticipate in the debates generated by certain
areas of scientific progress, such as GMOs,
stem cells or other so-called sensitive fields.
The scientific community must also explain the
need for upstream research whose short- or
medium-term applications are not evident. The
history of science is full of examples of major
discoveries in areas where they were least
expected. Take, for example, the discovery of
the role played by the tiny interfering RNAs in
PORTRAIT
regulating the flow of genetic information, for
which Andrew Fire and Craig Mello won the
2006 Nobel Prize for physiology and medicine.
This vast and new field of biology, with its
major implications for human health, emerged
due to the study of petunias! Research is like
planting seeds. Some will germinate, others
not. But it is vital to plant them all in the inter-
ests of future generations.”
Learning, unlearning, relearning
Committed to communication, Ali Saïb writes
scientific articles for the layman, chapters of
encyclopaedias or atlases, speaks at conferences
and also made a documentary film on viruses
(Dr Virus and Mr Hyde – Memories of a viro-
logist) produced for television and winner of
two awards in 2006 (2). He is also one of the
founders of The Association for the Promotion
of Sciences and Research (APSR) (FR). Among
other things, this works in cooperation with
scientific institutions to give secondary school
students the chance to work in laboratories
alongside researchers to whom they can pose
their questions. It is Ali Saïb’s achievements in
this field of science communication that in 2007
earned him the EMBO Award for Communica-
tion in the Life Sciences.
As a teacher, Saïb believes it is important to
develop a critical sense and open mind in
young people from a very early age, “even if
it is disconcerting for a student to sense that
a teacher is instilling doubt rather than trans-
mitting a hard and fast truth.” The relativity of
the present is the rule: “what I say is valid
today, and tomorrow it will perhaps be some-
thing else. You have to be able to adapt and
embrace new concepts and paradigms. You must
be able to learn, unlearn and relearn several
times in the course of a life, while retaining
a critical approach and cultivating creativity.” It is
also this that led Ali Saïb to the CNAM, a public
institution dedicated to lifelong education.
Christine Rugemer
(1) In France, the ‘cités’ or ‘banlieues’ are areas located on
the outskirts of major cities with a concentration of social
housing and people with socio-economic difficulties.
(2) First prize at the International Science Film Festival and
Best Science Film at the International Festival of SCOOP
and Journalism.
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 23
24/08/09 07:40
 HUMAN SCIENCES

Modern-day To combine research with

ethnologists
Photograph by Claude Lévi-Strauss of a young girl from the Amerindian Caduveo tribe
museology. To focus efforts
on international exchanges
and multidisciplinarity.
To broaden the scope of
dressed in festive attire. This is the description in his 1955 memoir Tristes Tropiques: “Two styles
are current among the women painters: abstraction and the decorative purpose are at the root of both.
anthropology to include other
The one is angular and geometrical, the other free and curvilinear […] The curvilinear style is usually human sciences. Quai Branly
adopted for face-painting, geometry being reserved for the body; though at times each region
may be adorned with a combination of the two. […] As a rule the subject and background are
Museum, a centre for the arts
interchangeable, so that the design may be read in either of two ways: a positive and a negative.” and civilisations of Africa,
Asia, Oceania and the
Americas, standing on the
banks of the river Seine at
the foot of the Eiffel Tower,
has successfully risen to
all these challenges.
Anne-Christine Taylor, head
of the museum’s research and
teaching department, serves
as our tour guide.

F
rench ethnologist Claude Lévi-Strauss
celebrated his 100th birthday on
28 November 2008. Musée du Quai
Branly (Quai Branly Museum) in Paris
paid special tribute to this figure that helped
to shape 20th-century thinking with his belief
that ethnology is the social science of the
observed. American anthropologist Erik Wolf
considered anthropology to be “the most scien-
tific of the humanities and the most humanistic
of the sciences.”
Indeed, it is this broader-ranging form of
© musée du quai branly/ photo Claude Lévi-Strauss

anthropology that ethnologist Anne-Christine

Taylor’s research and teaching department
addresses. Just as the museum’s founders
intended, its scope goes beyond aesthetic emo-
tions to deepen the context and significance of
objects representing symbols and traditions from
other cultures and civilisations. “It is a flexible
structure designed to circumvent all-too-often
ineffective institutional situations. Instead of
a team of permanent researchers, the department

24 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 24 24/08/09 07:40


has chosen to host individual or collective
projects for limited periods (1).” In association
with the French National Center for Scientific
Research (CNRS), the museum has created an
International Research Network (GDRI) on
Anthropology and Art History involving 15 sci-
entific institutions (from Germany, France, the
United Kingdom, Brazil, Mexico and the United
States). “The GDRI approach focuses on inter-
disciplinarity, by endeavouring to widen the
spectrum of anthropology and to promote inter-
action and exchanges between the various
human science fields.”
The GDRI sees itself first and foremost as
a project facilitator. “A researcher submits
a proposal to us. Should he or she wish to
include foreign researchers or to meet a particu-
lar scientist to discuss the project proposal, this
is where we can be of assistance. In parallel,
the department encourages budding talent by
offering one-year doctoral or post-doctoral
fellowships.”
From primitive to contemporary art
Part of the GDRI’s role has been to create
a wide-ranging programme of multidisciplinary
international symposia and seminars to foster
the exchange of theories and methods. The sub-
jects are far-ranging: from cosmology to the study
of funerary practices, to surveys of blogs by
young people from problem areas, to compari-
sons between ritual dances and contemporary
dance performances. “Comparing cultures from
different periods in history heightens visibility
and enables us to clearly define an issue that is
part of the current climate but is veiled and frag-
mented. For instance, while many researchers
sense that anthropology is related to contem-
porary art, either they fail to grasp the context
or have insufficient resources to give substance
to their instincts. This is where we can help
them. Our job is to correlate different arts, con-
ceptions of art and aesthetics from around the
world in order to reflect on their differences
and similarities. That is why, as a museum of
‘primitive’ art, we pay special attention to
projects that involve the West, particularly
Europe, because such research enables us to
analyse the links between our own and other
cultures.”
How useful is this approach? For the human-
ities and social sciences, art (in the original
sense of the Latin word ars, meaning know-
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 25
how) has become central to the creation and
manifestation of collective identities. Practices
of this sort turn into specific identity symbols
– one example of which is the set of rituals
that have developed among football fans (with
distinctive clothing, make-up, songs and col-
lective gestures).
“Researchers explore the meaning to be given
to objects by focusing on processes of ‘artifi-
cation’. Very simply, ‘artification’ is a term used
to theorise how certain practices or objects
become art (why some items are classified as
‘art’ and others as ‘ethnographic objects’).
Researchers see it as a means for mediation,
a purposive way of influencing others from
a distance. The arts have progressed from mere
systems of signs to systems of relationships,
and have become a means for influencing other
subjects.”
Don’t kill cultural transmission
Much of this art broadens the scope of an
anthropology discipline that is rooted in the
analysis of so-called ‘primitive’ societies. But
how are these societies evolving and where can
we still study societies that are not ‘polluted’?
How far can a 21st-century social context
reflect a tradition without corrupting it?
According to Anne-Christine Taylor, we are
deluding ourselves if we imagine that any cul-
ture is completely authentic at a given time in
its history. Societies everywhere have always
interacted with others. “What is true is that the
balance of power has changed considerably
because the phenomenon of globalisation has
altered the situation. Many societies continue
to be attached to their traditions, though,
despite giving the appearance of having adapted
to modern life. They pass down certain customs
that bear no relationship with the western
world. For instance, they may invest part of their
identity into evolving forms of expression.”
One example is the Huichol Indians of
Mexico. With their complex rituals, this indige-
nous people has been exposed to other societies
for centuries: first the Spanish conquistadores,
followed by a string of other invaders, inclu-
ding Mexican government officials and later
tourists. The creation of certain types of arte-
fact has always been a fundamental part of the
Huichol culture and, today, they are inventing
new forms of expression – paintings – that are
beginning to be prized by western collectors,
HUMAN SCIENCES
but which the Huichols view as a continuation
of their traditional relationship with the world.
“So, ethnologists are certainly not short of
work… Everything changes: not only the socie-
ties that ethnologists study but also ethnologists
themselves… We are certainly not witnessing the
end of anthropology, or of diversity. The more
globalisation there is, the more it encourages
the emergence of differences (provided that
societies are, at the very least, allowed to retain
their lands and the ability to pass down the
values they hold dear, especially their lan-
guage). While some native reservations are like
prisons that kill their inhabitants both morally
and physically, others, though doubtless fewer
in number, serve as sources of renewal. Present-
day ethnologists do not confine themselves to
societies formerly classed as ‘primitive’. They
work on contemporary issues, such as science
laboratories or youth gangs… Their focus is
the comparative study of manifestations of life
in society.”
C.R.
(1) All quotes are from Anne-Christine Taylor.
Container and contents
Q
uai Branly Museum was designed by
architect Jean Nouvel and inaugurated
in 2006. It houses artefacts from the
civilisations of Africa, Asia, Oceania and the (non-
western) Americas. Most of these artefacts came
from the former Musée de l’Homme in Paris. On
show in this resolutely contemporary building,
with a stunning plant-covered living wall com-
prising its riverside façade, are 3 500 artefacts
(out of a total of 300 000 or so owned by the
museum) exhibited on a single level, enabling
visitors to journey through the great civilisations
of the world. On a vast multimedia mezzanine
floor is a host of free-access exhibits and video
installations on specific subjects. This entire
collection can be viewed on the Quai Branly
Museum website, giving an idea of the vast
number and diversity of activities conducted by
the Museum.
www.quaibranly.fr
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 25
24/08/09 07:40
 PHYSICS OF PLASMAS
On the edge
of matter
One of a series of plasma balls
on show at the Microcosme teaching
and experimental exhibition put
together by CERN and permanently
open to the public in Geneva.
Plasmas constitute 99 % of
known and visible matter.
The object of extensive
research and the basis of
a host of applications, they
are invading our living
rooms, changing our plastics
and revolutionising our
laboratory analysis tools.
P
lasmas are rare on Earth, even though
they form the bulk of the visible uni-
verse. The fourth state of matter,
plasma lies behind the incredible
energy generated by the Sun and stars. On
Earth, it is manifested in lightning and gener-
ates phenomena like the aurora borealis
(Northern Lights) or St. Elmo’s Fire (see box)
that fascinated our ancestors.
26 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 26
Mastery of plasmas has given us the neon
tube, and more recently, extra-large, ultra-flat TV
screens (see box on page 28). But that’s not all.
From laboratories to industry, plasmas are on the
cutting edge of analysis technology and manu-
facturing processes. But what is a plasma?
Polymorphous portrait
Back to the classroom. States of matter are
defined by the cohesive force between atoms.
It is not the atoms themselves that are liquid,
solid or gaseous, but the entire structure that
they form. Under the effect of an energy source,
most solids become liquid and even gaseous
if sufficient energy is applied.
The plasma state is one notch higher. The
amount of energy to which the matter is sub-
mitted is such that some atoms destructure and
lose one or more electrons. These collide with
other atoms or molecules and impart energy
to them, one of the main effects of which is to
shift electrons from one orbit to another. Once
these electrons fit back into place, they release
© CERN
energy that can take the form of photons.
Hence the first characteristic of plasmas: they
glow. Ions, that is electrically charged atoms
that have lost or gained one or more electron(s),
may also strike other atoms or molecules,
thereby contributing to the general disorder
that is characteristic of plasma.
In short, plasma is an ionised gas. And since
not all atoms of this gas release electrons,
plasma represents a jumbled mass of molecules,
atoms, ions and electrons. The advantage of this
protean avatar of matter lies in its increased
properties of conductivity and reactivity, because
of its charged particles that can react with an
electric or magnetic field and interfere with
other materials to change their structures and
properties.
Serve hot or cold
Two large families of plasmas – hot plasmas
and cold plasmas – exist side-by-side, distin-
guished by their degree of ionisation. “In hot
plasma, the electrons gain so much energy
24/08/09 07:40
 PHYSICS OF PLASMAS

that most of the experiments prior to the

When physics and myth join hands launch of ITER are being carried out.
Another technical challenge is heating the

D
uring storms, the sailors of yesteryear sometimes saw the tips of their masts light up. This
D-T mixture beyond 100 million degrees in
so-called “St. Elmo’s Fire”, considered at the time as a divine manifestation, is in fact an exam-
order to reach the ignition point of the plasma,
ple of the natural generation of plasmas. Before a storm, the air becomes electrically charged,
i.e., the state where enough heat is released
and the electrical field that tends to concentrate around pointed objects is sufficient to ionise the
for the fusion reaction to become self-perpet-
surrounding air, creating the faint blue or violet light characteristic of St. Elmo’s Fire.
uating. “Several technologies are combined to
Plasmas are also the source of the aurora borealis or Nothern Lights. In this case, magnetic
achieve such temperatures”, Phil Morgan
storms generated by the Sun produce an inflow of charged particles that collide with the atoms
explains. “Initially we pass an electric current
of the ionosphere to generate, depending on altitude, nitrogen, oxygen or hydrogen plasmas.
through the D-T mixture to excite the charged
More recently scientists have observed plasmas lasting no more than 5 milliseconds when
particles into colliding, creating heat in the
powerful lightning occurs in the upper atmosphere. Depending on the type of plasma,
process. But the more the heat increases, the
the researchers have given them epic-sounding names like elves, leprechauns, red sylphs… The
weaker this reaction becomes, and we have to
Lightning and Sprites Observations experiment by the International Space Station is still trying
switch to heating by injecting new particles that
to better understand the origin of these transient phenomena.
in turn collide with the plasma particles and
www.esa.int
generate heat. Lastly, the plasma is subjected
to very high frequencies, enabling it to finally
achieve the optimal fusion temperature.”
Fusion plasmas offer immense potential. So
much so, as Riccardo d’Agostino stresses, that
this often obscures the applications of the other
hot plasmas. “These are used in industry to cut
delicate materials such as ceramics. In analytical
chemistry they are causing a revolution. The hot
plasma torch (Inductively Coupled Plasma – ICP)
allows us to decompose a sample at the atomic
scale and simultaneously identify almost all its
component elements.”

from the electric field they are able to redis-
tribute it by numerous collisions with the oth-
er forms of plasma. This translates into much
greater heat”, says Riccardo d’Agostino, profes-
sor of chemistry at the University of Bari (IT)
and co-editor of the journal Plasma Processes
and Polymers.
This heat can reach that of the Sun, the
plasma of which approaches 10 million degrees
through the fusion of hydrogen atoms within
it. With the discovery of nuclear fusion in the
1930s, controlling this fundamental energy of
the stars has been hugely and universally
coveted. In the field of military research, this
powerful principle has allowed the develop-
ment of the H-bomb, fortunately never used in
conflict. In the field of civil research, fusion
plasmas are at the centre of an unprecedented
scientific effort aimed at providing mankind
with energy that is both green and inexhaus-
tible. Such is ITER (1), a huge international
research project which aims to build the first
pilot nuclear fusion facility.
Theoretically, the principle is simple: when
two nuclei of light atoms fuse, the resulting
nucleus can attain a stable condition only by
ejecting particles to evacuate excess energy.
The fusion of deuterium (D) and tritium (T),
for example, two hydrogen isotopes having one
and two neutrons respectively, ejects a helium
nucleus (two protons and two neutrons) and
a fast neutron. It is more particularly the kinetic
energy of the latter, the most important, that
scientists wish to exploit.
Uncovering the secret of the stars
Putting theory into practice is much less
obvious. First of all, the fusion plasma reaches
becomes so hot that no material can contain it.
“We therefore confine it inside a Tokamak,
a sort of huge cylindrical ring in which a mag-
netic field keeps the plasma away from the
walls”, explains Phil Morgan, plasma physicist
at the Joint European Torus ( JET), the largest
experimental Tokamak in the world, based at
the Culham Science Centre (UK). It is at JET
From nanotechnologies…
But the most immediate revolution comes
undoubtedly from the cold plasmas, which are
a lot more manageable because of their low
temperature. Here we are taking advantage of
their reactivity to edit the properties of materials.
“Originally, we could generate cold plasmas only
at low pressure. At times this made them too
expensive, because of the need to isolate the
material in a vacuum chamber”, Riccardo
d’Agostino explains. “But since about 10 years
ago it has been possible to produce them at
atmospheric pressure. They are increasingly
being used by industry, for example replacing
the chemicals used in the past to increase the
paint adhesion qualities of automotive plastics,
leading to the widespread use of painted
bumpers.”
In laboratories, cold plasmas are fascinating
nanotechnology researchers, enabling them to
generate nanomaterials with specific properties.
This technology is of particular interest to the
researchers of Nano2Hybrids, a European

research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 27

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 PHYSICS OF PLASMAS
project to develop mini-gas sensors from
carbon nanotubes. “As the sensor properties of
carbon are too low, we graft metallic nano-
particles onto their surface using cold plasmas”,
says François Reniers, the director of the Gene-
ral Chemistry Laboratory of the Université Libre
de Bruxelles (ULB) (BE) , one of the partners
in Nano2Hybrids. “For this different techniques
are used. At the ULB and the Gabriel Lipmann
Public Research Centre (LU), we are working
with plasmas at atmospheric pressure while
our colleagues at the Université de Namur (BE)
are studying the effectiveness of low-pressure
deposition. The objective is to determine the
best way to functionalise the surfaces of the
nanotubes by modifying a set of parameters,
such as gas composition, pressure, exposure
time or the type of metal particles.”
… to biomedical sciences
Other researchers are planning to use plas-
mas to sterilise medical instruments. At least this
is the technology that was closely examined
by participants in the European project Bio-
decon – Decontamination of biological systems
using plasma discharges, which was completed
in early 2009. Biodecon has demonstrated the
feasibility and the benefits of plasma sterilisa-
tion. Traditional methods – ultraviolet (UV) treat-
ment, high temperature and/or oxidation using
chemicals – call for very stringent control and
can at times damage the medical equipment.
There are also occasions when they are inef-
fective, like UV when the bacteria are grouped
into biofilms, a kind of germ cluster that can be
up to several millimetres thick. And none of the
traditional sterilisation methods is effective for
removing prions, the biomolecules behind
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
“Cold plasma sterilisation would not only
simplify the traditional procedures but also
improve efficiency”, explains Achim von
Keudell, Biodecon project coordinator for the
Institut für reaktive Plasmen of the University
of Bochum (DE). “Indeed, a hydrogen-based
plasma attacks biofilms more effectively and
eradicates all the biomolecules, including pri-
ons, while reducing the risk of damaging the
instruments.”
Further upstream on the basic research side,
other scientists are examining the effects of the
fourth state of matter on living tissue. “Teams
are working on the use of cold plasmas for
28 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 28
© Thierry Visart (ULB)
1
2
© FUNDP/ SAVÉ/Daniel Van Acker
1 Oxygen plasma produced at low pressure.
2 Low-pressure plasma chamber.
Researchers use plasma treatment to make the
surfaces of carbon nanotubes more reactive by
grafting groups containing oxygen. This makes
it possible to control the size and dispersion
of the metal nanoparticles over
3 4
the surface of the nanotubes.
© Ali Mansour/SAM Luxembourg
3 Atmospheric plasma reactor
in operation at the Department of
Science and Materials Analysis
(SAM) of the Centre de recherche
Gabriel Lippmann in Luxembourg.
4 One of the cold plasma torches used by researchers working on
the Nano2Hybrids project at the ULB. This working group vaporises the
metallic nanoparticles onto the carbon nanotubes exposed to the plasma
(blue light).
© Shutterstock
wound disinfection or for dental scaling”, says
Achim von Keudell. “In the future, plasmas
could even help treat certain cancers”, adds
Riccardo d’Agostino. “But this is still very hypo-
thetical, because we still have no idea of how
plasma impacts human tissues”, Achim von Plasmas and TV
Keudell cautions. One thing is for sure, plasmas
T
are far from having said their last word. he advent of plasma screens in the late
Julie Van Rossom (2) ‘90s signed the death warrant of our
good old cathode ray tubes. Gone are
(1) See ‘ITER emerges from the Earth’, page 14. the small television sets discreetly placed on
(2) With the kind collaboration of Nicolas Vandencasteele,
PhD in chemistry and researcher at the ULB. furniture. Now the TV stands in the middle
of the living room and polarises everyone’s
attention.
Biodecon Hundreds of thousands of small cells
5 partners, 2 countries (DE-FR) connected to electrodes make up these
www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/biodecon televisual giants. Each cell contains a mixture
Nano2hybrids of argon (90 %) and xenon (10 %), so that when
8 partners, 5 countries (BE-ES-FR-LU-UK) the electrodes are activated, these gases ionise
www.nano2hybrids.net to form a plasma. At the plasma state, the
JET photons emitted by argon and xenon give off
www.jet.efda.org ultraviolet light. The front of each cell is coated
Plasma process and polymers with luminophores, substances that excite on
www.plasma-polymers.org contact with the UV and glow blue, red or
green, depending on their type.
24/08/09 07:40
 TRANSPORT

Fuelling the cars of

tomorrow
With the resounding launch of the hybrid
Toyota Prius in 2001 and the market debut
of Tesla’s first electric sports cars, one small
detail is being overlooked: the battery tech-
nology on which these cars are based still
needs serious improvement to withstand the
© CNRS Photothèque/François Jannin

constraints faced by vehicles in everyday use.

Solid oxide fuel cells and test bench.

Researchers have succeeded in lowering
the operating temperature of these batteries
by 100 °C.

T
he fact is that the lithium-ion batteries
(Li-ion) of the best laptops allow them
to be run for an hour and a half before
needing to be recharged for two hours
or more. And a laptop is a stationary application
while a car is designed to be mobile! In other
words, today’s batteries are inadequate for auto-
motive applications.
Much work remains to make lithium batteries
capable of powering urban cars at reasonable
prices. As Daimler AG spokesman Matthias
Brock is keen to point out, “the question of cost
is paramount and the battery is an important part
of the price of the car. To be competitive, we
must reduce the price of batteries, but this will
take another few years.”
According to Paul Nieuwenhuis, automotive
industry expert at Cardiff University Business
School (UK), the battery for a standard hybrid
car costs approximately €17 000, the same
amount as is required to build the rest of the car.
“One can assume that, by 2020 and with mass
production, the cost of the batteries will have
halved. This mass production will start with the
‘plug-in’ hybrids – hybrid cars rechargeable via
an electrical socket (connected hybrids) – but
‘pure’ battery electric vehicles will also benefit”,
he says.
A race for performance
Before that, these cars must gain speed, pow-
er and range. Right now, few vehicles are able to
travel more than 60 km on a single charge. So
far, many models operate on nickel-metal hydride
batteries (NiMH). “These are conventional batter-
ies for electric cars and they are perfectly func-
tional”, insists Saiful Islam of the University of
Bath (UK), a member of the Alistore European
Network of Excellence. This is a fact confirmed
by the emergence in small numbers, mainly in
urban areas, of hybrid and electric cars like the
Mercedes-Benz Smart Car or the Toyota Prius.
Right now, NiMH batteries are more reliable
and less expensive than lithium-ion batteries.
However, as Saiful Islam explains, “lithium-ion
batteries offer other benefits, in particular in terms
of energy density, which is much greater for the
same mass.” This property can have a major
impact on battery weight and on the storage
capacity of the little cells comprising it. Accord-
ing to Peter Bruce, an expert in energy storage
at the Scottish University of St Andrews (UK), a
Li-ion battery produces three to four volts per cell
against a little over two volts per cell for other
types of batteries. This makes it possible to
reduce the number of battery cells and increase
energy density. But adapting this potential to
mass use means improving the performance of
several components of the batteries.
Today’s Li-ion batteries have one major draw-
back: unreliability. Some manufacturers saw their
products explode when laptop manufacturing
was in its infancy. Such scenarios have to be
avoided at all costs in the case of
a moving vehicle. “New materials are the key to
progress in this area,” explains Saiful Islam.
Reliable, effective materials
German chemicals company Evonik Degussa
GmbH is trying to solve this problem through
the Li-Tec project, the outcome of a commercial
partnership with Daimler AG.

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 TRANSPORT
Toyota Prius as
presented at the 2006
London Motor Show.
Evonik has developed a new material
called SEPARION ® for producing the separa-
tor film (or simply ‘separator’) which is a major
component of batteries. As its name suggests,
it separates the two electrodes, the anode (+)
and cathode (-), through which circulates the
flow of lithium ions, and hence the current.
One role of the separator is to prevent short-
circuits while being sufficiently permeable and
porous to allow the passage of moving ions.
Separators are usually composed of semi-
permeable polymer membranes based on poly-
ethylene or polypropylene. But these materials
are flammable and are stable only up to 140 °C.
In case of overcharging, the separator can over-
heat, melt and trigger a short circuit, which may
cause an explosion.
Evonik’s innovation has been to introduce
separators consisting partially of ceramic com-
pounds, which are harder but still flexible
enough to allow the perforation of little pores
30 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 30
through which the electrons can flow. The idea
is not new, but Evonik has adapted it. “The
ceramics were too fragile and it was therefore
difficult to use a separator composed exclu-
sively of this material”, says Li-Tec’s project
director, Volker Hennige. Instead, Evonik has
invented a composite material in which a non-
woven polymer serves as a support substrate
and is mixed with ceramic powder. “In small
cells like in a laptop, you can use 100 % poly-
mer membranes as there is no major safety
issue. This arises only with the larger cells that
are essential for producing cost-efficient electric
cars”, says Volker Hennige.
The current model of the new Roadster, the
electric sports car by California car-builder Tesla,
also contains thousands of little cells rather
than a small number of larger cells, in particu-
lar in order to reduce the risk of explosion
within one of the cells. This manufacturing pre-
cautionary measure is also partly reflected in
© Paul Nieuwenhuis
the cost of this car, which comes out at over
€120 000!
Working on the electrodes
“The materials used until now for the cath-
ode prevent large-scale battery production”,
says Saiful Islam. One research objective is to
design cathodes capable of storing more energy
by increasing their lithium content using new
materials.
In a Li-ion battery, when both electrodes are
connected to the circuit, chemical energy is
released. The lithium ions flow from the cathode
to the anode when the battery is charging, and
from the anode to the cathode during dis-
charge. While the anode is made of graphite,
the cathode is mainly composed either of a layer
of metallic oxide such as lithium cobalt oxide,
or a polyanions-based material such as lithium
iron phosphate or spinels of magnesium oxide
and lithium. Of these materials, lithium cobalt
24/08/09 07:40

© Paul Nieuwenhuis
Th!nk, the Norwegian
electric car, can be equipped
with a lithium-ion battery
as an option.
oxide is the most common. However,
as Saiful Islam points out, “cobalt raises issues
of price and toxicity”.
To replace the cobalt oxide and allow large-
scale development of batteries for automotive
applications, scientists have focused their
research on oxides based on iron, nickel or
manganese as well as on lithium iron phosphate
(LiFePO4) cathodes. The latter show a greater
resistance to heat and to high-intensity electrical
current.
Even more avant-garde research is seeking
to get rid of the cobalt cathode altogether with
a lithium-air battery in which lithium enters
into the electrode and reacts with oxygen to
form lithium oxide. Results suggest that this
approach makes it possible to store more energy
than with traditional lithium-ion batteries. Peter
Bruce talks of up to 5 to 10 times more.
The necessary investments
The current research looks promising, and
although it will take another decade before
competing with the advantages of modern
internal combustion engine technology, elec-
tric vehicle technology is well established on
the EU agenda. In March 2009 the European
Commission earmarked a billion euros for the
development of green cars as part of the Green
Cars Initiative, which is an integral part of its
economic recovery plan. A portion of these
funds has been earmarked for research into
high-density batteries, electric motors, intelligent
electricity distribution networks and vehicle
recharging systems.
According to a study by bankers HSBC,
governments worldwide have provided €12 bil-
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 31
© Hubert Raguet/CNRS
Assembling a plastic
lithium-ion battery
at the LRCS at Amiens.
lion of stimuli to low-carbon-emission vehicles.
The major portion of this sum has been allo-
cated to research and development of lighter
batteries and plug-in hybrid cars as well as
credits or tax refunds for consumers buying new,
low-emission cars. But more is still needed.
According to Lew Fulton, an expert from the
International Energy Agency (IEA), if we suc-
ceed in reducing the cost of batteries to €380
per kilowatt hour, a connected hybrid with
a range of 50 km would cost around €3 000 more
than a conventional non-connected hybrid
model (where the battery is recharged by the
thermal engine and braking). “Putting on the
road 2 million connected hybrids a year by
2020 would therefore cost an additional
€8 billion per year. Research on batteries and
electric vehicles in general would cost another
several hundred million euros a year if it was
also desired to develop purely electric vehicles”,
says Lew Fulton.
Developing transmission and electricity dis-
tribution systems adapted to the era of electric
cars and hybrids is another challenge. Will new
energy production capacities be needed? Could
the development of an intelligent power dis-
tribution network – using computer technology
to communicate consumption information
minute by minute – pave the way for the wide-
spread use of electric vehicles?
Electrical U-turn ahead
Recharging battery-driven cars will certainly
push up energy demand. But these cars could
also be used to inject electricity back into the
network. Since this is already achievable with
lead batteries, it would be easy to establish an
TRANSPORT
© Hubert Raguet/CNRS
Mathieu Morcrette, director of the
Laboratoire de réactivité et chimie des solides
(LRCS) at Amiens (FR) assembling
a lithium-ion button cell in a glove box.
interconnection between the electricity grid
and electric cars.
From whatever perspective one addresses it,
the future development of electric vehicles is
highly ambitious and will require, first and fore-
most all, large investments of money. A portion
of the funding for the Green Cars Initiative is
also dedicated to creating cleaner and more effi-
cient combustion engines, which is undoubtedly
an easier path to follow. Even so, many car-
makers have fully embraced the concept of
electric cars. Matthias Brock from Daimler AG
predicts the emergence of three tracks: “elec-
tric cars could be used in town, given their
more limited range. For longer distances, inter-
nal combustion engines will remain the most
popular form of transportation. But we are also
concentrating on fuel cells because of their
total carbon emission neutrality.”
General Motors has also adopted the idea
of electric cars. Despite the crisis it is planning
to launch a new hybrid vehicle called the Opel
Ampera in Europe, as early as 2011. “Production
of the Ampera is going ahead whatever happens”,
says Craig Cheetham, spokesman for the Ame-
rican auto giant. Increased sales and Toyota’s
improved image since launching the Prius have
almost certainly made GM’s mouth water. This
innovative ingredient that is attracting attention
at all car shows, combined with the long-term
rise in oil prices, undoubtedly heralds further
changes to come.
Elisabeth Jeffries
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 31
24/08/09 07:40
 GENETICS
© CNRS Photothèque/Hubert Raguet
32
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 32
Genes that keep u
Study of the effects of noise on sleep.
Researchers study the brain and cardio-
vascular reactions of sleeping subjects
exposed to train, aeroplane or traffic
noise. They also analyse how these
nocturnal disturbances impact on
cognitive performance and mood the
next day. Noise fragments sleep and
causes vegetative reactions in the
cardiovascular system which, in the long
term, can place people at higher risk of
heart attack. Experiment conducted at
the French National Center for Scientific
Research (CNRS) in Strasbourg (FR).
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
Do you sleep a little or a lot?
It may surprise you to know
that the amount of sleep you
need depends on your genes.
Although much is known
about the genetic mechanisms
that send us to the land of
dreams, until recently far
less was known about the
mechanisms that determine
the amount of time we spend
sleeping. Now, research using
the fruit fly as an animal
model has pointed up a few
key genes.
I
n his novel À la Recherche du Temps
Perdu (In Search of Lost Time) Marcel
Proust wrote that “one cannot properly
describe human life unless one bathes it
in the sleep into which it plunges night after
night and which sweeps round it as a promon-
tory is encircled by the sea…” Sleep, which has
remained a constant of many species through-
out their evolution, occupies a third of a person’s
life. Why is it that, for millions of years, living
beings have slipped daily into this state of
partial unconsciousness that renders them so
vulnerable?
Despite the vital and universal nature of sleep,
this question has never been fully answered, and
many of the mechanisms governing sleep are still
a puzzle. Over the past 10 years or so, there has
been a surge of research into sleep regulation,
and molecular and genetic analysis techniques
are evolving rapidly, gradually unveiling the
mysteries of sleep. To discover how and why
we fall asleep naturally each night, researchers
24/08/09 07:40

p us in bed
are focusing their attention on the genetics of
sleep. Identifying the genes involved in sleep
regulation may not only provide answers to
these fundamental questions, but also lead to
new treatments for sleep disorders.
Deficit, clock and DNA
Sleep has a regulatory system enabling
organisms to compensate for loss of sleep or
surplus sleep (sleep homeostasis). The timing,
duration and quality of sleep are regulated by
two processes: a homeostatic mechanism and the
circadian system. The homeostatic mechanism
regulates sleep intensity, while the circadian
clock (your internal biological clock) regulates
the timing of sleep. A sleep deficit elicits a com-
pensatory increase in the intensity and dura-
tion of sleep, while excessive sleep reduces
sleep propensity. This explains why you need
to catch up on your sleep the day following
a sleepless night. Although the rhythm of the
circadian clock is endogenous, it is reset regu-
larly by daylight. “Sleep is regulated by the
duration and quality of the preceding period
of wakefulness, as well as by your circadian
clock. When the sleep-wake cycle is normal,
the circadian clock produces a cycle lasting
about 24 hours and determines the optimal
times for sleeping and being active. That is why
we fall asleep more easily at night than during
the day,” explains Tarja Porkka-Heiskanen,
coordinator of the European Enough Sleep
project, who is from the University of Helsinki’s
Institute of Biomedicine (FI). This research
project was completed in November 2008 and
included 10 European partners involved in the
study of homeostasis and sleep disorders.
Although all human beings are subject to
these two major sleep regulation processes,
there are wide variations from one person to
another. Some people are happy with just five
hours of sleep, while others are still tired after
eight. The time we go to bed and the amount
of sleep we need to function properly also
depend on the individual. The reason is simple:
sleep is genetically determined. “The electro-
physiological ‘fingerprint’ of sleep (the electri-
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 33
cal brain activity and physiological parameters
recorded during sleep) is one of the most
hereditary of all human characteristics. Sleep
studies of twins have also shown that sleep tim-
ing and duration are genetically programmed,”
says Tiina Paunio, researcher at Finland’s
National Institute for Health and Welfare and
head of genetic analyses in the Enough Sleep
project.
Fruit fly to the rescue
So your DNA determines whether you are
a morning lark or a night owl, as well as how
much sleep you need. “Sleep duration and tim-
ing are both controlled by genes,” explains
Amita Sehgal, professor of neuroscience at the
University of Pennsylvania’s Howard Hughes
Medical Institute (US), specialising in research
into the genetic and molecular mechanisms that
regulate circadian rhythms and sleep. “Several
studies have shown that the mutation of certain
genes in animals affects the duration or timing
of their sleep. However, we know much more
about the mechanisms and genes governing
the timing of sleep than about those governing
sleep duration,” adds Amita Sehgal.
Scientists have a key partner in their study
of sleep regulation: the common fruit fly (Dro-
sophila melanogaster). This little fly is one of
the model organisms most commonly used in
biological research – especially genetics. As
fruit flies are small, easy to breed and have a
very short generation time, they make the ide-
al guinea pigs for observing the effect of one
or more gene mutations on behaviour. When,
in 2000, two American research teams simulta-
neously discovered that the rest period
observed in the fruit fly could be classed as
sleep, this fly became a study model for the
genetics of sleep. Surely it is a bit far-fetched
to use a fly to try to understand human sleep?
On the contrary, the authors of these two stud-
ies show that the fruit fly’s sleep patterns close-
ly resemble those of humans. Just like humans,
the fruit fly usually stays quiet and immobile
for between 6 and 12 hours each night, during
which time it loses most of its ability to respond
GENETICS
to stimuli. When deprived of sleep, both
humans and their winged counterparts will
make up lost sleep the next night. Fruit flies
also sleep more in their youth than later in life,
when their sleep is fragmented, as with humans.
A sleep-depriving mutation
Although the genes that control the amount
of sleep you need, and hence sleep duration,
have been more reluctant to reveal themselves,
they have not remained completely obscure.
Several suspects have been identified in recent
years. In 2005, a research team from the Uni-
versity of Wisconsin (US) discovered the role
of the Shaker gene in the sleep duration of fruit
flies. This gene codes for the potassium chan-
nels that control the entry of the potassium ion
(K+) into the cells, so determining the electrical
activity of the neurons. While exploring the
factors responsible for sleep duration, the scien-
tists made a detailed study of some 9 000 mutant
fruit flies. It was then that they happened across
a line of fruit flies that sleep just one third the
amount of time that ‘normal’ fruit flies sleep.
When they discovered that these short-
sleeping mutants also manifested vigorous leg-
shaking behaviour as they recovered from
anaesthesia, the researchers turned their atten-
tion to the Shaker gene that causes this effect.
The genetic analyses revealed that the mutants’
Shaker genes contained a single amino-acid
mutation, which meant that a functional potas-
sium ion channel could not be formed on the
cell membrane, with the result that potassium
could not flow through it. Apart from the direct
link between this Shaker gene variant and the
short sleep duration of the fruit flies carrying it,
another interesting feature of these stay-awake
mutants is that they have a much shorter life
expectancy than non-mutants. This discovery,
published in Nature, not only confirms the key
role played by potassium flow in sleep regula-
tion, as suggested in previous studies, but also
points to the Shaker gene as one of the key
elements in the genetics of sleep. Can these
observations be applied to human beings?
We still have no confirmation that human genes
and potassium ion channels are akin to those
of the fruit fly. Now, though, researchers have
upped their testing from fruit flies to mammals:
“The Shaker gene is also present in mice, and
studies have shown that this gene affects their
sleep too,” explains Amita Sehgal.
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 33
24/08/09 07:40
 GENETICS
Sleep need, a question of excitability
In late 2007, a research team from the Uni-
versity of Lausanne’s Faculty of Biology and
Medicine (CH) unveiled another key element
in sleep genetics in Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences. When different strains of
mice were deprived of sleep, the researchers
discovered that they did not all experience the
same sleep need. An analysis of the expression
of all genes in the mice brains revealed that
the Homer1a gene was the main gene respon-
sible for differences in sleep need. This gene,
which is also involved in the excitability of
neurons, plays a key role in regulating intra-
cellular calcium (Ca++). A state of wakefulness
causes an inrush of calcium into the neurons
to enable them to respond to the stimuli
received, but an excess of Ca++ can become
toxic to the neurons. According to the authors,
sleep triggers the Ca++ regulation process via
the Homer1a gene. These results would explain
both our sleep need and the fact that not eve-
rybody reacts to sleep deprivation in the same
way. The Swiss researchers believe that this dis-
covery would offer the first molecular proof of
the role of sleep in the process of brain pro-
tection and recovery.
In July 2008, Science published the results of
a study by Amita Sehgal revealing the effect on
the sleep of fruit flies of a mutation in a gene
called Sleepless. This gene codes for a protein
which, when released into the brain of fruit
flies, reduces the excitability of nerve cell mem-
branes and creates the need to sleep. Fruit flies
Sleep helps combat
obesity
C
hronic sleep deprivation disrupts
our body’s metabolic balance and
the physiological regulation of eating
patterns. Various experiments have shown
that obesity is linked with short sleep duration.
How exactly does sleep protect people from
obesity? At night, the body secretes the appetite-
suppressing hormone, leptin, which stops us
feeling hungry. By contrast, during the day-
time, it secretes the hunger hormone, ghrelin,
to encourage us to eat. In people who sleep
little, ghrelin is secreted over a longer time
period, increasing their appetite.
34 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 34
© Kyunghee Koh
Images taken from a 10-minute video of a fruit fly with a mutated Sleepless gene (on the right) and a ‘normal’
fly (on the left). The normal fly remains immobile during this 10-minute interval, while the mutant fly moves
several times. In fact, fruit flies with a mutated Sleepless gene can sleep between 85 % and 100 % less per day.
with a mutated Sleepless gene, which were una- and the mechanisms that govern it could lead
ble to produce this protein, slept between 85 % to the development of more targeted treat-
and 100 % less per day. ments for people with sleep disorders to
Lastly, a new study by scientists from North replace the sleeping tablets they are currently
Carolina State University (US), published in prescribed, thereby improving their quality of
Nature Genetics in early 2009, has confirmed life. Although recent scientific discoveries have
that fruit flies are ‘genetically programmed’ to illuminated some of the murky depths into
sleep. The genetic analysis of 40 lines of fruit which most ordinary mortals sink every night,
fly used for this research has led to the identi- it will be a long time before the experts can
fication of some 1 700 genes responsible for collect and assemble all the pieces in the jigsaw
sleep variability in fruit flies. The authors sus- and finally lay their weary heads to rest.
pect that some of these genes are involved in Audrey Binet
the regulation of sleep duration.
Towards better hypnotic drugs?
“There is still much more we have to learn
about the genetic regulation of sleep, such as
the sequential organisation of the expression
of sleep genes and the variability of their
expression over time,” explains Tiina Paunio.
Indeed, sleep does not remain constant over
a person’s lifetime. Sleep disorders can appear
with age, stress, or illnesses such as sleep
apnoea or depression, altering the quantity or
Enough Sleep
quality of this state so crucial to human phys-
7 partners, 5 countries (CH-FI-IT-NL-SE)
ical and mental well-being. The aim of the
www.enoughsleep.fi
recently completed European PROUST project
PROUST
was to press for the ‘time’ factor to be included
4 partners, 4 countries (EE-FR-IT-SE)
in biomedical research as a fourth dimension of
www.europroust.org
life. One strand of the PROUST project con-
Website of the French National
cerned the regulation of sleep-related genes
Institute for Health and Medical
over time.
Research (INSERM) with information
Lack of sleep causes such effects as impaired
on sleep
cognitive performance and immune response,
http://ura1195-6.univ-lyon1.fr
metabolic imbalances and diminished concen-
tration. Understanding the function of sleep
24/08/09 07:40

Nuclear waste:
an insoluble question?
B
With mankind confronted by
an energy crisis and climate
change, nuclear power is
back on the scene. But despite
excellent energy efficiency
and low CO2 emissions,
nuclear fission still leaves us
with the delicate problem of
radioactive waste. A typical
European response in this
area is the Belgian model.
Chronology of the work of the HADES (High-Activity Disposal Experiment Site) underground laboratory –
based at Mol (BE), where the PRACLAY experiment will take place in 2010.
Second access well
1997-1999
Source: GIE EURIDICE
research_eu_61_EN_090826.indd 35
y 2008, the UK began the return to
nuclear power by calling for the con-
struction of new reactors. Sweden
joined the movement in February
2009 by reviving its atomic energy program,
on hold since 1980. In its wake, Paris announced
an agreement with Italy to build the first four
nuclear power plants there. And all this with-
out any real mass protest. According to a Euro-
barometer survey in 2008, almost 44 % of
Europeans support nuclear power, compared
with 37 % in 2005. Energy dependence and
climate change today appear more tangible
than a hypothetical nuclear accident, and of
more immediate concern than the future
management of nuclear waste.
Test Drift
Connecting gallery
2001-2002
PRACLAY gallery
2007
POLLUTION
Varying definitions
According to the World Nuclear Association,
some 237 nuclear reactors will be built across
the world between now and 2030. With 80 %
of nuclear waste coming from these reactors,
the issue of waste management is more rele-
vant than ever. The remaining 20 % comes from
medical applications (detection and treatment
of pathologies), agricultural use (elimination
of bacteria) and scientific research.
But what is radioactive waste? According to
the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),
it is “any matter for which no use is foreseen,
and which contains radionuclides in concen-
trations greater than the values that the author-
ities regard as permissible”.
First access well
1980-1982
Underground
research lab
1982-1983
1987
Experimental well
and gallery
1983-1984
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 35
26/08/09 10:19
 POLLUTION

An EU directive exists defining radi-
ation protection standards, but the actual man-
agement of nuclear waste remains a national
competence. A joint convention of 1997 sim-
ply states that each country will manage its
own waste.
“This is a working definition”, says Jean-Paul
Minon, Director General of the Organisme
national des déchets radioactifs et des matières
fissiles enrichies (ONDRAF) (BE). “Like with
municipal waste, it is the owner who decides
what is of no use. In Belgian hospitals, the radio-
active sources used in cobalt therapy are
decommissioned as soon as their irradiation
power has decreased by half, because this
means longer exposure times for patients, even
though these sources can clearly still save many
lives. We gladly donate them to third world
countries, providing they pick up the cost of
transport.”
Answer A, B or C?
Since the 1950s, the international community
has allowed the disposal of radioactive waste
into the environment, mainly in the Atlantic
Ocean, where more than 100 000 tonnes of radio-
active waste have been dumped in concrete
drums. This controversial practice was aban-
doned in 1982 in favour of other methods of
disposal. Currently, it is the interplay of two
parameters, the half-life (see box) and the
activity of the waste, which determines the
appropriate form of management. In the Bel-
gian model, which is representative of what
happens in most Member States, nuclear waste
is divided into three categories, A, B and C, on
which the nature of the container, the type of
storage and the permitted exposure time
depends.
Class A waste is permanently stored on the
surface. As Jean-Paul Minon explains, the
volumes to be managed remain reasonable.
“For a country of 10 million inhabitants like
Belgium, where 55 % of the electricity con-
sumed is of nuclear origin, Class A waste rep-
resents 72 000 m³ over the 40-year lifetime of
the power stations, including their decommis-
sioning.” This waste is packed in steel drums
and stored on the Belgoprocess site in Dessel
(BE), pending final destination. The shielding
and thickness – between 25 and 80 cm – of the
reinforced concrete walls guard against any
outward emission.
“We can therefore ensure the safe manage-
ment of such waste on the surface”, says Jean-
Paul Minon, “because its activity level will be
down to that of natural background radiation
after only 300 years. But this is not true for
Class B and Class C waste, where storage
periods may extend over hundreds of thou-
sands of years. These time spans, unmanagea-
ble on a human scale, force us to consider
deep-layer geological storage.
Test digging
“There is a widespread popular conception
that countries already bury their radioactive
waste”, notes ONDRAF spokesperson Émile
Biesemans. “But this is absolutely not the case.
European countries are still carrying out tests
in this area to ensure the feasibility of this type
of storage. We can consider that Europe has
begun tackling the question in time, because
Class C waste requires a long period of cooling
– at least 60 years – in a tank or on the surface
before geological storage”.
Right now the EU has 10 out of the world’s
14 underground laboratories. One of the first,
built in 1980, is the HADES – High-Activity Dis-
posal Experiment Site - underground laboratory
based in Mol (BE). The scientific research centre
is located some 225 metres underground in
a layer of Boom clay, seen as a potentially
appropriate host geological formation for long-
life highly radioactive waste. The site hosts var-
ious European programmes examining the
hydrogeological, geomechanical and geochem-
ical feasibility of deep storage. The results are
allowing scientists to fine-tune their forecasts
and their evaluations of the short and long-
term modelling.

Hot stuff!
The ABC of radioactivity In 2010, a 10-year thermal experiment enti-
tled PRACLAY – Preliminary demonstration test

R
adioactivity is a spontaneous process in which unstable atomic nuclei decay, emitting energy for clay disposal of high-level radioactive
and forming stable nuclei of lower mass. This energy takes the form of alpha or beta radiation, waste – will be initiated at Mol. The project’s
often accompanied by gamma radiation. Alpha radiation relates to very heavy nuclei, like scientific coordinator, Xiangling Li, is busy
that of uranium. It corresponds to the ejection of two protons and two neutrons, or, in other words, defining its objectives. “The high activity vitri-
a helium nucleus. Beta radiation comes from nuclei presenting an excess of neutrons or protons. fied waste that it is planned to store perma-
Excess neutrons are converted into protons with an emission of electrons, or, conversely, protons nently in this way continues to give off heat
into neutrons with an emission of positrons. Gamma radiation, finally, is an emission of high- for hundreds of years. Which is why we are
energy photons that accompanies these nuclear transformations. trying to verify, on as long a time-scale as pos-
Depending on the nature of the nucleus, radioactive processes can vary enormously in time. We sible, that this heat does not cause major dis-
call the half-life of an element the time required for the radioactivity of a sample to be divided by 2. ruptions of the soil, endangering the stability
For example, a block containing 1 mg of 60Co – with a half-life of 5.2 years – will contain no more of the excavation and the containment and
than 0.5 mg after 5.2 years, 0.25 after 10.4 years and so on. insulation capabilities of the Boom clay. Pre-
The activity of a source is the number of radioactive disintegrations per second and is measured liminary tests in the lab, on-site on a reduced
in becquerels (Bq). The dose, a unit directly linked to the biological effects of radiation, is expressed scale and by simulation suggest that Boom clay
in sieverts (Sv). Thus, death is almost certain to follow exposure to more than 10 Sv, while the radio- is an excellent candidate. We are optimistic that
protection level acceptable to the public is around 0.001 Sv per year. In general, below 0.005 Sv per this live experiment will confirm our predic-
hour, waste is considered as low-activity, between 0.005 and 2 Sv per hour, it is considered a medium- tions”.
activity, and above this as high-activity waste.

36 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 36 24/08/09 07:40


1 2
© EURIDICE
© EURIDICE
1 Excavator for piercing the galleries.
2 3 The connecting gallery reaches the Test Drift.
4 The traffic galleries.
5 The HADES laboratory, 224 metres underground.
The technological and scientific importance
of this project, which is being undertaken with
national and European funding, goes well
beyond the borders of Belgium. The sharing
of knowledge advocated by the scientific teams
will be beneficial to countries like France or
Switzerland, which have similar geological for-
mations. Certain technical aspects will also be
valuable to other EU countries wishing to
establish similar storage areas in crystal rock
or in salt mines. “It is even possible that our
expertise will open up new avenues for the
absorption of atmospheric CO2, since the geo-
logical storage of this gas is based on similar
techniques,” says Xiangling Li.
An effective shield?
Prior to burial, high-activity liquid waste
from the reprocessing of spent fuel is vitrified,
i.e. trapped inside a glass matrix. This structure
should considerably slow the radioactive emis-
sions. “At least that’s what we want to check”,
says Elie Valcke, who heads up the CORALUS
(Corrosion of alpha-active glass in under-
ground storage conditions) project. “Between
2000 and 2003, we inserted into the Boom clay
four test tubes containing several vitrified non-
radioactive and highly radioactive test samples,
in direct contact with different types of fill. In
2004, two tubes were extracted, one main-
tained at 30 °C for 3.3 years, and the other at
90 °C for 1.3 years. The results are quite positive
since the loss of mass due to the dissolution of
the glass was only 0.2 % for the first tube, and
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 37
3 4
© EURIDICE
© EURIDICE
2 % for the second. In both cases, all radio-
activity released by the glass wall was stopped
by the filling material, including 99.9 % within
a radius of just five millimetres.” The scientific
team believe that analysis of the last tubes,
scheduled to be extracted in 2009 (6.5 years at
90 °C) and 2014 (10 years at 30 °C), will con-
firm the effectiveness of vitrification.
Jean-Paul Minon is keen to emphasise that
even if Class A waste will be stored permanently
on the surface from 2016 onwards, no decision
concerning the final disposal of Class B and
Class C waste has been, taken in Belgium. “Even
if the feasibility of deep-layer storage has been
demonstrated, the ultimate decision will be not
only political but also social. Dialogue with the
public has become inevitable. And that’s good.
Between now and then, it’s possible that new
solutions will be envisaged. Some people
believe, for example, in evacuating radioactive
waste into space, but our launchers are far from
being reliable enough to consider it seriously.”
Marie-Françoise Lefèvre
ONDRAF
www.nirond.be
CORALUS project
www.sckcen.be
PRACLAY project
www.euridice.be
POLLUTION
5 5
© EURIDICE
Nuclear safety bodies
W
hile competence for policies for
the management of radioactive
waste lies at national level, various
international bodies exist to disseminate best
practices.
IAEA: The International Atomic Energy Agen-
cy is a body of the United Nations Security Coun-
cil. Its primary role is to encourage the safe and
peaceful use of nuclear energy. The IAEA has
set up the programme of safety standards for
radioactive waste (RADWASS) which lists the
standards to be met.
UNSCEAR: The United Nations Scientific Com-
mittee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation is
tasked with assessing the levels and effects of
radiation exposure and communicating
its findings to governments, and with suppor-
ting the development of national security
measures.
ICPR: The International Commission on Radio-
logical Protection is an independent organi-
sation that promotes public dissemination of
the science of radiation protection and pro-
vides safety recommendations on radiation.
NEA: The Nuclear Energy Agency assists mem-
ber countries of the Organisation for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) in
maintaining the necessary scientific platforms
for the safe economic and environmentally
friendly use of nuclear energy.
www.iaea.org
www.unscear.org
www.icrp.org
www.nea.fr
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 37
24/08/09 07:40
 HEALTH

What’s to fear about

© Shutterstock
mobile phones?

400 with cancer of the parotid gland were

Interphone, the largest epidemiological investigation ever interviewed using a common protocol, along
conducted into the link between cancer and mobile phones, with a control group of 7 658 people.

is delivering its first results. While the interpretation of this A prudent interpretation ...
study does not yet allow us to draw definite conclusions, For gliomas, the brain cancer for which the
mortality risk is highest, the Interphone study
it suggests that the use of mobile phones could promote states that “the pooling of data from the Scandi-
the occurrence of certain brain tumours. navian countries and the UK has identified an
increased risk of developing this type of

M
obile phone use has grown expo-
nentially over the past 10 years,
much faster than television and
radio ever did. It is therefore too
early to quantify the long-term risks to health.
The number of users and relay antennas,
sprouting up even in the most remote corners
of the world, mean we are constantly immersed
in a flow of radio frequencies (RF). Are our
bodies capable of withstanding such exposure?
The initial results of the Interphone study,
launched in 1999 by the International Agency
for Research on Cancer (IARC) in 13 indus-
trialised countries, suggest that people who
have used mobile phones regularly for 10 years
face a higher risk of developing certain tumours.
The study focuses on four types of tumours
affecting the brain or the parts of the head
around the ears. Each survey participant
received a detailed questionnaire on their use
of mobile phones, their demographic profiles,
whether or not they used other communica-
tion systems, whether they smoked, and their
personal and family medical histories. In all,
2 765 people with gliomas, 2 425 with menin-
giomas, 1 121 with acoustic neuromas and
tumour on the side of the head normally used
for telephoning”. The results thus suggest that
the probability of users developing a glioma
after 10 years is up to 60 % higher in the Scandi-
navian countries… nearly 100 % in France and
close to 120 % in Germany.
For meningiomas and acoustic neuromas the
results are more mixed, although a similar
trend emerges. For tumours of the parotid
gland, on the other hand, no increased risk has
been generally observed. But further investiga-
tions, with longer latency periods, are needed
to confirm these results.

38 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 38 24/08/09 07:40

 HEALTH

Could over-use of mobile phones ing international standards. The control group

© CNRS Photothèque/CREMANT/Nice-Sophia Antipolis/

LEAT/Emmanuel Perrin
present a health hazard, and even cause certain was not exposed.
brain cancers? Current research is unable to give any Two major conclusions emerge from this
conclusive answer. study. The first concerns the effect of exposure
on rats’ immune systems. Analysing blood sam-
ples carried out every three months, Dirk Adang
Elisabeth Cardis of the Centre for Research pinpointed an increase in monocytes, white
in Environmental Epidemiology (CREAL) in blood cells involved in the elimination of foreign
Barcelona (ES), the coordinator of the Inter- bodies from the organism, in rats of the three
phone study, however, plays down the alarm- exposed groups compared with the control
ing nature of these early results: “They do group. This finding suggests that the organism
indeed indicate a possible increased risk responds to low-dose electromagnetic expo-
among long-term users, but this observation is sure as a foreign aggression. A second and
perhaps artificial, owing to two main biases more worrying finding concerns the mortality
that may invalidate the conclusions. On the one rate: 60 % of rats in the three exposed groups System of reconfigurable radiation diagram
hand, the reports may be underestimated died within three months of the end of the antennas for mobile telephony UMTS (Universal
because of selection bias, i.e. the nearly 55 % experiment, against 29 % in the control group. Mobile Telecommunications System), one of the
non-response rate among healthy users. On third-generation technologies. Work being carried
the other hand, people with cancer may have Electromagnetic cocktail out at the Laboratoire d’électronique, antennes et
overestimated their use of mobile phones. That Again, relating as they do to an experiment télécommunications, at Valbonne (FR).
is what is known as memorisation bias.” carried out on rats, these results do not permit
A good number of the organisations cam- definitive conclusions. At the European Com-
paigning for the imposition of more stringent mission, a report published in 2009 by the
standards on the use of mobile phones believe Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly
the definition of ‘regular user’ – used in the Identified Health Risks (SCENHIR) indicates
Interphone study as someone using a mobile that there is no evidence of any impact of
Does electro-hyper-
phone at least once a week for at least six electromagnetic waves on human health but sensitivity exist?
months – is much too broad, which could recommends that more research be carried out

C
again bias the results. “This is, however, a very on the subject. ertain people appear to be more
clear concept that runs through all the studies,” Although the conditions in which mobile sensitive to electromagnetic waves
says Elizabeth Cardis. “When people meet this phones are harmful to public health are not emitted by, in particular, mobile phone
profile, a detailed questionnaire is sent to docu- clearly established, one can reasonably doubt relay antennas. Even though the World Health
ment their complete histories of mobile phone that the friendly mobile is totally innocent. Organization (WHO) has included electro-
use. We have done analyses by number of What then of proximity to relay antennas? And hypersensitivity in its list of pathologies,
years’ use, the total number of calls, number of the combined effect with Wi-Fi waves? The this disease is recognised only in Sweden and
of hours, etc.” health impact of these parameters is still Great Britain. Strasbourg citizen Sabine Rinckel
unknown. Additional independent scientific has undertaken numerous legal actions to
Interference with the immune system studies are probably required to clarify them. obtain redress from the French authorities.
The final Interphone results should be Meanwhile, scientists are advocating the pre- “I’ve suffered migraines and back pain ever
published within a few months. Right now, cautionary principle: avoiding the excessive since they installed a relay antenna on the
governments cannot (or do not want to) use the use of mobile phones, especially among young roof of my building”, says the 40-year-old.
Interphone study as a basis for introducing or children, using wired headsets or hands-free “I have tingling in fingers and legs. Not to
modifying regulations. However, other studies devices, and not using mobile phones in moving mention these electric shocks that lacerate my
are pointing in the same direction, like a doc- vehicles, which forces them to operate at full jaw. I had surgery in 1981 during which screws
toral thesis defended at the Université Catholique power to maintain connectivity. Don’t they say and plates were inserted onto the bones of my
de Louvain – UCL (BE) in June 2008 before an that excessive use of anything is harmful? face.”
international jury of experts. Dirk Adang, super- Frédéric Dubois The doctors who examined Sabine Rinckel
vised by André Vander Vorst, has measured the were unable to diagnose anything because her
impact of electromagnetic waves in four groups pathology is not recognised by the profession.
of rats. Rodents of three of these groups were International Agency for “Despite moving apartment, I continue to
submitted over a period of 18 months, equiva- Research on Cancer experience these symptoms. They are so strong
lent to 70 % of their lives, to different levels of www.iarc.fr that I am able to locate relay antennas without
electromagnetic exposure in line with prevail- seeing them.”

research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 39

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 39 24/08/09 07:40

 IN BRIEF
SCIENCE AT
YOUR FINGERTIPS
Summer paleotrip
Since 2005, the Royal Belgian
Institute of Natural Sciences (ISNB)
has been offering holidays that
are, to say the least, original. The
first ‘paleotrip’, or paleontological
dig (Les Dinosaures de l’Amour),
took 11 amateur paleontologists
to Blagoveschensk, on Russia’s
border with China. They had been
selected more for their enthusiasm
than for their expertise, and were
brought along to help the scientists
in their research. The objective was
© ISNB
Archaeological dig in Russia (2005).
The dinosaur remains are analysed by
the Blagoveschensk laboratory, after
which the Belgian team takes casts
of the most interesting pieces back
to the Royal Belgian Institute of
Natural Sciences (ISNB) for further
research.
to hunt down dinosaurs that had
died out 65 million years ago, to
try to understand how and in what
time frame they became extinct
and to examine in more detail the
hypothesis that a meteorite had
40 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 40
been responsible for their
extinction. In 2006, 12 ‘paleotrip-
pers’ (ranging in age from 21 to 64)
embarked on a second field trip.
“We excavated the two richest
sites in Russia, which also harbour
the youngest dinosaurs in Asia.
These dinosaurs lived 65 million
years ago, just before the famous
Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (K-T)
crisis, which led to the extinction
of the species. We now know that
dinosaurs were a highly diversified
species before they became
extinct and that they died out very
suddenly,” explains Pascal Godefroit,
a paleontologist at the ISNB.
This summer, the hunt will continue
at Velaux, near Marseilles, in
collaboration with the University
of Poitiers (FR). Although this site
has already yielded up some
wonderful fossils, it has never
been subjected to large-scale
excavations until now. While
it is too late to enrol for this
year’s expedition, it might be
worth bearing in mind for next
summer.
www.sciencesnaturelles.be/
active/expeditions/archi-
ve2006/paleotrip2006
Taking stock of
informal education
ECSITE 2.0 R/evolution/s is the title
of the 20th annual conference of
ECSITE, the European Network of
Science Centres and Museums,
held at the ‘Leonardo da Vinci’
National Museum of Science
and Technology in Milan (IT) from
4 to 6 June 2009. ECSITE brought
together some 350 institutions
can experiment with biodegradable
and non-degradable materials and
set up a ‘compost factory’ in their
and bodies involved in dissemi-
nating the culture of science
classroom (using biodegradable
kitchen waste to make compost
(including science museums and for fertilising crop plants).
centres, universities, aquariums Alternatively, they can create
and libraries). The conference a polyculture system where they
provided an opportunity for feed fish on vegetables they have
informal education partners to grown in the classroom, or con-
take stock of two decades of struct a wetland model to recycle
science promotion activities and grey water and wastewater in
to discuss future plans. How to ecological ways. There are also
approach new scientific content? excursions where children can
Which innovative methods and study life in a river ecosystem
aids might be of interest? How or visit a water treatment plant.
to attract new visitors and trigger This is an EU-supported ‘young
a science debate? citizens’ project.
www.ecsite-conference.net www.play-with-water.ch
Water as Come on, girls…
a learning aid Why do girls seem less interested
in science and technology than
It is never too early to encourage
boys? Is it a matter of preference,
environmental awareness and
or of preconceptions, education or
respect for nature. The initiators of
gender differences in the way girls
the Play with Water project target
perceive science and technology
children from the age of seven
careers? The seven partners in the
upwards. They provide primary-
European GAPP project (Gender
school teachers with classroom
awareness participation process) (1)
experiments, excursion ideas
took a practical approach to
and teaching material for raising
answering this question by
environmental and ecological
studying schoolgirls and -boys
awareness. For instance, pupils
aged between 14 and 18 years
and involving their teachers
and sometimes their families.
The project involved a total
of 26 research institutes,
40 researchers, 1 817 pupils,
87 teachers and 207 parents at
various stages before it ended
in late 2008.
The GAPP project promoters
devised a number of practical
© Courtesy Ranka Junge/ZHAW
activities to bring pupils into
contact with scientists, including
laboratory experiments followed
by discussions (Italy), individual
meetings with scientists (Belgium)
and the production of a film on
24/08/09 07:40

© Shutterstock
researchers (Poland). A document
on the design, implementation
and evaluation of these initiatives
can be downloaded from the
project website. It should be of
interest to anyone working in
science communication and give
them ideas for good practice.
So, what were the project
conclusions? That science and
technology careers are just as
accessible to girls as to boys
and that the desired attributes
(intelligence, creativeness and
perseverance) are not in the least
gender specific. Anything else is
simply down to preconceived ideas.
www.gendergapp.eu
Genomic
revolution
The subject of genomics never
ceases to raise new issues and
has caused much ink to flow.
The ‘Inside DNA’ website provides
a wealth of scientific information.
Teachers can find classroom
resources tailored to pupils of
differing levels. The ‘Real Research’
space offers students and the
public a chance to further their
knowledge by reading the views
of leading researchers. Anyone
can give their point of view on
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 41
ethical matters arising from new
human genetics developments,
and this feedback will be shared
directly with the Human Genetics
Commission, the UK Government’s
advisory body on new develop-
ments in human genetics. “It’s your
chance to have a say in the future
policy of a science that will affect
all of our lives,” say the organisers.
This virtual environment is sup-
ported in the field by a touring
exhibition that will travel the length
and breadth of the UK in 2009.
Inside DNA was developed by the
British science centre, AT-Bristol,
with funding from the Wellcome
Trust and support from the Sanger
Institute genomics centre.
www.insidedna.org
Crossborder
Science Ac’
It all began in the Parisian district
of Montagne Sainte-Geneviève,
where, in 2006, researchers
and students from the district’s
education and research
institutions got together to found
an association called Paris-Montagne
and a programme entitled Science
Académie (‘Science Academy’
in English). The title was shortened
to Science Ac’, to parody France’s
TV reality show talent contest,
Star Ac’ (the British equivalent was
‘Fame Academy’). In 2008, a total
of 200 secondary school pupils
took part in Science Ac’ (of whom
66 % were girls).
The association’s aim is for
secondary-school pupils to
discover science careers and
research procedures and they
are given a chance to take part
in a laboratory or hospital
placement. There the young
people meet researchers who,
while not mentors per se, can
guide them in their choices and
nudge them in the right direction.
Summer schools are held in
universities abroad and individual
stays are organised in Germany,
Croatia, Hungary, the UK or Serbia
for secondary-school pupils who
have participated in Science Ac’
programmes. Many of these
© Shutterstock
IN BRIEF
training placements rely on
support from the Network for
Youth Excellence (NYEX).
“We are convinced of the need
to harness the cultural and social
diversity that exists in Europe,” says
association president Livio Riboli-
Sasco, who is studying for a PhD
in theoretical biology at Paris
Descartes University (FR).
Paris-Montagne works in close
collaboration with the Hungarian
association KutDiák and the
Portuguese association Ciênca
Viva. The associations’ leaders
are endeavouring to launch the
ENSEMblE project to promote
individual programmes for young
people abroad. “In France, we
target our activities mainly at
young people from disadvantaged
backgrounds. In Hungary, a large
proportion are secondary-school
students living in rural areas,
as well as young Roma gypsies.
The programmes provide these
young people with a sense
of personal fulfilment and
recognition and a means for
social advancement. Their
encounters with research circles
have a significant impact on many
young people, encouraging them
to become active citizens capable
of formulating their own questions
and engaging in dialogue using
rational arguments.”
www.scienceacademie.org
www.kutdiak.hu
www.cienciaviva.pt
www.nyex.info
(1) Città della Scienza (IT), Ciênca Viva (PT),
Experimentarium (DK), Royal Belgian Institute
of Natural Sciences (BE), NEMO (NL), SISSA-ICS
(IT), University of Warsaw (PL).
Close-up of DNA’s
molecular of structure.
research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 41
24/08/09 07:40
 IN BRIEF
TEACHING
CORNER
Good old carbon 14
Most of us have heard about carbon-14 dating but are
not always clear what it actually is or how it is used to
estimate the age of a fossil. Carbon 14 (14C) is a naturally
occurring carbon isotope, that is to say, an atom with the
same number of protons as other atoms of the same element
but a different number of neutrons (carbon 14 has six protons
and eight neutrons). The other two naturally occurring carbon
isotopes are carbon 12 (12C) and carbon 13 (13C), but what
makes carbon 14 useful for dating purposes is the fact that
it is radioactive (1), hence its alternative name of radiocarbon.
Carbon 14 is formed when cosmic rays collide with atoms
in the Earth’s upper atmosphere, creating secondary cosmic
rays in the form of energetic neutrons. When these neutrons
collide, a nitrogen 14 atom turns into a carbon 14 atom and
a hydrogen atom. The carbon 14 atom immediately binds
with oxygen to form carbon dioxide (CO2). The CO2 dissipates
throughout the atmosphere and into the oceans (where it
forms carbonates).
So carbon 14 is found everywhere that CO2 reacts, such
as in living beings that absorb carbon (and hence carbon 14).
Plants fix atmospheric carbon naturally by means of photo-
synthesis, which is how carbon is introduced into the rest
of the food chain, when animals eat the plants and absorb
carbon into their bodies. After the organism dies, the carbon-
fixation process ceases and its store of carbon is frozen
at that point, except in the case of carbon 14, which,
being radioactive, continues to decay slowly without being
replaced, turning into the more stable form of nitrogen 14.
This decay becomes ever slower and is never complete.
Indeed, the amount of carbon 14 in the organism shrinks
to half after only 5 730 years (known as its half-life).
As measurements have shown the bombardment of
cosmic particles forming carbon 14 to be fairly stable over
a period of several millennia, it follows that the proportion
of carbon 14 contained in living beings is also stable over
that time-frame. So, all we need to do to estimate a fossil’s
age is to determine the proportion of carbon 14 that has
decayed since death. Using modern-day techniques, this
can be done on samples smaller than one milligramme.
(1) See box entitled The ABC of radioactivity, page 36.
© Shutterstock
42 research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 42
PUBLICATIONS
Sustainable development
and territorial dynamics
2008, 37 pp,
ISBN 978-92-79-09525-2
Sustainable development and territorial
dynamics are at the meeting point of the
European Union’s social, economic and
environmental policies. These two key
issues have a direct relationship with the EU
Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), cohesion
policy and structural funds. This report
describes research projects in the fields of
economics, social science and humanities
under the Seventh Framework Programme.
Special Eurobarometer survey
on medical and health research
2007, 118 pp,
ISBN 978-92-79-06661-0
This report of a Eurobarometer opinion poll
conducted by the Commission presents the
main conclusions about Europeans’ level of
interest and awareness about medical and
health research. It also identifies factors and
information sources that could help to raise
public awareness.
Combating deadly diseases –
EU-funded projects
2007, 324 pp,
ISBN 92-79-03349-2
The global emergency caused by
HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis calls for
new approaches to confront these three
poverty-related diseases. The Sixth Frame-
work Programme has allocated some
€400 million to researching therapies and
vaccines against the three deadly diseases.
This is an overview of the projects launched
under the Sixth Framework Programme.
You can consult and order more publications about the European Union
from the EU Bookshop. http://bookshop.europa.eu
Downsizing:
the march of micro-
and nano-manufacture
Downsizing:
the march of
micro- and
nano-manufacture
EU-funded research leads
Europe into the world
success stories
of the ultra-small
2009, 23 pp,
ISBN 978-92-79-11214-0
The manufacture of micro- and nano-products
is strategically important for the competi-
tiveness of European industry because it
helps to improve the functionality, intel-
ligence and durability of existing products.
This publication presents nine selected
European collaborative research projects
in the micro- and nanotechnology sector.
European union research
on human rights,
conflicts and security
2008, 73 pp,
ISBN 978-92-79-10653-8
While war and peace are as old as humankind
– as are violations of human dignity and
integrity – their shapes, causes and impacts
keep changing over time and in different
contexts. This is a practical guide to European
research projects for analysing conflict
management that have been launched
under the Sixth, and first phase of the
Seventh, Framework Programmes.
Global governance of science
Global Governance of Science
Report of the Expert Group on Global Governance of Science
to the Science, Economy and Society Directorate,
Directorate-General for Research, European Commission
REPORT
EUR 23616 EN
2009, 44 pp,
ISBN 978-92-79-07972-6
As a political entity that spans the national,
regional and global levels, the European
Union is ideally placed to encourage critical
reflection on the global governance of
science and innovation and to play a practical
leadership role. This report by an expert
group makes recommendations to European
policy-makers, Member States and science-
related organisations.
24/08/09 07:40
 IN BRIEF

YOUNG RESEARCHERS of using DNA sequences to

Araxi, evolutionary biologist, aged 31
I fell into science by accident.
My father is a geophysicist at the
National University of Mexico but
I never thought I would become
a scientist myself. Originally
I enrolled in a psychology
programme but, when I had the
chance to visit a neuroscience lab,
the place seemed so familiar to
me that I simply stayed on. With an
exchange scholarship I continued
working in the field at McGill
University in Montreal (CA). By
now I was certain I wanted to
become a researcher but it was
© Humberto Gutierrez
understand the history of genes.
So in 2000, as a psychology
graduate, I started my PhD in
Molecular Evolution at the
University of Bath (UK) under
Professor Laurence Hurst, with
scholarships from the Mexican and
UK governments. We did some of
the first large-scale bioinformatics
analyses of the human genome
showing that gene activity shapes
gene characteristics and gene
order in chromosomes.
With my PhD degree, I took
a postdoctoral position in Arizona
in 2003. My dream had come true:
I was now a scientist! But I moved
back to the UK after becoming
pregnant and remained largely
and a L’Oreal UK Women in Science
Fellowship, and commuted one
day a week from home in Cardiff
to Bath. I now lead my own
research group at the University
of Bath and this year was awarded
the Biochemical Society Early
Career Researcher Award.
I take every opportunity to raise
the profile of women scientists
by lecturing to general audiences
and participating in science policy
initiatives like the Unesco UK
annual conference. Last year
I received a SHE Inspiring Women
Award and was named a ‘Rising
Talent’ by the International
Women’s Forum for Society and
Economy. Thousands of young
female researchers abandon

reading a paper on the evolution
of ion channels that steered me
away from neurosciences; I was
very impressed by the elegance
of natural selection and the power
away from research. With support
from my PhD supervisor, I returned
to science in 2007 after applying
successfully for a Royal Society
Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowship
universities every year, taking
their expertise with them. I am
very fortunate in getting so much
support at home and at work.
Araxi Urrutia

OPINION Aside from its environmental and public health

Water, a vital resource under threat
Water is the basis of life. Unremitting use of
this vital resource inevitably has an impact on
both the quality of the resource itself and the
environment as a whole.
As they can quench their thirst by a mere
turn of the tap, Europeans tend to forget that
water is essential not only to their own lives
and well-being but also – and in much greater
quantities – as a resource for industry and agri-
culture. On Earth, water is unequally and
unfairly distributed. One billion people world-
wide have no access to drinking water within
15 minutes’ walking distance from their home.
Although Europe is particularly privileged in
this respect, as we have had access to drinking-
water facilities for centuries, this does not mean
that we should abuse a resource so often per-
ceived, wrongly, as eternal and inexhaustible.
implications, water is now an economic, poli-
tical and strategic issue.
intelligence, as well as by raising public aware-
ness, especially among policy-makers – aided
in their decision-making by water operators,
Our quality of life relies on an unseen army who are experts in this vital resource.
of tens of thousands of employees and on hun-
dreds of thousands of kilometres of pipeline, Pierre-Yves Monette,
thousands of technical installations and colos- Secretary General of the European Federation
sal sums of money. In order to cut costs, improve of National Associations of Drinking Water
services, enhance water quality and manage Suppliers and Waste Water Services (EUREAU)
water resources effectively, efforts must be www.eureau.org
focused on research and technological develop-
ment. It takes a vast amount of knowledge and
expertise to deliver a simple glass of water.
Water is not a perpetual miracle and is facing
major threats like climate change, pollution,
flooding, drought, wastage and obsolete infra-
structure. Unless we change our consumption
and production patterns, in the future we will
DIARY
To keep up-to-date with research and
need three planets to sustain our current life-
development news, see:
style.
http://ec.europa.eu/research/headlines
These challenges must therefore be
addressed, without delay, by applying human

research*eu No. 61 | JULY 2009 43

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 43 24/08/09 07:40

 IMAGE OF SCIENCE

KIAH09061ENC
CHIK colours
In spite of its harmless-sounding nickname, ‘CHIK’,
or chikungunya, is still a source of concern and a challenge
for researchers, who are working to improve diagnostic tools,
sequence virus strains and improve their understanding
of the factors determining the virulence of the different
strains. In the above image, fluorescence microscopy is used
to detect the chikungunya virus in cultured human cells.
© Inserm/Institut Pasteur

Using the Hoechst fluorescent stain, the nuclei appear blue

under the microscope, while the Cy3 fluorophore shows
the viral antigens as orange.

research_eu_61_EN_090824.indd 44 24/08/09 07:40


europa.news
A selection of news
from CORDIS
http://cordis.europa.eu/news,
the Community Research
& Development
Information Service.
research_eu_61_ENencart_090824.indd 1
Improvements
in the fight
against cancer
in Europe
According to a study
published in the context
of the EUROCARE (European
Cancer Registry–based study
on survival and care of cancer
patients) project, the life
expectancy of Europeans
affected by cancer is increasing.
Comparing the number of
patients surviving cancer for
more than five years during
two reference periods, from
1988 to 1990 and from 1997
to 1999, researchers noted
that the proportion of patients
surviving lung, stomach and
colorectal cancer respectively
increased from 6 % to 8 %,
from 15 % to 18 %, and from
42 % to 49 %.
But disparities between
individual countries remain
enormous. All cancers com-
bined, Icelandic men have the
highest survival rate (47 %).
On the female side, Finland
and France show the best
results (59 %). Poland is at
the bottom of the list for
both sexes, with a cure rate
of 21 % for men and 38 %
among women. According
to the study’s authors, these
HE WHO SEEKS FINDS
differences between countries
reflect variations in the
diagnosis, treatment and
prevention of cancer within
the EU. These are all inequa-
lities that Europe must tackle
in the future.
www.eurocare.it
A tumour
inhibitor gene
Spanish, Portuguese, Finnish,
American and Japanese
researchers working on the
CancerDIP (The use of methy-
lated DNA immunoprecipitation
– MeDIP) in cancer for better
clinical management)
project have pointed to the
importance of the TARBP2
gene in regulating the activity
of other genes known to
promote cancer. TARBP2
encodes a protein necessary
for the formation of micro-RNA,
or small strands of ribonucleic
acid involved in the activation
or inhibition of genes, includ-
ing ‘tumour suppressor’ genes.
Scientists have found that
in cells with mutated TARBP2
genes, the amount of micro-
RNA is abnormally low and the
activity of oncogenic genes
increased. Inserting a normal
allele of the TARBP2 gene into
these cells reduces the micro-
EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009 1
24/08/09 07:43
 HE WHO SEEKS FINDS

RNA to normal levels and
inhibits tumour growth.
This work, coordinated by
the Spanish National Cancer
Research Centre – CNIO in
Madrid, could stimulate the
search for drugs targeting the
genes that ‘block’ tumours.
www.nature.com
is currently no cure for psoriasis;
the only remedy for sufferers
is permanent treatment to
better control the symptoms
associated with this pathology.
www.nature.com
Like baby,
like dog!
children’s ability to use visual
communication evolves
dramatically. In particular
they learn to understand the
importance of finger-pointing
in the designation of objects.
According to the authors,
it is the interactions during
the language-learning process
that allow young children to
take this step.

Susceptibility At age two, children and dogs www.springer.com/life+sci/

to psoriasis
The onset of psoriasis has
long been known to be linked
to individuals’ genetic pre-
dispositions. But it is only
now that scientists can identify
the exact nature of genetic
variations behind greater
susceptibility to this chronic
skin disease.
An international research
team, led by the Universitat
Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona,
has revealed in Nature Genetics
that people lacking the genes
LCE3B and LCE3C are more
likely to develop psoriasis.
These two genes appear to
be involved in protecting the
skin. In their absence, the skin
seems to be exposed to
damage and inflammations
of various kinds leading to the
development of this disease
that affects 2 to 3 % of the
European population. There
evolving in similar environments behavioural/journal/10071
show the same capacity to
respond to adults’ directional
gestures. To test this ability,
Gabriella Lakatos’s team
from the Eötvös University
of Budapest observed how
15 dogs and 13 two-year-old
and 11 three-year-old infants
responded to various arm or leg
movements pointing to a flower
pot containing a reward. The
results of this study in the
framework of the European
‘Origins of referential communi-
cation’ programme were
published in the journal
Animal Cognition.
Canines and two-year-old
children responded uniformly
when the direction was
indicated by holding out
a part of the body, but the
number of correct answers
was lower than that obtained
for the three-year-olds.
Between two and three,

2 EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009

research_eu_61_ENencart_090824.indd 2 24/08/09 07:43


Generation of
new heart cells
Are we born with a limited
number of heart cells or is the
heart able to generate new
ones? To this long-debated
question, researchers at the
Karolinska Institute have come
up with an answer: heart cells
are continually replaced. The
renewal rate is 1 % per year up
to age 20 years and decreases
over the years, reaching 0.5 %
in the seventies. Thus, over
a lifetime, less than half of the
myocardial cells are revamped.
The method used by Jonas
Frisenna and his team to
uncover the heart’s ability to
produce new cells is totally
innovative. They determine the
age of heart cells using the
carbon-14 (14C) dating method!
Following the aerial nuclear
explosions conducted during
the Cold War in the 1950s,
large quantities of this radio-
active isotope were released
into the atmosphere and
absorbed by plant, animal and
human cells and DNA. But
since the Nuclear Test Ban,
these quantities of 14C have
decreased quite rapidly.
Scientists have analysed the
14C content of the DNA of heart
cells of people born before and
after the nuclear tests to
research_eu_61_ENencart_090824.indd 3
HE WHO SEEKS FINDS
determine when these cells used the technique of micro-
were generated. The results of neurography. This consists
this study, published in Science, of implanting a tiny electrode
open new perspectives in the in the nerve, which measures
search for therapies to alleviate the electrical activity of the
cell death in myocardial many component nerve fibres.
infarction. Each such fibre is responsible
for the perception of tactile
www.sciencemag.org signals over about one square
centimetre of skin.
Analgesic www.sahlgrenska.gu.se
stroking
And if gentleness were
enough to soothe pain?
Side-stepping the old adage
“fight evil with evil”, a research
group coordinated by the
University of Gothenburg (SE)
unveiled a mechanism which
explains why stroking the
skin can relieve suffering.
In fact, in response to this
gentle contact, the skin nerves
directly transmit the sensation
of pleasure to the brain, even
if it is simultaneously receiving
pain impulses from the same
cutaneous region.
“The nerve signals that tell the
brain that we are being stroked
on the skin have their own
separate path to the central
nervous system and are not
blocked by pain; on the
contrary, they can mitigate it”,
says Håkan Olausson, who
heads this research. To achieve
these results, scientists have
EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009 3
24/08/09 07:43
 HE WHO SEEKS FINDS

reactions require or are two molecular caps, onto

Towards
self-repairing
materials?
Researchers at the Eindhoven
University of Technology (NL)
have developed a technique
that can cause chemical
reactions by exerting mecha-
nical force. To transform the
reactants into products, some
facilitated by the presence
of a chemical catalyst. This
is usually activated by heat,
light or other chemical agents.
Alessio Piermatti and his
team have now found a way
of shifting a catalyst from
a dormant to an active state
by ‘pulling’ on a polymer chain.
For this, the scientists wrapped
a catalytic metal ion between
each of which they fixed
a long polymer tail. When
this complex is immersed in
a liquid with a sufficiently
strong flow, one of the caps
is removed, releasing the metal
ion that can now catalyse the
chemical reaction. According
to the study’s authors, this
discovery opens the way for
the creation of self-repairing
materials, able to strengthen
themselves under the influence
of mechanical force.

DRAT! I PULLED www.nature.com

THE POLYMER
CHAIN TOO HARD!

4 EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009

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Sniffing
the eruption
Volcanic eruptions release
very large quantities of
sulphur dioxide (SO2) into
the atmosphere where it is
transformed into sulphate
particles. Integrating these
particles into current climate
models would make them
even more precise. That’s the
objective of researchers at
the Chalmers University of
Technology (SE) who have
created a new volcano moni-
toring apparatus.
Tested on the world’s 17 most
active volcanoes, this new
device can measure the rate
at which SO2 is emitted during
the degassing of magma,
a phenomenon that is decisive
in triggering an eruption.
“Added to the other parameters
recorded by observatories, this
information will also provide
a better estimate of the risk of
eruption since increased gas
emissions by a volcano may
indicate that the magma is
about to rise”, says Mattias
Johansson, the PhD student
behind the development of
this equipment that is equally
effective for measuring pollution
levels in cities. Equipped with
software that converts the
collected data into a simple
research_eu_61_ENencart_090824.indd 5
graph, the monitoring device
will enable specialists to
determine at a glance the
amount of SO2 emitted by the
volcano at any given moment.
www.chalmers.se
Signs
and letters
SignSpeak (Scientific under-
standing and vision-based
technological development
for continuous sign language
recognition and translation),
a European project launched
under the Seventh Framework
Programme and coordinated
by the University of Aachen,
aims to develop technology
that can translate sign language
into text. Deaf and hard of
hearing people can communi-
cate without issue with other
people who have mastered
sign language, however
serious work remains to
improve their integration
into wider society.
The SignSpeaker system will
detect the dominant hand as
well as the facial expressions
and body posture of the user
and will also take into account
the context in which a sign is
made, through the signs that
precede or follow. Researchers
will begin by conducting
NEW RESEARCH
a scientific study in order to
improve the understanding of
the structure of sign language,
an essential step in developing
a machine to recognise the
components.
Sustainable
aquaculture
Developing a competitive
and sustainable European
aquaculture by building up
a knowledge-base of the life
cycle of fish is the objective
of the LIFECYCLE (Building
a biological knowledge-base
on fish lifecycles for competitive,
sustainable European aqua-
culture) project. Coordinated
by the University of Gothenburg
(SE), this project focuses on
the early development, growth
and environmental adaptation
of the four main species bred
in Europe, which are Atlantic
salmon, rainbow trout, bream
and sea bass.
In order to broaden our
understanding of the
mechanisms that control
the biological functions of
these fish, the 14 consortium
members will take as their
basis the latest physiological
research in this area as well as
functional genomics. The data
collected in this way should
enable researchers and
EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009 5
24/08/09 07:43
 NEW RESEARCH

stakeholders in the aquacul- such as glass or sheet metal.

ture sector to tackle problems According to the partners,
With stars
related to changes in physio- these nano-structures are ideal in their eyes
logical systems at various for absorbing light energy. The
stages of the fish life cycle. main challenge for researchers The European Union has
lies in determining the optimal decided to extend its financial
www.lifecycle-fp7.eu diameter of the nanorods. support to the RadioNet project
for a further three years under
the Seventh Framework Pro-
Solar nanocells gramme. This project, already
funded under the Sixth Frame-
The solar cells in use today
work Programme, with the
have an energy-to-electricity
aim of grouping the major
conversion efficiency of around
observatories and creating
18 %. The problem is that
a European community of
manufacturing these cells
radio astronomy specialists,
requires large amounts of raw
is now sharing infrastructures
materials in a very energy-
and knowledge with astro-
consuming process. Thin-film
nomers around the world.
solar cells, which are much
Radio astronomy is a branch
cheaper to produce, are
of astronomy that explores
expected to dominate the
the radio waves emitted by
market very soon, but their
celestial bodies such as stars,
efficiency is only around 10 %.
black holes and galaxies.
The ROD-SOL (All-inorganic
This discipline is also studying
nanorod-based thin-film solar
the fossil radiation from the
cells on glass) project, funded
Big Bang at the origin of our
by the European Union, aims
universe. With this additional
to increase the efficiency of
€10 million of funding, the
these thin-layer solar cells with
26 RadioNet partners from EU
the help of nanotechnology.
Member States, South Africa,
The seven research organi-
South Korea and the United
sations and four industrial
States are hoping to offer
partners involved in this
astronomers the best radio
project are seeking to develop
telescopes and are also
and optimise the synthesis of
looking to get involved in
silicon nanorods, that is tiny
the projects to build the
silicon columns with diameters
next generation of these
measured in nanometers,
radio astronomy observation
on cheaper substrates
instruments such as ALMA

6 EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009

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 IT’S DECIDED

(Atacama Large Millimetre ECVAM was established in

Array), under construction
in Peru, or the SKA (Square
Kilometre Array), the future
location of which should
be revealed in 2012.
www.radionet-eu.org
1992 to validate scientific tests
that could replace animals
with cell cultures or computer
models.
http://ecvam.jrc.it

Alternatives to
animal testing
A memorandum of cooperation
to accelerate the search for
alternatives to animal testing
has been signed by four
international agencies, IF THIS MEANS
including the European I DON’T HAVE
Centre for Validation of
Alternative Methods – ECVAM,
TO DONATE MY LIVE
which is part of the Joint BODY! …
Research Centre (JRC) of the
Commission. The agreement
between this organisation
and its American, Canadian
and Japanese counterparts,
which are already working
closely together, aims to
formalise and boost activities
to reduce the number of
animals used in research.
This agreement should facilitate
the identification and adoption
of new approaches to scienti-
fically validated experimen-
tation. In the EU alone, some
12 million animals are used
each year for safety testing and
other biomedical experiments.

EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009 7

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 THE VOICE OF RESEARCH
Science and
diplomacy
“Through its use and
application of scientific
cooperation to help build
bridges and strengthen
relationships between
societies, especially in areas
where often there were
no other formal means
of approach, Europe is
a wonderful example of
science diplomacy. […]
Science diplomacy was not
the only player, but it was
very valuable in creating links
between European countries,
first after World War II and
now after the Cold War. […]
“The fact that science is without
borders is what makes it so
useful in diplomacy.
8 EUROPA.NEWS | JULY 2009
research_eu_61_ENencart_090824.indd 8
“A physicist in Hungary is
constrained by the same
laws of physics and maths
as a physicist in France.
The political situation may
be completely different,
but the ability to communicate
and collaborate is in fact
universal. […]
“Infectious diseases don’t know
borders, so the ability to share
research and understanding
is critical for maintaining the
health of the populations on
both sides of a political border”,
says Dr. Vaughan Turekian,
director of the new centre for
science diplomacy set up by
the American Association for
the Advancement of Science
(AAAS), in an interview with
our colleagues from Cordis
News.
http://cordis.europa.eu
24/08/09 07:43