Project description
Pioneering molecular communication for complex environments
In today’s connected world, seamless communication across various distances and challenging environments remains a crucial issue. Traditional electromagnetic communication fails in situations such as tunnels or within the human body. The ERC-funded REACTION project aims to pioneer molecular communication (MC), a biocompatible and energy-efficient alternative. By leveraging disciplines including chemistry and microfluidics, REACTION seeks to create microfluidic MC transceivers capable of real-time chemical signal processing. The project’s innovations promise to revolutionise communication with applications such as improving micro-robotic interactions, developing digital olfactory devices for the Internet of Senses, and advancing efficient drug delivery systems. This could change how we perceive and interact with complex environments.
Objective
Conveying information over a distance has been a problem for decades and is urgently needed across a range of distance scales (from macro to nano) and diverse environments to ensure seamless connectivity everywhere. With the advantages of biocompatibility and energy efficiency, molecular communication (MC) has been proposed to carry information (e.g. text, image, robotic command) over a distance across macro to nanoscales via chemical signals using molecules, which is extremely important for scenarios where electromagnetic (EM) wave-based communications are unsuitable or prohibited, such as in micro- or nanoscales, tunnels, human bodies, or explosive gas environments. Until now, there exists a fundamental and long-standing challenge of the lack of microscale components that can perform real-time signal processing directly over chemical signals, which is crucial for MC transceivers and their applications.
REACTION will address this fundamental challenge by drawing theory, methods, and techniques from disciplines, including communication engineering, chemistry, microfluidics, signal processing, and electronic engineering. REACTION aims to design, model, simulate, and prototype microfluidic MC transceivers and systems with complex microfluidic chemical circuits, for information exchange across different scales and environments. These circuits will be capable of performing real-time chemical signal processing across diverse concentration profiles, multiple types of concurrent molecules, and consecutive chemical pulses. The successful implementation of these designs will bring 1) a new solution for multi-robotic communication in microscale via airborne MC prototype, 2) new digital olfactory devices with the capability of gas-phase scent profile detection, transmission, and recreation for the Internet of Senses; and 3) an optimized drug injection design for efficient drug delivery.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- natural sciences physical sciences classical mechanics fluid mechanics microfluidics
- natural sciences computer and information sciences internet
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2025-STG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
WC2R 2LS London
United Kingdom
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.