Project description
What a single cell can teach us about learning
Learning is often associated with brains and neurons. But the ability to respond to repeated signals may be a more fundamental property of matter itself. Understanding how such learning emerges could open new possibilities in materials science and medicine. In this context, the ERC-funded LearningMatters project will study Physarum, a single-celled organism that forms branching networks yet has no brain. Signals travel through its tubular structure as flows and chemical changes, and the organism adapts by altering the mechanical properties of its walls. By recreating similar mechanisms in soft materials such as hydrogels, the project aims to develop ‘learning matter’ that could one day support new biomedical technologies, including advanced tissue implants.
Objective
How many times have you wished you could simply pause your brain, only to find, to your frustration, that it is still busy, revisiting and processing inputs?
Response to continual inputs is normal and essential, it is how we learn. In fact, any matter continually responds to input. Yet, our understanding of learning struggles with continual input.
I here break with the current focus on the brain to uncover the physics of continual learning matter instead by investigating the emergence of learning bottom-up in life reduced in complexity to a network-shaped single cell – Physarum.
Lacking any neurons, flows flushing throughout Physarum’s tubular network propagate input packaged as chemical concentration and flow shear force. Tube wall visco-elasticity re-organises in response – continually – learning its future response. Such mechanical learning serves as the blueprint for implementing learning in soft matter, as Physarum’s responsiveness in wall visco-elasticity has its soft matter twin in synthetic hydrogels.
Implementing Physarum’s learning mechanics, cast in the language of theoretical physics, directly into soft matter, I uncover the physics of continual learning matter and, thus, develop biocompatible learning matter. My ambitious aim requires an interdisciplinary approach spanning biology, soft matter, and theoretical physics to
1) reveal how Physarum learns as its matter mechanically responds to input,
2) manufacture synthetic, soft matter flow networks that mimic Physarum’s learning mechanics,
3) derive a theory of continual learning from both biological and soft matter learning data to identify how learned behaviour is selected to last or vanish and
4) apply soft matter learning to initiate proof-of-concept vascularised tissue implants.
My conceptual insight may inspire artificial intelligence but unfolds its ground-breaking power by making learning available in biocompatible soft matter with massive potential for medical treatment with tissue implants.
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.
This project's classification has been human-validated.
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.
This project's classification has been human-validated.
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
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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
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Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2025-COG
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80333 Muenchen
Germany
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