QuantumBirds SIGNED
Radical pair-based magnetic sensing in migratory birds
Total Cost €
0EC-Contrib. €
0Partnership
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Explore the words cloud of the QuantumBirds project. It provides you a very rough idea of what is the project "QuantumBirds" about.
Project "QuantumBirds" data sheet
The following table provides information about the project.
| Coordinator |
THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
Organization address contact info |
| Coordinator Country | United Kingdom [UK] |
| Total cost | 8˙561˙588 € |
| EC max contribution | 8˙561˙588 € (100%) |
| Programme |
1. H2020-EU.1.1. (EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)) |
| Code Call | ERC-2018-SyG |
| Funding Scheme | ERC-SyG |
| Starting year | 2019 |
| Duration (year-month-day) | from 2019-04-01 to 2025-03-31 |
Partnership
Take a look of project's partnership.
| # | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD | UK (OXFORD) | coordinator | 4˙225˙563.00 |
| 2 | CARL VON OSSIETZKY UNIVERSITAET OLDENBURG | DE (OLDENBURG) | participant | 4˙336˙025.00 |
Map
Project objective
The navigational and sensory abilities of night-migratory songbirds, travelling alone over thousands of kilometres, are absolutely staggering. The successful completion of these magnificent voyages depends crucially on the birds’ ability to sense the Earth’s magnetic field. Exactly how this magnetic sense works is one of the most significant open questions in biology and biophysics. The experimental evidence suggests something extraordinary. The birds’ magnetic compass sensor seems to rely on coherent quantum phenomena that indirectly allow magnetic interactions a million times smaller than kBT (Boltzmann’s constant multiplied by temperature) to be detected in biological tissue. QuantumBirds brings together quantum physics, spin chemistry, behavioural biology, biochemistry, and molecular biology in a unique, ambitious, imaginative and genuinely synergetic research programme that will prove whether the primary magnetic detection event occurring in the birds’ retinas involves the quantum spin dynamics of photochemically formed radical pairs in cryptochrome proteins.
We will address three specific questions:
1. Are avian cryptochromes capable of functioning as magnetic compass receptors? 2. Do retinal neurons encode light-dependent, cryptochrome-derived magnetic information? 3. Are cryptochromes the primary magnetoreceptor molecules for magnetic compass orientation?
Success in this endeavour will: (a) revolutionise our understanding of magnetoreception, the least understood of all biological senses; (b) firmly establish the emerging field of “Quantum Biology” and thereby reduce by six orders of magnitude the threshold for sensory detection of weak stimuli in biological systems; (c) prepare the ground for the development of a novel and powerful range of bio-inspired magnetic sensing devices; and (d) provide insights that could be applied in quantum computing and guide research into the potential effects of weak anthropogenic electromagnetic fields on human health.
Publications
| year | authors and title | journal | last update |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 |
H. G. Hiscock, T. W. Hiscock, D. R. Kattnig, T. Scrivener, A. M. Lewis, D. E. Manolopoulos, P. J. Hore Navigating at night: fundamental limits on the sensitivity of radical pair magnetoreception under dim light published pages: , ISSN: 0033-5835, DOI: 10.1017/s0033583519000076 |
Quarterly Reviews of Biophysics 52 | 2020-03-11 |
| 2019 |
Thomas C. Player, P. J. Hore Viability of superoxide-containing radical pairs as magnetoreceptors published pages: 225101, ISSN: 0021-9606, DOI: 10.1063/1.5129608 |
The Journal of Chemical Physics 151/22 | 2020-03-11 |
| 2019 |
Brian D. Zoltowski, Yogarany Chelliah, Anushka Wickramaratne, Lauren Jarocha, Nischal Karki, Wei Xu, Henrik Mouritsen, Peter J. Hore, Ryan E. Hibbs, Carla B. Green, Joseph S. Takahashi Chemical and structural analysis of a photoactive vertebrate cryptochrome from pigeon published pages: 19449-19457, ISSN: 0027-8424, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1907875116 |
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 116/39 | 2020-03-11 |
| 2020 |
Thomas P. Fay, Lachlan P. Lindoy, David E. Manolopoulos, P. J. Hore How quantum is radical pair magnetoreception? published pages: 77-91, ISSN: 1359-6640, DOI: 10.1039/c9fd00049f |
Faraday Discussions 221 | 2020-03-11 |
| 2019 |
Dmitry Kobylkov, Joe Wynn, Michael Winklhofer, Raisa Chetverikova, Jingjing Xu, Hamish Hiscock, P. J. Hore, Henrik Mouritsen Electromagnetic 0.1–100 kHz noise does not disrupt orientation in a night-migrating songbird implying a spin coherence lifetime of less than 10 µs published pages: 20190716, ISSN: 1742-5689, DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2019.0716 |
Journal of The Royal Society Interface 16/161 | 2020-03-11 |
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