Paul d’Estournelles de Constant

La haute figure de Paul d’Estournelles de Constant (1852-1924) témoigne de la très grande qualité intellectuelle autant qu’humaine du personnel politique de la IIIe République. Entré dans la carrière diplomatique en 1876, il s’illustre en Tunisie où, jeune diplomate, il est un des acteurs de l’élaboration du protectorat et du règlement des capitulations, puis à Londres. Conseiller d’ambassade auprès de l’ambassadeur William Waddington, il participe à l’instauration du protectorat à Madagascar..

Paul d’Estournelles de Constant

La haute figure de Paul d’Estournelles de Constant (1852-1924) témoigne de la très grande qualité intellectuelle autant qu’humaine du personnel politique de la IIIe République. Entré dans la carrière diplomatique en 1876, il s’illustre en Tunisie où, jeune diplomate, il est un des acteurs de l’élaboration du protectorat et du règlement des capitulations, puis à Londres. Conseiller d’ambassade auprès de l’ambassadeur William Waddington, il participe à l’instauration du protectorat à Madagascar..

Un Breton contre la marine de la Belle Époque

La marine française est l’objet de critiques depuis la fin du xixe siècle en raison de sa résistance aux idées républicaines. Le corps de ses officiers est notamment mis en accusation pour son cléricalisme et ses sympathies monarchiques. Dans ce contexte tendu, la publication du roman Les Maritimes à la fin de l’année 1901 provoque un retentissant scandale largement relayé et instrumentalisé par la presse radicale qui y voit la confirmation de ses accusations : arrivisme, incompétence, antisémitisme, royalisme sont ainsi mis en exergue dans un roman qui accuse et ridiculise violemment le petit monde de la société toulonnaise. Avec l’arrivée au pouvoir du Bloc des gauches, ce roman à clés tombe à pic pour justifier les réformes trop longtemps différées de républicanisation de la marine. Si Olivier Diraison-Seylor ne retrouve pas avec ses romans ultérieurs la gloire des Maritimes, ce dernier reste un des rares exemples de roman antimilitariste ayant l’armée de mer pour objet. Cela explique pourquoi il demeure longtemps victime de la vindicte de représentants de l’institution qui conservent intact le souvenir de l’insulte.The French Navy was well-known in the 1900s to be a bastion of conservatism, opposed to republican ideas. The Officer corps, in particular, was accused of being clericalist and monarchist. In November 1901, the publication of a novel, Les Maritimes, written by an unknown author, Olivier Seylor, caused uproar. This vitriolic attack against officers and their wives, easily identifiable, was seen as an assault on the institution. Indeed, the novel and its argument was a useful weapon in the conflict that began between the new government of the « Bloc des Gauches » and the Navy. In his policy of « républicanisation », the timing of this caricature could not have been more appropriate. Even if the author, navy officer, suggested that he did not write an antimilitarist novel, Les Maritimes was seen as an attack against the Institution

Le Bouclier de Neptune

Avec la publication de la thèse de Frédéric Saffroy sur les fortifications côtières françaises de la première moitié du XXe siècle se voit comblé un vide historiographique. Si les ouvrages et la pensée stratégique du « système Séré de Rivière », tous comme ceux de la « ligne Maginot », ont fait l’objet de nombreux travaux, la question du dispositif mis en place entre le début du siècle et la Seconde Guerre mondiale restait en souffrance et c’est un des grands mérites de cet ouvrage d’y répon..

RNb-NeuS: Reflectance and Normal-based Multi-View 3D Reconstruction

This paper introduces a versatile paradigm for integrating multi-view reflectance (optional) and normal maps acquired through photometric stereo. Our approach employs a pixel-wise joint re-parameterization of reflectance and normal, considering them as a vector of radiances rendered under simulated, varying illumination. This re-parameterization enables the seamless integration of reflectance and normal maps as input data in neural volume rendering-based 3D reconstruction while preserving a single optimization objective. In contrast, recent multi-view photometric stereo (MVPS) methods depend on multiple, potentially conflicting objectives. Despite its apparent simplicity, our proposed approach outperforms state-of-the-art approaches in MVPS benchmarks across F-score, Chamfer distance, and mean angular error metrics. Notably, it significantly improves the detailed 3D reconstruction of areas with high curvature or low visibility.Comment: 14 pages, 13 figures, 7 tables. Accepted to CVPR 2024. The project page can be accessed via https://robinbruneau.github.io/publications/rnb_neus.html. The source code is available at https://github.com/bbrument/RNb-Neu

Rare predicted loss-of-function variants of type I IFN immunity genes are associated with life-threatening COVID-19

Background: We previously reported that impaired type I IFN activity, due to inborn errors of TLR3- and TLR7-dependent type I interferon (IFN) immunity or to autoantibodies against type I IFN, account for 15–20% of cases of life-threatening COVID-19 in unvaccinated patients. Therefore, the determinants of life-threatening COVID-19 remain to be identified in ~ 80% of cases. Methods: We report here a genome-wide rare variant burden association analysis in 3269 unvaccinated patients with life-threatening COVID-19, and 1373 unvaccinated SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals without pneumonia. Among the 928 patients tested for autoantibodies against type I IFN, a quarter (234) were positive and were excluded. Results: No gene reached genome-wide significance. Under a recessive model, the most significant gene with at-risk variants was TLR7, with an OR of 27.68 (95%CI 1.5–528.7, P = 1.1 × 10−4) for biochemically loss-of-function (bLOF) variants. We replicated the enrichment in rare predicted LOF (pLOF) variants at 13 influenza susceptibility loci involved in TLR3-dependent type I IFN immunity (OR = 3.70[95%CI 1.3–8.2], P = 2.1 × 10−4). This enrichment was further strengthened by (1) adding the recently reported TYK2 and TLR7 COVID-19 loci, particularly under a recessive model (OR = 19.65[95%CI 2.1–2635.4], P = 3.4 × 10−3), and (2) considering as pLOF branchpoint variants with potentially strong impacts on splicing among the 15 loci (OR = 4.40[9%CI 2.3–8.4], P = 7.7 × 10−8). Finally, the patients with pLOF/bLOF variants at these 15 loci were significantly younger (mean age [SD] = 43.3 [20.3] years) than the other patients (56.0 [17.3] years; P = 1.68 × 10−5). Conclusions: Rare variants of TLR3- and TLR7-dependent type I IFN immunity genes can underlie life-threatening COVID-19, particularly with recessive inheritance, in patients under 60 years old

Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation for Severe Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome associated with COVID-19: An Emulated Target Trial Analysis.

RATIONALE: Whether COVID patients may benefit from extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) compared with conventional invasive mechanical ventilation (IMV) remains unknown. OBJECTIVES: To estimate the effect of ECMO on 90-Day mortality vs IMV only Methods: Among 4,244 critically ill adult patients with COVID-19 included in a multicenter cohort study, we emulated a target trial comparing the treatment strategies of initiating ECMO vs. no ECMO within 7 days of IMV in patients with severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (PaO2/FiO2 <80 or PaCO2 ≥60 mmHg). We controlled for confounding using a multivariable Cox model based on predefined variables. MAIN RESULTS: 1,235 patients met the full eligibility criteria for the emulated trial, among whom 164 patients initiated ECMO. The ECMO strategy had a higher survival probability at Day-7 from the onset of eligibility criteria (87% vs 83%, risk difference: 4%, 95% CI 0;9%) which decreased during follow-up (survival at Day-90: 63% vs 65%, risk difference: -2%, 95% CI -10;5%). However, ECMO was associated with higher survival when performed in high-volume ECMO centers or in regions where a specific ECMO network organization was set up to handle high demand, and when initiated within the first 4 days of MV and in profoundly hypoxemic patients. CONCLUSIONS: In an emulated trial based on a nationwide COVID-19 cohort, we found differential survival over time of an ECMO compared with a no-ECMO strategy. However, ECMO was consistently associated with better outcomes when performed in high-volume centers and in regions with ECMO capacities specifically organized to handle high demand. This article is open access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives License 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)