Reliability approach in spacecraft structures

This paper presents an application of the probabilistic approach with reliability assessment on a spacecraft structure. The adopted strategy uses meta-modeling with first and second order polynomial functions. This method aims at minimizing computational time while giving relevant results. The first part focuses on computational tools employed in the strategy development. The second part presents a spacecraft application. The purpose is to highlight benefits of the probabilistic approach compared with the current deterministic one. From examples of reliability assessment we show some advantages which could be found in industrial applications

Tuning the DNA Reactivity of cis-Platinum: Conjugation to a Mismatch-Specific Metallointercalator

A novel bimetallic conjugate combining a rhodium intercalator that selectively binds DNA mismatches and a reactive cis-platinum analogue that targets DNA by coordination has been prepared. The site-selectivity of the bimetallic complex in forming coordination adducts is examined using mismatched and well-matched oligonucleotides of different sequences. The results indicate that through the bifunctional complex, the platinum center can be targeted near mismatched sites. Interestingly, with mismatched, DNA both intrastrand and the less common interstrand cross-linked adducts are formed. The recognition of a DNA mismatch by the bulky Rh intercalator appears to direct the Pt unit, depending upon steric constraints, to react preferentially with mismatched DNA at a site that may or may not be the preferred site of Pt coordination. Thus, the presence of a permanent link to a site-specific intercalator is able to tune the reactivity of the cis-platinum analogue

Application des surfaces de réponse pour l’analyse fiabiliste d’une structure spatiale

Cette communication présente une application des surfaces de réponse pour l’analyse de la fiabilité d’une structure satellite. Les méta-modèles sont construits par régression itérative où seul les termes significatifs sont sélectionnés parmi une liste de régresseurs potentiels préalablement déterminée par une analyse de sensibilité. Les méta-modèles sont ensuite vérifiés par une méthode de bootstrap où les variations observées sur les prédictions sont prises en compte dans le calcul des probabilités de défaillance afin de valider le résultat

Hydrologically driven seasonal changes in the sources and production mechanisms of dissolved organic carbon in a small lowland catchment

International audienceTo obtain better constraints on the control of seasonal hydrological variations on dissolved organic carbon (DOC) dynamics in headwater catchments, we combined hydrometric monitoring with high-frequency analyses of DOC concentration and DOC chemical composition (specific UV adsorption, 13C) in soil and stream waters during one complete hydrological cycle in a small lowland catchment of western France. We observed a succession of four hydrological periods, each corresponding to specific DOC signatures. In particular, the rise of the upland water table at the end of the rewetting period yielded to a strong increase of the specific UV absorbance (from 2.5 to 4.0 L mg C 1 m 1) and of the 13C values (from 29 to 27%) of the soil DOC. Another striking feature was the release of large amounts of DOC during reduction of soil Fe-oxyhydroxides at the end of the highflow period. Comparison of hydrometric data with DOC composition metrics showed that soils from the upland domains were rapidly DOC depleted after the rise of the water table in these domains, whereas wetland soils acted as quasi-infinite DOC sources. Results from this study showed that the composition and ultimate source of the DOC exported to the stream will depend on the period within the annual hydrological cycle. However, we found that the aromatic DOC component identified during the high-flow period will likely represent the dominant DOC component in stream waters on an annual basis, because most of the annual stream DOC flux is exported during such periods

Sources of dissolved organic matter during storm and inter-storm conditions in a lowland headwater catchment: constraints from high-frequency molecular data

International audienceThe transfer of dissolved organic matter (DOM) at soil–river interfaces controls the biogeochemistry of mi-cropollutants and the equilibrium between continental and oceanic C reservoirs. Understanding the mechanisms controlling this transfer is fundamental to ecology and geochem-istry. DOM delivery to streams during storms is assumed to come from the flushing of preexisting soil DOM reservoirs mobilized by the modification of water flow paths. We tested this hypothesis by investigating the evolution of the composition of stream DOM during inter-storm conditions and five storm events monitored with high-frequency sampling. The composition of DOM was analyzed using thermally assisted hydrolysis and methylation (THM) with tetramethylammo-nium hydroxide (TMAH) coupled to a gas chromatograph and mass spectrometer. In inter-storm conditions, stream DOM is derived from the flushing of soil DOM, while during storm events, the modification of the distribution of chemical biomarkers allows the identification of three additional mechanisms. The first one corresponds to the destabilization of microbial biofilms due to the increase in water velocity, resulting in the fleeting export of a microbial pool. The second mechanism corresponds to the erosion of soils and river banks, leading to a partition of organic matter between particulate and dissolved phases. The third mechanism is linked to the increase in water velocity in soils that could induce the erosion of macropore walls, leading to an in-soil partition between soil microparticles and dissolved phase. The contribution of this in-soil erosive process would be linked to the magnitude of the hydraulic gradient following the rise of the water table and could persist after the recession, which could explain why the return to inter-storm composition of DOM does not follow the same temporal scheme as the discharge. These results are the most important factors in understanding the transfer of nutrients and micropollutants at the soil–river interfaces during the hot moments that are storm events

Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cell Infection and Sensing Capacity during Pathogenic and Nonpathogenic Simian Immunodeficiency Virus Infection.

International audienceHuman immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in humans and simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) in macaques (MAC) lead to chronic inflammation and AIDS. Natural hosts, such as African green monkeys (AGM) and sooty mangabeys (SM), are protected against SIV-induced chronic inflammation and AIDS. Here, we report that AGM plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDC) express extremely low levels of CD4, unlike MAC and human pDC. Despite this, AGM pDC efficiently sensed SIVagm, but not heterologous HIV/SIV isolates, indicating a virus-host adaptation. Moreover, both AGM and SM pDC were found to be, in contrast to MAC pDC, predominantly negative for CCR5. Despite such limited CD4 and CCR5 expression, lymphoid tissue pDC were infected to a degree similar to that seen with CD4(+) T cells in both MAC and AGM. Altogether, our finding of efficient pDC infection by SIV in vivo identifies pDC as a potential viral reservoir in lymphoid tissues. We discovered low expression of CD4 on AGM pDC, which did not preclude efficient sensing of host-adapted viruses. Therefore, pDC infection and efficient sensing are not prerequisites for chronic inflammation. The high level of pDC infection by SIVagm suggests that if CCR5 paucity on immune cells is important for nonpathogenesis of natural hosts, it is possibly not due to its role as a coreceptor. The ability of certain key immune cell subsets to resist infection might contribute to the asymptomatic nature of simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) infection in its natural hosts, such as African green monkeys (AGM) and sooty mangabeys (SM). This relative resistance to infection has been correlated with reduced expression of CD4 and/or CCR5. We show that plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDC) of natural hosts display reduced CD4 and/or CCR5 expression, unlike macaque pDC. Surprisingly, this did not protect AGM pDC, as infection levels were similar to those found in MAC pDC. Furthermore, we show that AGM pDC did not consistently produce type I interferon (IFN-I) upon heterologous SIVmac/HIV type 1 (HIV-1) encounter, while they sensed autologous SIVagm isolates. Pseudotyping SIVmac/HIV-1 overcame this deficiency, suggesting that reduced uptake of heterologous viral strains underlays this lack of sensing. The distinct IFN-I responses depending on host species and HIV/SIV isolates reveal the host/virus species specificity of pDC sensing

État des recherches en didactique du français

Ce numéro de Pratiques constitue, à la suite du numéro 145/146 de juin 2010, le second volet de notre enquête consacrée à l’état du champ des recherches en didactique du français. Il y a un an, nous écrivions que le contexte politique et institutionnel n’était pas favorable aux recherches en didactique, évoquant notamment l’effet de l’intégration des IUFM aux universités et les réformes régressives de la formation des maîtres. Dans l’intervalle, le contexte n’a pas changé, il s’est même aggra..

The Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey of SDSS-III

The Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) is designed to measure the scale of baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) in the clustering of matter over a larger volume than the combined efforts of all previous spectroscopic surveys of large scale structure. BOSS uses 1.5 million luminous galaxies as faint as i=19.9 over 10,000 square degrees to measure BAO to redshifts z<0.7. Observations of neutral hydrogen in the Lyman alpha forest in more than 150,000 quasar spectra (g<22) will constrain BAO over the redshift range 2.15<z<3.5. Early results from BOSS include the first detection of the large-scale three-dimensional clustering of the Lyman alpha forest and a strong detection from the Data Release 9 data set of the BAO in the clustering of massive galaxies at an effective redshift z = 0.57. We project that BOSS will yield measurements of the angular diameter distance D_A to an accuracy of 1.0% at redshifts z=0.3 and z=0.57 and measurements of H(z) to 1.8% and 1.7% at the same redshifts. Forecasts for Lyman alpha forest constraints predict a measurement of an overall dilation factor that scales the highly degenerate D_A(z) and H^{-1}(z) parameters to an accuracy of 1.9% at z~2.5 when the survey is complete. Here, we provide an overview of the selection of spectroscopic targets, planning of observations, and analysis of data and data quality of BOSS.Comment: 49 pages, 16 figures, accepted by A

The Eighth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: First Data from SDSS-III

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) started a new phase in August 2008, with new instrumentation and new surveys focused on Galactic structure and chemical evolution, measurements of the baryon oscillation feature in the clustering of galaxies and the quasar Ly alpha forest, and a radial velocity search for planets around ~8000 stars. This paper describes the first data release of SDSS-III (and the eighth counting from the beginning of the SDSS). The release includes five-band imaging of roughly 5200 deg^2 in the Southern Galactic Cap, bringing the total footprint of the SDSS imaging to 14,555 deg^2, or over a third of the Celestial Sphere. All the imaging data have been reprocessed with an improved sky-subtraction algorithm and a final, self-consistent photometric recalibration and flat-field determination. This release also includes all data from the second phase of the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Evolution (SEGUE-2), consisting of spectroscopy of approximately 118,000 stars at both high and low Galactic latitudes. All the more than half a million stellar spectra obtained with the SDSS spectrograph have been reprocessed through an improved stellar parameters pipeline, which has better determination of metallicity for high metallicity stars.Comment: Astrophysical Journal Supplements, in press (minor updates from submitted version

The Ninth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: First Spectroscopic Data from the SDSS-III Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey III (SDSS-III) presents the first spectroscopic data from the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS). This ninth data release (DR9) of the SDSS project includes 535,995 new galaxy spectra (median z=0.52), 102,100 new quasar spectra (median z=2.32), and 90,897 new stellar spectra, along with the data presented in previous data releases. These spectra were obtained with the new BOSS spectrograph and were taken between 2009 December and 2011 July. In addition, the stellar parameters pipeline, which determines radial velocities, surface temperatures, surface gravities, and metallicities of stars, has been updated and refined with improvements in temperature estimates for stars with T_eff<5000 K and in metallicity estimates for stars with [Fe/H]>-0.5. DR9 includes new stellar parameters for all stars presented in DR8, including stars from SDSS-I and II, as well as those observed as part of the SDSS-III Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration-2 (SEGUE-2). The astrometry error introduced in the DR8 imaging catalogs has been corrected in the DR9 data products. The next data release for SDSS-III will be in Summer 2013, which will present the first data from the Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE) along with another year of data from BOSS, followed by the final SDSS-III data release in December 2014.Comment: 9 figures; 2 tables. Submitted to ApJS. DR9 is available at http://www.sdss3.org/dr