Participation in a time of climate crisis

The climate crisis puts real pressure on legal guarantees of public participation in decision making. This pressure comes from a number of directions, but we are particularly concerned with the technocratic erosion of routines of participation, in a turn to expertise rather than democracy for legitimate decision making. At the same time, populists resist the constraints imposed on their power by legal rights of participation. We argue, however, that the climate crisis, while putting pressure on participation, also reinforces its necessity, and the limitations of technocratic decision making. Politics is unavoidable, even and especially in a crisis. Law, or its silence, contributes to the context, the place, and the meaning of participation, and we study its strangely underexplored role in shaping participation on the ground

Diversity and spatial distribution of metalreducing bacterial assemblages in groundwaters of different redox conditions

The spatial distribution and diversity of metal-reducing bacterial assemblages belonging to Geobacteraceae were studied in groundwaters with different physicochemical characteristics by means of terminal-restriction fragment length polymorphism (T-RFLP) molecular fingerprinting, as applied to the 16S rRNA gene. The physicochemical conditions of these environments were unfavorable to support active-metal-reducing processes. The highest diversity of Geobacteraceae was observed in groundwater samples characterized by the highest dissolved Fe and Mn concentrations. T-RFLP analyses revealed major differences in the Geobacteraceae ribotype diversity and community composition of the groundwater samples as well as a considerable variability and spatial turnover of Geobacteraceae assemblages. Results from this work suggest that changes in the physicochemical characteristics of the aquifer deeply influence the richness and community structure of Geobacteraceae, even in those systems in which metal-reduction processes are not dominant. [Int Microbiol 2009; 12(3):153-159

A hierarchy of linguistic predictions during natural language comprehension

Understanding spoken language requires transforming ambiguous acoustic streams into a hierarchy of representations, from phonemes to meaning. It has been suggested that the brain uses prediction to guide the interpretation of incoming input. However, the role of prediction in language processing remains disputed, with disagreement about both the ubiquity and representational nature of predictions. Here, we address both issues by analyzing brain recordings of participants listening to audiobooks, and using a deep neural network (GPT-2) to precisely quantify contextual predictions. First, we establish that brain responses to words are modulated by ubiquitous predictions. Next, we disentangle model-based predictions into distinct dimensions, revealing dissociable neural signatures of predictions about syntactic category (parts of speech), phonemes, and semantics. Finally, we show that high-level (word) predictions inform low-level (phoneme) predictions, supporting hierarchical predictive processing. Together, these results underscore the ubiquity of prediction in language processing, showing that the brain spontaneously predicts upcoming language at multiple levels of abstraction

State of research in automatic as-built modelling

This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Elsevier via http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.aei.2015.01.001Building Information Models (BIMs) are becoming the official standard in the construction industry for encoding, reusing, and exchanging information about structural assets. Automatically generating such representations for existing assets stirs up the interest of various industrial, academic, and governmental parties, as it is expected to have a high economic impact. The purpose of this paper is to provide a general overview of the as-built modelling process, with focus on the geometric modelling side. Relevant works from the Computer Vision, Geometry Processing, and Civil Engineering communities are presented and compared in terms of their potential to lead to automatic as-built modelling.We acknowledge the support of EPSRC Grant NMZJ/114,DARPA UPSIDE Grant A13–0895-S002, NSF CAREER Grant N. 1054127, European Grant Agreements No. 247586 and 334241. We would also like to thank NSERC Canada, Aecon, and SNC-Lavalin for financially supporting some parts of this research

EPICA Dome C electronic control system

AbstractA new deep drill has been developed within the framework of the European Programme for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA). Several versions of the EPICA drill exist. The version used at Dome Concordia (75˚06'1" S, 123˚23'71" E) was operated with a new electronic control system developed by the Ente per le Nuove tecnologie, l'Energia e l'Ambiente (ENEA) Research Center in Brasimone, Italy. This electronic control system was used for the first time during the 1997/98 Antarctic summer season

Viral Production, Decay Rates, and Life Strategies along a Trophic Gradient in the North Adriatic Sea

Although the relationships between trophic conditions and viral dynamics have been widely explored in different pelagic environments, there have been few attempts at independent estimates of both viral production and decay. In this study, we investigated factors controlling the balance between viral production and decay along a trophic gradient in the north Adriatic basin, providing independent estimates of these variables and determining the relative importance of nanoflagellate grazing and viral life strategies. Increasing trophic conditions induced an increase of bacterioplankton growth rates and of the burst sizes. As a result, eutrophic waters displayed highest rates of viral production, which considerably exceeded observed rates of viral decay (up to 2.9 × 109 VLP liter−1 h−1). Viral decay was also higher in eutrophic waters, where it accounted for ca. 40% of viral production, and dropped significantly to 1.3 to 10.7% in oligotrophic waters. These results suggest that viral production and decay rates may not necessarily be balanced in the short term, resulting in a net increase of viruses in the system. In eutrophic waters nanoflagellate grazing, dissolved-colloidal substances, and lysogenic infection were responsible together for the removal of ca. 66% of viral production versus 17% in oligotrophic waters. Our results suggest that different causative agents are primarily responsible for the removal of viruses from the water column in different trophic conditions. Factors other than those considered in the past might shed light on processes responsible for the removal and/or decay of viral particles from the water column

Cystic Fibrosis Defective Response to Infection Involves Autophagy and Lipid Metabolism

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is a hereditary disease, with 70% of patients developing a proteinopathy related to the deletion of phenylalanine 508. CF is associated with multiple organ dysfunction, chronic inflammation, and recurrent lung infections. CF is characterized by defective autophagy, lipid metabolism, and immune response. Intracellular lipid accumulation favors microbial infection, and autophagy deficiency impairs internalized pathogen clearance. Myriocin, an inhibitor of sphingolipid synthesis, significantly reduces inflammation, promotes microbial clearance in the lungs, and induces autophagy and lipid oxidation. RNA-seq was performed in Aspergillusfumigatus-infected and myriocin-treated CF patients' derived monocytes and in a CF bronchial epithelial cell line. Fungal clearance was also evaluated in CF monocytes. Myriocin enhanced CF patients' monocytes killing of A. fumigatus. CF patients' monocytes and cell line responded to infection with a profound transcriptional change; myriocin regulates genes that are involved in inflammation, autophagy, lipid storage, and metabolism, including histones and heat shock proteins whose activity is related to the response to infection. We conclude that the regulation of sphingolipid synthesis induces a metabolism drift by promoting autophagy and lipid consumption. This process is driven by a transcriptional program that corrects part of the differences between CF and control samples, therefore ameliorating the infection response and pathogen clearance in the CF cell line and in CF peripheral blood monocytes

PENELLOPE V. The magnetospheric structure and the accretion variability of the classical T Tauri star HM Lup

HM Lup is a young M-type star that accretes material from a circumstellar disk through a magnetosphere. Our aim is to study the inner disk structure of HM Lup and to characterize its variability. We used spectroscopic data from HST/STIS, X-Shooter, and ESPRESSO taken in the framework of the ULLYSES and PENELLOPE programs, together with photometric data from TESS and AAVSO. The 2021 TESS light curve shows variability typical for young stellar objects of the "accretion burster" type. The spectra cover the temporal evolution of the main burst in the 2021 TESS light curve. We compared the strength and morphology of emission lines from different species and ionization stages. We determined the mass accretion rate from selected emission lines and from the UV continuum excess emission at different epochs, and we examined its relation to the photometric light curves. The emission lines in the optical spectrum of HM Lup delineate a temperature stratification along the accretion flow. While the wings of the H I and He I lines originate near the star, the lines of species such as Na I, Mg I, Ca I, Ca II, Fe I, and Fe II are formed in an outer and colder region. The shape and periodicity of the 2019 and 2021 TESS light curves, when qualitatively compared to predictions from magnetohydrodynamic models, suggest that HM Lup was in a regime of unstable ordered accretion during the 2021 TESS observation due to an increase in the accretion rate. Although HM Lup is not an extreme accretor, it shows enhanced emission in the metallic species during this high accretion state that is produced by a density enhancement in the outer part of the accretion flow.Comment: 15 pages, 14 figures. Accepted for publication in A&

Predictors of antiproliferative effect of lanreotide autogel in advanced gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms

PURPOSE: The antiproliferative properties of lanreotide autogel (LAN) in gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms (GEP NENs) were demonstrated in the CLARINET study. However, there is limited literature regarding factors that affect progression-free survival (PFS) in patients with GEP NENs treated with LAN. METHODS: We identified a total of 191 treatment-naive patients with advanced GEP NENs and positive SSTR uptake on imaging (Octreoscan or 68Gallium DOTATATE Positron Emission Tomography [68GaPET]) who received first-line LAN monotherapy, albeit at various starting doses (60, 90 or 120 mg/month). A group of 102 patients who initiated treatment at the standard dose of 120 mg/month were included in the study and further evaluated by univariate and multivariate analyses to identify predictors of PFS. RESULTS: The location of tumour primary was in the small bowel in 63 (62%), pancreas in 31 (30%) and colon/rectum in 8 patients (8%). The tumours were well-differentiated, and the majority were grade 1 (52%), or 2 (38%). About 60% of cases had progressive disease at the time of treatment initiation. Most patients with available pretreatment nuclear medicine imaging (Octreoscan or 68Ga PET) had a Krenning score of 3 (44%) or 4 (50%). The median PFS for the entire cohort was 19 months (95% CI 12, 26 months). The univariate analysis demonstrated that grade 2 tumours, progressive disease at baseline and metastatic liver disease were associated with a significantly shorter PFS, while other evaluated variables did not affect PFS at a statistically significant level. However, at multivariate analysis only the tumour grade remained statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: The current study showed that, of many evaluated variables, only the tumour grade was predictive of PFS duration and this should be considered during patient selection for treatment