Evaluation of pavement layer thicknesses using GPR: A comparison between full-wave inversion and the straight-ray method

The characterization of pavement properties is essential to manage transport infrastructures. In this paper, we aim at assessing the abilities of the ground-penetrating radar (GPR) full-wave inversion and straight-ray methods to achieve this task. The first approach consists in combining a full-wave- inversion procedure with a recently developed electromagnetic model. The latter takes advantage of a closed-form solution of Maxwell’s equations to describe the antenna-medium system. The second approach resorts to the surface reflection coefficient method. We showed through numerical experiments that the straight-ray method in general provides fast and good results, but full-wave inversion applies to a wider range of model configurations and is subject to less important errors. A laboratory experiment was also conducted to take into account the effects of measurement errors as well as inherent pavement heterogeneities. The results evidence that noisy data and a lack of information can sometimes lead to an inappropriate estimation of the parameters. Nonetheless, applying an adequate processing before invert- ing the data made both inversion methods able to provide an estimation of the pavement thickness along the acquisition profile

How Cooking Time Affects In Vitro Starch and Protein Digestibility of Whole Cooked Lentil Seeds versus Isolated Cotyledon Cells

Lentils are sustainable sources of bioencapsulated macronutrients, meaning physical barriers hinder the permeation of digestive enzymes into cotyledon cells, slowing down macronutrient digestion. While lentils are typically consumed as cooked seeds, insights into the effect of cooking time on microstructural and related digestive properties are lacking. Therefore, the effect of cooking time (15, 30, or 60 min) on in vitro amylolysis and proteolysis kinetics of lentil seeds (CL) and an important microstructural fraction, i.e., cotyledon cells isolated thereof (ICC), were studied. For ICC, cooking time had no significant effect on amylolysis kinetics, while small but significant differences in proteolysis were observed (p < 0.05). In contrast, cooking time importantly affected the microstructure obtained upon the mechanical disintegration of whole lentils, resulting in significantly different digestion kinetics. Upon long cooking times (60 min), digestion kinetics approached those of ICC since mechanical disintegration yielded a high fraction of individual cotyledon cells (67 g/100 g dry matter). However, cooked lentils with a short cooking time (15 min) showed significantly slower amylolysis with a lower final extent (~30%), due to the presence of more cell clusters upon disintegration. In conclusion, cooking time can be used to obtain distinct microstructures and digestive functionalities with perspectives for household and industrial preparation

Real-Life Experience of Tralokinumab for the Treatment of Adult Patients with Severe Atopic Dermatitis: A Multicentric Prospective Study.

Tralokinumab, the first fully human monoclonal antibody that binds specifically to interleukin-13, was safe and effective for treating atopic dermatitis (AD) in clinical trials, but real-life experience is still limited. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of tralokinumab in severe AD in a real-life multicenter prospective cohort. Adult patients with severe AD were enrolled between January 2022 and July 2022 and received tralokinumab subcutaneously for 16 weeks. Objective and subjective scores were collected at baseline, weeks 6 and 16. Adverse events were reported throughout the study. Twenty-one patients were included. An improvement of at least 75% on the Eczema Area and Severity Index (EASI 75) was achieved in 66.7% of patients at week 16. The median objective and subjective scores at week 16 were significantly (p < 0.001) lower than those at baseline. Combination with cyclosporine was sometimes necessary at the beginning of treatment, and addition of upadacitinib was required for some patients with very severe disease during the treatment. The most frequent adverse events were flares of eczema (23.8%) and reactions at injection site (19.0%). No cases of conjunctivitis were reported. Four patients (19.0%) discontinued treatment. Tralokinumab is an effective first-line biotherapy for severe AD. However, therapeutic response may be progressive. Safety data were reassuring. Atopic dermatitis flares or reactions at the injection site may lead to discontinuation of treatment. A history of conjunctivitis on dupilumab is not a contraindication to the initiation of tralokinumab