Monsters in early modern philosophy

Monsters as a category seem omnipresent in early modern natural philosophy, in what one might call a “long” early modern period stretching from the Renaissance to the late eighteenth century, when the science of teratology emerges. We no longer use this term to refer to developmental anomalies (whether a two-headed calf, an individual suffering from microcephaly or Proteus syndrome) or to “freak occurrences” like Mary Toft’s supposedly giving birth to a litter of rabbits, in Surrey in the early eighteenth-century (Todd 1995). But the term itself has a rich semantic history, coming from the Latin verb monstrare (itself deriving from monere, to remind, warn, advise), “to show,” from which we also get words like “monitor,” “admonish,” “monument” and “premonition”; hence there are proverbs like, in French, le monstre est ce qui montre, difficult to render in English: “the monsters is that which shows.” Scholars have discussed how this “monstrative” dimension of the monster is in fact twofold: on the one hand, and most awkwardly, the monster is an individual who is “pointed at,” who is shown; on the other hand, the monster is a sign, a portent, an omen, and in that sense “shows us” something (on the complex semantic history of the term across Indo-European languages see Ochsner 2005). The latter dimension persists in naturalized form in the early modern period when authors like Bacon, Fontenelle or William Hunter insist that monsters (or anomalies) can show us something of the workings of Nature

La flexibilité des élevages à l'épreuve du développement des filières qualité. Le cas du bassin allaitant bourguignon

National audienceCette note présente l'état d'avancement de la recherche menée sur. La flexibilité des élevages à l'épreuve du développement des filières qualité par le LISTO-Dijon et la Cellule SAD de l'URH-Theix, recherche dont l'objectif principal est "de produire des connaissances sur ce que mettent en jeu les transformations de l'activité d'élevage du point de vue des éleveurs eux-mêmes, en focalisant notre attention sur ce qui conditionne la flexibilité des élevages, étant entendu par-là la capacité des producteurs à saisir des opportunités et à résister aux aléas". Ne revenant ni sur les raisons qui ont conduit à l'élaboration de ce projet de recherche, ni sur sa problématique générale, ni sur son organisation d'ensemble (on trouvera en annexe 1 une reprise synthétique des informations déjà fournies sur ce point), elle se veut livrer les résultats des travaux réalisés au cours de la première année de son fonctionnement effectif. Ces travaux ont, pour l'essentiel consisté en la réalisation d'une première série d'enquêtes exploratoires (dites El) qui visaient à caractériser les exploitations retenues pour notre étude en nous faisant une première idée de leur évolution, cela afin de formuler plus précisément comment aborder, dans la suite du programme, la question de leur flexibilité. Après avoir rappelé comment nous avons défini cet "échantillon", nous présenterons donc ici les analyses que nous avons effectuées sur ces premières enquêtes, nous indiquerons, ensuite, comment nous avons, à partir de là, précisé les différents volets de ce programme et nous exposerons, enfin, où nous en sommes dans le déroulement des opérations de recherche correspondant à chacun de ces volets

Evolution de la filière bovine et de la flexibilité des exploitations d'élevage. Etudes de cas dans le bassin allaitant bourguignon

National audienc

Prédiction de l’entrée en travail sous 24 heures en cas de rupture des membranes à terme

International audienc

Identification of biologic markers of the premature rupture of fetal membranes: proteomic approach.

In obstetrics, premature rupture of the membranes (PROM) is a frequent observation which is responsible for many premature deliveries. PROM is also associated with an increased risk of fetal and maternal infections. Early diagnosis is mandatory in order to decrease such complications. Despite that current biological tests allowing the diagnosis of PROM are both sensitive and specific, contamination of the samples by maternal blood can induce false positive results. Therefore, in order to identify new potential markers of PROM (present only in amniotic blood, and absent in maternal blood), proteomic studies were undertaken on samples collected from six women at terms (pairs of maternal plasma and amniotic fluid) as well as on four samples of amniotic fluid collected from other women at the 17(th) week of gestation. All samples (N = 16) were analyzed by two-dimensional (2-D) high-resolution electrophoresis, followed by sensitive silver staining. The gel images were studied using bioinformatic tools. Analyses were focused on regions corresponding to pI between 4.5 and 7 and to molecular masses between 20 and 50 kDa. In this area, 646 +/- 113 spots were detected, and 27 spots appeared to be present on the gels of amniotic fluid, but were absent on those of maternal plasma. Nine out of these 27 spots were also observed on the gels of the four samples of amniotic fluids collected at the 17(th) week of pregnancy. Five of these 9 spots were unambiguously detected on preparative 2-D gels stained by Coomassie blue, and were identified by mass spectrometry analyses. Three spots corresponded to fragments of plasma proteins, and 2 appeared to be fragments of proteins not known to be present in plasma. These 2 proteins were agrin (SWISS-PROT: O00468) and perlecan (SWISS-PROT: P98160). Our results show that proteomics is a valuable approach to identify new potential biological markers for future PROM diagnosis

Identification of biologic markers of the premature rupture of fetal membranes: proteomic approach.

In obstetrics, premature rupture of the membranes (PROM) is a frequent observation which is responsible for many premature deliveries. PROM is also associated with an increased risk of fetal and maternal infections. Early diagnosis is mandatory in order to decrease such complications. Despite that current biological tests allowing the diagnosis of PROM are both sensitive and specific, contamination of the samples by maternal blood can induce false positive results. Therefore, in order to identify new potential markers of PROM (present only in amniotic blood, and absent in maternal blood), proteomic studies were undertaken on samples collected from six women at terms (pairs of maternal plasma and amniotic fluid) as well as on four samples of amniotic fluid collected from other women at the 17(th) week of gestation. All samples (N = 16) were analyzed by two-dimensional (2-D) high-resolution electrophoresis, followed by sensitive silver staining. The gel images were studied using bioinformatic tools. Analyses were focused on regions corresponding to pI between 4.5 and 7 and to molecular masses between 20 and 50 kDa. In this area, 646 +/- 113 spots were detected, and 27 spots appeared to be present on the gels of amniotic fluid, but were absent on those of maternal plasma. Nine out of these 27 spots were also observed on the gels of the four samples of amniotic fluids collected at the 17(th) week of pregnancy. Five of these 9 spots were unambiguously detected on preparative 2-D gels stained by Coomassie blue, and were identified by mass spectrometry analyses. Three spots corresponded to fragments of plasma proteins, and 2 appeared to be fragments of proteins not known to be present in plasma. These 2 proteins were agrin (SWISS-PROT: O00468) and perlecan (SWISS-PROT: P98160). Our results show that proteomics is a valuable approach to identify new potential biological markers for future PROM diagnosis