Urban Climate, Human behavior & Energy consumption: from LCZ mapping to simulation and urban planning (the MapUCE project)

International audienceThe MApUCE project aims to integrate in urban policies and most relevant legal documents quantitative data from urban microclimate, climate and energy.The primary objective of this project is to obtain climate and energy quantitative data from numerical simulations, focusing on urban microclimate and building energy consumption in the residential and service sectors, which represents in France 41% of the final energy consumption. Both aspects are coupled as building energy consumption is highly meteorologically dependent (e.g. domestic heating, air-conditioning) and heat waste impact the Urban Heat Island. We propose to develop, using national databases, a generic and automated method for generating Local Climate Zones (LCZ) for all cities in France, including the urban architectural, geographical and sociological parameters necessary for energy and microclimate simulations.As will be presented, previous projects on adaptation of cities to climate change have shown that human behavior is a very potent level to address energy consumption reduction, as much as urban forms or architectural technologies. Therefore, in order to further refine the coupled urban climate and energy consumption calculations, we will develop within TEB (and its Building Energy Module) a model of energy consumer behavior.The second objective of the project is to propose a methodology to integrate quantitative data in urban policies. Lawyers analyze the potential levers in legal and planning documents. A few “best cases” are also studied, in order to evaluate their performances. Finally, based on urban planning agencies requirements, we will define vectors to include quantified energy-climate data to legal urban planning documents. These vectors have to be understandable by urban planners and contain the relevant information.To meet these challenges, the project is organized around strongly interdisciplinary partners in the following fields: law, urban climate, building energetics, architecture, sociology, geography and meteorology, as well as the national federation of urban planning agencies.In terms of results, the cross-analysis of input urban parameters and urban micro-climate-energy simulated data will be available on-line as standardized maps for each of the studied cities. The urban parameter production tool as well as the models will be available as open-source. LCZ and associated urban (and social!) indicators may be integrated within the WUDAPT database

Dietary polyphenol supplementation prevents alterations of spatial navigation in middle-aged mice

Spatial learning and memory deficits associated with hippocampal synaptic plasticity impairments are commonly observed during aging. Besides, the beneficial role of dietary polyphenols has been suggested as potential functional food candidates to prevent this memory decline. Indeed, polyphenols could potentiate the signaling pathways of synaptic plasticity underlying learning and memory. In this study, spatial learning deficits of middle-aged mice were first highlighted and characterized according to their navigation patterns in the Morris water maze task. An eight-week polyphenol-enriched diet, containing a polyphenol-rich extract from grape and blueberry (PEGB; from the Neurophenols Consortium) with high contents of flavonoids, stilbenes and phenolic acids, was then successful in reversing these age-induced effects. The use of spatial strategies was indeed delayed with aging whereas a polyphenol supplementation could promote the occurrence of spatial strategies. These behavioral results were associated with neurobiological changes: while the expression of hippocampal calmodulin kinase II (CaMKII) mRNA levels was reduced in middle-aged animals, the polyphenol-enriched diet could rescue them. Besides, an increased expression of nerve growth neurotrophic factor (NGF) mRNA levels was also observed in supplemented adult and middle-aged mice. Thus these data suggest that supplementation with polyphenols could be an efficient nutritional way to prevent age-induced cognitive decline

Test faible consommation des circuits munis de chaînes de scan

MONTPELLIER-BU Sciences (341722106) / SudocSudocFranceF

GENIUS, a methodology to integer building scale data into urban microclimate and energy consumption modelling

International audienceAccurate simulation of the city energy balance requires studying the thermal behaviour of buildings and therefore requires knowing many details: at least the buildings geometries, their envelope materials and surroundings ground covering. For instance, information on shape and location of a building are useful to assess the performance of solar panels; information on the materiality of the facades, make it possible to estimate solar gains through the windows and therefore to perform building energy balance simulations (Masson, 2000); etc. Consequently, several recent research works have been aiming to integer building scale data into urban scale simulations (microclimate, energy consumption of buildings at the city scale, energy production, etc.). Among those researches, we can quote the WUDAPT project (Ching, 2012) aiming to define a worldwide building database based on the LCZ classification of urban forms (Stewart & Oke, 2009). 2. Problematics The main issue in integrating this type of information to urban scale simulations is the lack of precision of the available data for buildings (Ching et al., 2009). If a limited number of buildings can be very precisely described (through existing Building Information Model (BIM) for instance (Ferries et al., 2014), but also through historical studies or architectural inventories), the data at the city scale remains broadly heterogeneous. In this paper, we will present how we used those localized descriptions of buildings to enrich existing urban database existing at national scale in the context of the MApUCE project (a French research program that aims to integrate quantitative data from urban microclimate, climate and energy in urban policies). 3. Method Our working method, called GENIUS (GENerator of Interactive Urban blockS), was to perform a literature review combined with interviews of urban planners to characterize a typology of urban forms in the whole French territory, and to associate it with a wide database. The key theme of our work concerns the integration of building scale data into urban microclimate and energy consumption modelling. It leads us to formulate the question "how can we characterize the building scale in oder to update, and to make full use of urban simulation tools ?" To answer this question, we have broken down our work into three consecutive sections:-The first section interview urban planners about the differents urban typologies in France. Our aim is to take in account the vision of designers operating processes, in order to identify a system of ranking of urban typology .-The second section covers existing buildings database for identify, characterize intangible datas, such as buildings use, date of construction and buildings location. The aim of this analysis is to create the conditions for identify representative buildings in France.-The third section defines the building scale data. It is supported by a bibliographical study of building materials and systems, architecture and building cultures, conservation, etc. and is aimed at reaching an understanding of how information on building scale can be used for urban simulation tools. To conclude, we define different paths to be developed with the aim of improving the link between scale building data and urban microclimate and energy consumption modelling.

Résultats préliminaires de datation rubidium-strontium sur des sédiments glauconieux dans le Paléogène d'Angleterre

Das mit einem ursprünglichen 87Sr/86Sr — Wert von 0,709 konventionelle Alter des Glaukonits des Thanet aus der Thanethalbinsel in England beträgt 55 Mill. J. Die Lage der Punkte, die das Gesamtgestein und die feine Fraktion derselben Probe darstellen, zeigt, dass beide Fraktionen einen Ueberschuss an geerbtem radiogenischen 87 -Strontium enthalten.Предварительные результаты датирования стронций-рубидиевым методом глауконитовых отложений палеогена Англии 87 sr Условный возраст , с начальным отношением gggr = 0.709, танетского глауконита с полуострова Танет (Англия) равен 55 м.л. Положение характерных точек цельной породы и мелкой фракции того-же образца показывает, что обе фракции содержат унасле довательный излишек радиогенного стронция 87.An age of 55 M.Y. calculated with an initial 87Sr/86Sr ratio equal to 0,709 has been obtained on a glauconite from the Thanet bed in Thanet, England. The position of the total rock and of the fine fraction on the isotopic diagramm means that these two fractions contain an excess of inherited radiogenic 87 strontium.L'âge conventionnel, avec un rapport initial 87 Sr/86 Sr égal à 0,709, de la glauconie du Thanétien de la presqu'île de Than et en Angleterre est de 55 M. A. La position des points représentatifs de la roche totale et de la fraction fine du même échantillon montre que ces deux fractions contiennent un excès de strontium 87 radiogénique hérité.Bonhomme Michel, Clauer Norbert, Odin Gilles. Résultats préliminaires de datation rubidium-strontium sur des sédiments glauconieux dans le Paléogène d'Angleterre. In: Bulletin du Service de la carte géologique d'Alsace et de Lorraine, tome 23, n°3-4, 1970. Sédimentologie et géochimie de la surface. pp. 209-213

Power Driven Chaining of Flip-Flops in Scan Architectures

International audiencePower consumption during scan testing is becoming a primary concern. In this paper, we present a novel approach for scan cell ordering which significantly reduces the power consumed during scan testing. The proposed approach is based on the use of a two-step heuristic procedure that can be exploited by any chip layout program during scan flip-flops placement and routing. The proposed approach works for any conventional scan design and offers numerous advantages compared with existing low power scan techniques. Reductions of average and peak power consumption during scan testing are up to 58% and 24% respectively for experimented ISCAS benchmark circuits

Test Power: A Big Issue in Large SOC Design

International audienc

Scan Cell Ordering for Low Power Scan Testing

International audiencePower consumption during scan testing is becoming a primary concern. In this paper, we present a novel approach for scan cell ordering which significantly reduces the power consumed during scan testing. The proposed approach is based on the use of a two steps heuristic procedure that can be exploited by any chip layout program before flip-flops placement and routing. The proposed approach works for any conventional scan design and offers numerous advantages compared with existing low power scan techniques. Reductions of average and peak power consumption during scan testing are up to 34% and 18% respectively for experimented ISCAS benchmark circuits

Power Conscious Testing

International audienceTest power relates to the power consumed during test of integrated circuits or embedded cores. Test power is now a big concern in large System-on-Chip designs. In this paper, we propose to shortly review the state-of-the-art in this domain. We first survey the recent approaches proposed for minimizing test power. Next, we propose some interesting directions for the development of new low power testing techniques by enumerating the relevant criteria that have to be satisfied

GENIUS: A tool for multi-disciplinary and multi-scalar databases

International audienceCities are responsible for the majority of energy consumption on the planet. As a consequence, researches regarding energy use in urban context have been increasing for the last decades. Recently the interrelationship between city, energy consumption and urban microclimate appeared as a key component of urban sustainability.To be accurate, those studies must take into account a multidisciplinary urban context and modelling tools need high definition data. Nevertheless, at the city scale, input data is either imprecise or only available for small areas. In particular, there is a lack of information about buildings footprints, roofs sloping, envelope materials, etc. Moreover, the existing data do not allow researchers to explore prospective issues such as climate change or future urban development.In this sense, we developed a new tool called GENIUS (GENerator of Interactive Urban blockS) to build high definition and evolutionary maps from available databases. GENIUS creates maps composed of archetypical neighbourhood coming as shape-files of polygons with additional information (height, age, use, thermal insulation, etc.). Those archetypical neighbourhoods come to seven types of urban blocks that can be found in most European cities. Those types can be compared with Stewart and Oke Local Climate Zones (LCZ). The first step of our method is to transform an existing map into an “archetypical map”. To do this, the urban database of the IGN (French Geographical Institute) was used. The maps were divided into cells of 250 meters resolution. For each cell, about 40 morphological indicators were calculated. Seven groups of blocks were then identified by means of Principal Component Analysis. GENIUS databases are also able to evolve through time. As a matter of fact, the initial map is transformed, year after year, by taking into account changes in density and urban history. In that sense, GENIUS communicates with NEDUM, a model developed by the CIRED (International Centre for Environment and Development), that simulates the spread of the city and provides information on build density. Under the influence of those density evolutions and of different urban planning scenarios, GENIUS changes the type of urban blocks and their parameters (height, plot ratio, thermal properties, etc.). The paper will present the validation of GENIUS and its application on the French city of Toulouse. Six scenarios have been designed taking into account demographic evolutions, economic contexts and urban planning policies. For each of those scenarios, we generated maps of the city and its surroundings from 2010 to 2100.The obtained maps enabled us to come up with simulations of Toulouse energy consumptions and microclimate both present and future