Early Huntington's disease affects movements in transformed sensorimotor mappings

This study examined the effect of transformed visual feedback on movement control in Huntington’s disease (HD). Patients in the early stages of HD and controls performed aiming movements towards peripheral targets on a digitizing tablet using an indirect visual control of movement through a monitor and emphasizing precision. In a baseline condition, HD patients were slower but showed few precision problems in aiming. When visual feedback was inverted in both vertical and horizontal axes, patients showed problems in initial and terminal phases of movement where feedback is most critical. When visual feedback was inverted along a single axis as in a mirror-inversion, HD patients showed large deviations and over-corrections before adaptation. Adaptation was similar in both groups. These results suggest that HD impairs on-line error correction in novel movements

Mapping Real Time Applications on NoC Architecture with Hybrid Multi-objective Algorithm

International audienceThe work presented in this paper is a contribution to solving a widespread problem in the field of system design, embedded the placement of a large application on an architecture (NOC). Application is represented by a set of tasks that communicate with each other by sending message via bus on a heterogeneous architecture. Our role is to place the tiles (task) on different elements (core) of architecture with the objectives of minimizing time execution and the energy consumption under the constraints of load balancing, bandwidth, available memory and size of the queue waiting processors. To solve this problem, we used in the context of our present work, a new meta-heuristic algorithm Particle Swarm. it has proved its effectiveness in many fields such as optimization of networks, image processing and even control of industrial systems but it was never applied in our domain

Optimal Management of Severe/Refractory Asthma

Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease of the airways, affecting approximately 300 million people worldwide. Asthma results in airway hyperresponsiveness, leading to paroxysmal symptoms of wheeze, cough, shortness of breath, and chest tightness. When these symptoms remain uncontrolled, despite treatment with high doses of inhaled and ingested corticosteroids, asthmatic patients are predisposed to greater morbidity and require more health care support. Treating patients with severe asthma can be difficult and often poses a challenge to physicians when providing ongoing management. This clinical review aims to discuss the definition, prevalence and evaluation of severe asthmatics, and provides a review of the existing pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic treatment options

Synthesis of RuO 2 nanowires from Ru thin films by atmospheric pressure micro-post-discharge

International audienceOxidation by a micro-post-discharge at atmospheric pressure of thin films of ruthenium deposited on fused silica by pressure-modulated magnetron sputtering is studied. Single-crystalline RuO 2 nanowires are obtained for the first time with a diffusion process over large areas. Nanowires grow typically at temperatures below 550-600 K, provided the level of stress is high enough to fragment grains in sub-grains with sizes between 30 and 50 nm. Because of the alternation of dense and porous layers forming the coating, inward diffusion of vacancies leads to no patent Kirkendall's effect, pores being distributed over the whole coating thickness and not mainly at the interface with the substrate. The centre of the treatment being heated at temperatures higher than 900 K, gaseous RuO 4 is formed, leading to an evaporated area. At its edge, a ring of microcrystals is formed, likely by a CVD mechanism

Magnetism, Spin-Orbit Coupling, and Superconducting Pairing in UGe2_2

A consistent picture on the mean-field level of the magnetic properties and electronic structure of the superconducting itinerant ferromagnet UGe$_2$ is shown to require inclusion of correlation effects beyond the local density approximation (LDA). The "LDA+U" approach reproduces both the magnitude of the observed moment, composed of strongly opposing spin and orbital parts, and the magnetocrystalline anisotropy. The largest Fermi surface sheet is comprised primarily of spin majority states with orbital projection $m_{\ell}$=0, suggesting a much simpler picture of the pairing than is possible for general strong spin-orbit coupled materials. This occurrence, and the quasi-two-dimensional geometry of the Fermi surface, support the likelihood of magnetically mediated p-wave triplet pairing.Comment: accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. Lett; URL for better quality image of Fig.3 (2MB) at http://yammer.ucdavis.edu/public/UGe2/fig3.ep

Observation and assessment of model retrievals of surface exchange components over a row canopy using directional thermal data

Land surface temperature is an essential climate variable that can serve as a proxy for detecting water deficiencies in croplands and wooded areas. Its measurement can however be influenced by anisotropic properties of surface targets leading to occurrence of directional effects on the signal. This may lead to an incorrect interpretation of thermal measurements. In this study, we perform model assessments and check the influence of thermal radiation directionality using data over a vineyard. To derive the overall directional surface temperatures, elemental values measured by individual cameras were aggregated according to the respective cover fractions/weights in viewing direction. Aggregated temperatures from the turbid model were compared to corresponding temperatures simulated by the 3D DART radiative transfer model. The reconstructed temperatures were then used in surface-energy-balance (SEB) simulations to assess the impact of the Sun-target-sensor geometry on retrievals. Here, the pseudo-isotropic Soil-Plant-Atmosphere-Remote-Sensing-of-Evapotranspiration (SPARSE) dual-source model together with the non-isotropic version (SPARSE4), were used. Both schemes were able to retrieve overall fluxes satisfactorily, confirming a previous study. However, the sensitivity (of flux and component temperature estimates) of the schemes to viewing direction was tested for the first time using reconstructed sets of directional thermal data to force the models. Degradation (relative to nadir) in flux retrieval cross-row was observed, with better consistency along rows. Overall, it was nevertheless shown that SPARSE4 is less influenced by the viewing direction of the temperature than SPARSE, particularly for strongly off-nadir viewing. Some directional/asymmetrical artefacts are however not well reproduced by the simple Radiative Transfer Methods (RTM), which can then manifest in and influence the subsequent thermal-infrared-driven SEB modelling.This work was supported by the ALTOS project (PRIMA 2018 - Section 2), with grants provided by ANR via the agreement n°ANR-18-PRIM-0011-02 as well as the CNES/TOSCA program for the TRISHNA project. First author acknowledges the financial support of his PhD from CNES and Région Occitanie. The field experiments were carried out in the context of the HiLiaise and ESA WineEO projects. Joan Boldu (proprietor) and David Tous (SafSampling) are also acknowledged for allowing/providing access to the site and other site related data. Nicolas Lauret’s help with preparation of the DART mock-ups is appreciated.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Opipramol inhibits lipolysis in human adipocytes without altering glucose uptake and differently from antipsychotic and antidepressant drugs with adverse effects on body weight control

Treatment with several antipsychotic drugs exhibits a tendency to induce weight gain and diabetic complications. The proposed mechanisms by which the atypical antipsychotic drug olanzapine increases body weight include central dysregulations leading to hyperphagia and direct peripheral impairment of fat cell lipolysis. Several investigations have reproduced in vitro direct actions of antipsychotics on rodent adipocytes, cultured preadipocytes, or human adipose tissue-derived stem cells. However, to our knowledge, no such direct action has been described in human mature adipocytes. The aim of the present study was to compare in human adipocytes the putative direct alterations of lipolysis by antipsychotics (haloperidol, olanzapine, ziprazidone, risperidone), antidepressants (pargyline, phenelzine), or anxiolytics (opipramol). Lipolytic responses to the tested drugs, and to recognized lipolytic (e.g., isoprenaline) or antilipolytic agents (e.g., insulin) were determined, together with glucose transport and amine oxidase activities in abdominal subcutaneous adipocytes from individuals undergoing plastic surgery. None of the tested drugs were lipolytic. Surprisingly, only opipramol exhibited substantial antilipolytic properties in the micromolar to millimolar range. An opipramol antilipolytic effect was evident against isoprenaline-, forskolin-, or atrial natriuretic peptide-stimulated lipolysis. Opipramol did not impair insulin activation of glucose transport but inhibited monoamine oxidase (MAO) activity to the same extent as antidepressants recognized as MAO inhibitors (pargyline, harmine, or phenelzine), whereas antipsychotics were inefficient. Considering its unique properties, opipramol, which is not associated with weight gain in treated patients, is a good candidate for drug repurposing because it limits exaggerated lipolysis, prevents hydrogen peroxide release by amine oxidases in adipocytes, and is thereby of potential use to limit lipotoxicity and oxidative stress, two deleterious complications of diabetes and obesity

The use of the scintillation technique for monitoring seasonal water consumption of olive orchards in a semi-arid region

To monitor seasonal water consumption of agricultural fields at large scale, spatially averaged surface fluxes of sensible heat (H) and latent heat (LvE) are required. The scintillation method is shown to be a promising device for obtaining the area-averaged sensible heat fluxes, on a scale of up to 10 km. These fluxes, when combined with a simple available energy model, can be used to derive area-averaged latent heat fluxes. For this purpose, a Large Aperture Scintillometer (LAS) was operated continuously for more than one year over a tall and sparse irrigated oliveyard located in south-central Marrakesh (Morocco). Due to the flood irrigation method used in the site, which induces irregular pattern of soil moisture both in space and time, the comparison between scintillometer-based estimates of daily sensible heat flux (HLAS) and those measured by the classical eddy covariance (EC) method (HEC) showed a large scatter during the irrigation events, while a good correspondence was found during homogenous conditions (dry conditions and days following the rain events). We found, that combining a simple available energy model and the LAS measurements, the latent heat can be reliably predicted at large scale in spite of the large scatter (R2 = 0.72 and RMSE = 18.25Wm2) that is obtained when comparing the LAS against the EC. This scatter is explained by different factors: the difference in terms of the source areas of the LAS and EC, the closure failure of the energy balance of the EC, and the error in available energy estimates. Additionally, the irrigation efficiency was investigated by comparing measured seasonal evapotranspiration values to those recommended by the FAO. It was found that the visual observation of the physical conditions of the plant is not sufficient to efficiently manage the irrigation, a large quantity of water is lost (37% of total irrigation). Consequently, the LAS can be considered as a potentially useful tool to monitor the water consumption in complex conditions