Large-Scale Integration of Nanoelectromechanical Systems for Gas Sensing Applications

We have developed arrays of nanomechanical systems (NEMS) by large-scale integration, comprising thousands of individual nanoresonators with densities of up to 6 million NEMS per square centimeter. The individual NEMS devices are electrically coupled using a combined series-parallel configuration that is extremely robust with respect to lithographical defects and mechanical or electrostatic-discharge damage. Given the large number of connected nanoresonators, the arrays are able to handle extremely high input powers (>1 W per array, corresponding to <1 mW per nanoresonator) without excessive heating or deterioration of resonance response. We demonstrate the utility of integrated NEMS arrays as high-performance chemical vapor sensors, detecting a part-per-billion concentration of a chemical warfare simulant within only a 2 s exposure period

Towards a quantitative and qualitative enhancement of the extraction of phenolic compounds from red grape pomace using electrotechnologies

Ce travail porte sur l’amélioration quantitative et qualitative du procédé de fabrication d’extraits de marc de raisin riches en composés phénoliques. Les effets de technologies alternatives de traitement de la biomasse végétale sur l’amélioration des rendements d’extraction ont été étudiés à l’échelle laboratoire. Leurs impacts sur la qualité biochimique des extraits obtenus ont été évalués via la caractérisation analytique des composés phénoliques.Une étude comparative de différentes technologies alternatives de pré-traitement en milieux aqueux (décharges électriques haute tension (DEHT), champs électriques pulsés (CEP) et ultrasons (US)), d’un marc de raisin issu d’un procédé de vinification en rouge, en amont de la diffusion, a permis d’approfondir la compréhension des phénomènes induits et de leurs effets sur l’amélioration de l’extractabilité des composés. Nous avons montré que le choix du procédé à mettre en oeuvre était relatif au type de composés phénoliques ciblés : la localisation tissulaire de ces composés est apparue comme un facteur-clé pour optimiser leur extraction. La technologie de pré-traitement par CEP, induisant un endommagement localisé des structures végétales, s’est avérée particulièrement intéressante pour extraire sélectivement les anthocyanes situés au niveau des couches de cellules supérieures de l’hypoderme de la pellicule de raisin. Nous avons, par la suite, montré que le pré-traitement par CEP, en milieu sec (sans ajout de solvant) et à intensité de champ électrique modérée, était plus efficace pour la récupération sélective des anthocyanes et moins énergivore qu’un traitement CEP de forte intensité d’une suspension aqueuse de marc. Pour ce faire, nous avons mis en place une nouvelle configuration de cellule qui nous a permis d’étudier la faisabilité d’un pré-traitement en milieu sec, sans ajout de liquide conducteur, et d’optimiser les paramètres opératoires (masse volumique, intensité du champ électrique, énergie spécifique) influençant la récupération subséquente, lors de la diffusion, des composés phénoliques. Afin d’intégrer notre démarche expérimentale dans une approche systémique de type « bioraffinerie », l’accent a été mis sur le traitement du marc réhydraté à posteriori de la diffusion. L’intensification du pressage de ce marc par chauffage ohmique (CO) permet d’améliorer les rendements globaux d’extraction tout en assurant un premier niveau de déshydratation de cette biomasse.Un bilan technico-économique montre que l’application successive des électro-technologies (pré-traitement par CEP en milieu sec et pressage assisté par CO à posteriori de la diffusion) permet une amélioration des rendements massiques d’extraction de l’ordre de 30 % comparativement au procédé classique. Ce gain matière compense l’augmentation du coût de production (+ 2.7 % comparativement au procédé classique) et résulte une diminution du coût de production de l’extrait (7.3 €/kg vs 9.4 €/kg pour le procédé classique).This work aims at studying the effect of alternative technologies for the processing of winery byproducts on the improvement of extraction yields at laboratory scale. Their impacts on the biochemical quality of the extracts obtained from grape pomace were evaluated by the characterization of the extracted compounds. A comparative study on the effects of different alternative pre-treatment (pulsed electric field (PEF), high voltage electric discharges (HVED) and ultrasounds (US)) of aqueous suspensions of red grape pomace, prior to the extraction step, was realized with the specific objective of understanding the induced phenomena. The electroporation induced by PEF may allow the specific recovery of anthocyanins that are located in the upper cell layers of the hypodermis by facilitating the solvent penetration to particular skin tissues of grape. The location of targeted compounds with respect to tissue structures seems to be a key issue to optimize their extraction. As a consequence, we subsequently examined the feasibility of a PEF pre-treatment of relatively low humidity grape pomace for the enhancement of bioactive compounds extraction. We demonstrated that a relatively dry pomace (RH ≈ 55 %) can be effectively treated by PEF after optimal densification using a suitable configuration of the PEF cell. The PEF pre-treatment of a densified fermented grape pomace, at moderate electric field strengths, requires less output current and lower specific energy and is also more efficient for the selective recovery of anthocyanins than Hi-PEF pre-treatment of an aqueous suspension of grape pomace. We finally focused on the treatment of rehydrated grape pomace following the diffusion step. The enhancement of pressing of the grape pomace by ohmic heating allowed the recovery of two fractions: a solid fibrous residue partly dehydrated which could be further valorized as an agro-material or in feeding, and an extract, particularly rich in bioactive components.The technical-economic assessment shows that the successive application of electro-technologies (pre-treatment of grape pomace in dry environment by PEF followed by a pressing step assisted by ohmic heating) lead to an improvement of extraction yields of about 30 % compared to the conventional method. This mass improvement offset the increased production costs (+ 2.7 % compared to the conventional process) by reducing the total production costs of the extract (7.3 €/kg vs 9.4 €/kg for the conventional process)

Full-silica metamaterial wave plate for high-intensity UV lasers

International audienceBringing light-matter interactions into novel standards of high-energy physics is a major scientific challenge that motivated the funding of ambitious international programs to build high-power laser facilities. The major issue to overcome is to avoid laser intensity heterogeneities over the target that weaken the light-matter interaction strength. Laser beam smoothing aims at homogenizing laser intensities by superimposing on the target laser speckle intensities produced by orthogonal left and right circularly polarized beams. Conventional wave plates based on anisotropic crystals cannot support the laser fluences of such lasers, and the challenge is now to design wave plates exhibiting a high laser induced damage threshold (LIDT). Fused silica exhibits high LIDT, but its isotropic dielectric permittivity prevents effects on polarization retardance. Metamaterials have been widely investigated to tailor the phase and polarization of light but with plasmonic or high-refractive-index materials, and applying this approach with silica is highly challenging due to the weak optical contrast between silica and air or vacuum. Here we design and fabricate a silica-based metasurface acting almost like a quarter-wave plate in the UV spectral range, fulfilling the numerous constraints inherent to highpower laser beamlines, in particular, high LIDT and large sizes. We numerically and experimentally demonstrate that fused silica etched by deep grooves with a period shorter than the wavelength at 351 nm operates the linear-to-quasi circular polarization conversion together with a high transmission efficiency and a high LIDT. The high aspect ratio of the grooves due to the short period imposed by the short wavelength and the deepness of the grooves required to overcome the weak optical contrast between silica and air is experimentally obtained through a CMOS compatible process

Unsupervised anomaly detection in 3D brain FDG PET: A benchmark of 17 VAE-based approaches

International audienceThe use of deep generative models for unsupervised anomaly detection is an area of research that has gained interest in recent years in the field of medical imaging. Among all the existing models, the variational autoencoder (VAE) has proven to be efficient while remaining simple to use. Much research to improve the original method has been achieved in the computer vision literature, but rarely translated to medical imaging applications. To fill this gap, we propose a benchmark of fifteen variants of VAE that we compare with a vanilla autoencoder and VAE for a neuroimaging use case relying on a simulation-based evaluation framework. The use case is the detection of anomalies related to Alzheimer's disease and other dementias in 3D FDG PET. We show that among the fifteen VAE variants tested, nine lead to a good reconstruction accuracy and are able to generate healthy-looking images. This indicates that many approaches developed for computer vision applications can generalize to the unsupervised detection of anomalies of various shapes, intensities and locations in 3D FDG PET. However, these models do not outperform the vanilla autoencoder and VAE

Extraction and purification of high added value compounds from by-products of the winemaking chain using alternative/nonconventional processes/technologies

Grape byproducts are today considered as a cheap source of valuable compounds since existent technologies allow the recovery of target compounds and their recycling. The goal of the current article is to explore the different recovery stages used by both conventional and alternative techniques and processes. Alternative pre-treatments techniques reviewed are: ultrasounds, pulsed electric fields and high voltage discharges. In addition, nonconventional solvent extraction under high pressure, specifically, supercritical fluid extraction and subcritical water extraction are discussed. Finally alternative purification technologies, for example membrane processing were also examined. The intent is to describe the mechanisms involved by these alternative technologies and to summarize the work done on the improvement of the extraction process of phenolic compounds from winery by-products. With a focus on the developmental stage of each technology, highlighting the research need and challenges to be overcome for an industrial implementation of these unitary operations in the overall extraction process. A critical comparison of conventional and alternative techniques will be reviewed for ethe pre-treatment of raw material, the diffusion of polyphenols and the purification of these high added value compounds. This review intends to give the reader some key answers (costs, advantages, drawbacks) to help in the choice of alternative technologies for extraction purposes