Towards an Updatable Strategy Logic

This article is about temporal multi-agent logics. Several of these formalisms have been already presented (ATL-ATL*, ATLsc, SL). They enable to express the capacities of agents in a system to ensure the satisfaction of temporal properties. Particularly, SL and ATLsc enable several agents to interact in a context mixing the different strategies they play in a semantical game. We generalize this possibility by proposing a new formalism, Updating Strategy Logic (USL). In USL, an agent can also refine its own strategy. The gain in expressive power rises the notion of "sustainable capacities" for agents. USL is built from SL. It mainly brings to SL the two following modifications: semantically, the successor of a given state is not uniquely determined by the data of one choice from each agent. Syntactically, we introduce in the language an operator, called an "unbinder", which explicitely deletes the binding of a strategy to an agent. We show that USL is strictly more expressive than SL.Comment: In Proceedings SR 2013, arXiv:1303.007

Impact of Calcium Phosphate Particle Morphology on Osteoconduction: an in vivo study

Apatite/β−TCP particles exhibiting non-conventional urchin-like morphology were prepared by hydrothermal synthesis. Their implantation in the rat calvarium was followed during 60 days. A total absence of osteoconduction was observed despite a favorable chemical composition, stressing the fundamental role of particle morphology on bone regeneration. Results are discussed in relation with other literature data. Possible explanations include the disfavored accumulation of biological mediators due to the acicular shape of the particles and/or a limited accessibility for cells

Sur l’assignation de buts comportementaux à des coalitions d’agents

International audienceDans cet article, nous présentons un cadre de modélisation formelle pour l'ingénierie du besoin qui prenne simultanément en compte les buts comportementaux et les agents. Pour ce faire, nous introduisons un langage noyau, appelé KHI, ainsi que sa sémantique dans une logique de straté-gies appelée USL. Dans KHI, les agents sont décrits par leurs capacités et les buts sont définis par des formules de logique temporelle linéaire. Une « assignation » associe alors chacun des buts à un ensemble (une coalition) d'agents, qui sont responsables de sa satisfaction. Nous présentons et dis-cutons ensuite différents critères de correction pour cette relation d'assignation. Ceux-ci permettent d'évaluer la « pertinence » d'une assignation de buts à des coalitions. Ils différent selon les interactions qu'ils permettent entre les coalitions d'agents. Nous proposons alors une procédure décidable de vérification pour la satisfaction des critères de correction pour l'assignation. Elle consiste à réduire la satisfaction des critères à des instances du problème de model-checking pour des formules d'USL dans une structure dérivée des capacités des agents. 1 Contexte Si, en toute rigueur, la discipline de la modélisation du besoin ne se restreint pas à elles seules [17, 14], les approches dites par buts [18] ou par agents [2, 9] ont le vent en poupe dans la communauté idoine (cf. les citations précédentes mais aussi [12, 15]). En KAOS [18], la question première est de déterminer les besoins dont il faut tenir compte pour rendre compte d'un système au sein d'un environnement, le tout formant un système global à mettre au point. Celui-ci doit répondre à des buts et est constitué d'agents (entités actives). Un but est défini comme un énoncé prescriptif sous la responsabilité d'agents du système global. Les buts peuvent être de toutes sortes (on retrouve les traditionnelles taxonomies autour des buts non-fonctionnels [11]). Mais on distingue en particulier les buts comportementaux qui caractérisent des traces et peuvent donc faire l'objet d'une formalisation dans une logique temporelle telle que LTL. Bien que partageant superficiellement de nombreuses notions avec KAOS, TROPOS se concentre avant tout sur la notion d'acteur, défini comme un agent intentionnel. Un tel agent est muni de buts qu'il sou-haite voir remplis mais dont la satisfaction, partielle comme complète, n'est pas nécessairement de sa responsabilité. Celle-ci peut être déléguée à d'autres acteurs. TROPOS [2] pousse ainsi à l'explicitation des liens de dépendance et de collaboration entre acteurs. Ceci s'explique en particulier par le fait que les systèmes visés par la méthode sont susceptibles de comprendre des acteurs « humains » ou institu-tionnels. TROPOS a aussi fait l'objet d'une proposition formelle visant à étudier dans quelle mesure des acteurs peuvent contribuer à satisfaire des buts pour d'autres acteurs. L'approche en question [9, 10] introduit à cette fin les notions, dites « sociales », de rôle, d'engagement (commitment) et de protocole. Le rôle représente le comportement attendu des acteurs. Une assignation de rôles à des acteurs est alors évaluée au moyen d'un critère de correction. Celui-ci revient essentiellement à vérifier que les capacités d'un acteur entraînent les conséquents des engagements où le rôle assigné apparaît comme débiteur

Is the formula of Traub still up to date in antemortem blood glucose level estimation?

According to the hypothesis of Traub, also known as the ‘formula of Traub', postmortem values of glucose and lactate found in the cerebrospinal fluid or vitreous humor are considered indicators of antemortem blood glucose levels. However, because the lactate concentration increases in the vitreous and cerebrospinal fluid after death, some authors postulated that using the sum value to estimate antemortem blood glucose levels could lead to an overestimation of the cases of glucose metabolic disorders with fatal outcomes, such as diabetic ketoacidosis. The aim of our study, performed on 470 consecutive forensic cases, was to ascertain the advantages of the sum value to estimate antemortem blood glucose concentrations and, consequently, to rule out fatal diabetic ketoacidosis as the cause of death. Other biochemical parameters, such as blood 3-beta-hydroxybutyrate, acetoacetate, acetone, glycated haemoglobin and urine glucose levels, were also determined. In addition, postmortem native CT scan, autopsy, histology, neuropathology and toxicology were performed to confirm diabetic ketoacidosis as the cause of death. According to our results, the sum value does not add any further information for the estimation of antemortem blood glucose concentration. The vitreous glucose concentration appears to be the most reliable marker to estimate antemortem hyperglycaemia and, along with the determination of other biochemical markers (such as blood acetone and 3-beta-hydroxybutyrate, urine glucose and glycated haemoglobin), to confirm diabetic ketoacidosis as the cause of deat

Modelling Memory: do crop models need to become nostalgic?

International audienceIncreased frequency of stress events such as heat waves has been observed for the last decades. Based on the last IPCC report, they are expected to be more frequent, to last longer and to increase in intensity during the reproductive phase of economically important crops. Many recent studies pointed out induced memory effects of stressing events when plants are challenged several times with similar stresses throughout the crop season. These memory effects were shown to be potentially beneficial since the plants are 'primed' and thus more prepared to develop an earlier, more rapid, intense and/or sensitive response when the stress recurs [1]. Therefore, the new climatic patterns prompts to take into account stress memory into predictive crop modelling approaches so as to estimate the effects of repeated stresses and their consequences on crop yield, quality of harvested products. During the last decades, the use of crop models have been enlarged to climate change driven predictions [2]. While evidence for improving crop climate models and especially the temperature response functions in order to reduce uncertainty in yield simulations before any decision making in agriculture, no modelling studies have attempted to decipher and interpret simulation bias in the light of stress memory nor they focused on methodologies to take into account stress memory effects

Modelling Memory: do crop models need to become nostalgic?

International audienceIncreased frequency of stress events such as heat waves has been observed for the last decades. Based on the last IPCC report, they are expected to be more frequent, to last longer and to increase in intensity during the reproductive phase of economically important crops. Many recent studies pointed out induced memory effects of stressing events when plants are challenged several times with similar stresses throughout the crop season. These memory effects were shown to be potentially beneficial since the plants are 'primed' and thus more prepared to develop an earlier, more rapid, intense and/or sensitive response when the stress recurs [1]. Therefore, the new climatic patterns prompts to take into account stress memory into predictive crop modelling approaches so as to estimate the effects of repeated stresses and their consequences on crop yield, quality of harvested products. During the last decades, the use of crop models have been enlarged to climate change driven predictions [2]. While evidence for improving crop climate models and especially the temperature response functions in order to reduce uncertainty in yield simulations before any decision making in agriculture, no modelling studies have attempted to decipher and interpret simulation bias in the light of stress memory nor they focused on methodologies to take into account stress memory effects

Targeted Sub-Attomole Cancer Biomarker Detection Based on Phase Singularity 2D Nanomaterial-Enhanced Plasmonic Biosensor

Detection of small cancer biomarkers with low molecular weight and a low concentration range has always been challenging yet urgent in many clinical applications such as diagnosing early-stage cancer, monitoring treatment and detecting relapse. Here, a highly enhanced plasmonic biosensor that can overcome this challenge is developed using atomically thin two-dimensional phase change nanomaterial. By precisely engineering the configuration with atomically thin materials, the phase singularity has been successfully achieved with a significantly enhanced lateral position shift effect. Based on our knowledge, it is the first experimental demonstration of a lateral position signal change > 340 μm at a sensing interface from all optical techniques. With this enhanced plasmonic effect, the detection limit has been experimentally demonstrated to be 10–15 mol L−1 for TNF-α cancer marker, which has been found in various human diseases including inflammatory diseases and different kinds of cancer. The as-reported novel integration of atomically thin Ge2Sb2Te5 with plasmonic substrate, which results in a phase singularity and thus a giant lateral position shift, enables the detection of cancer markers with low molecular weight at femtomolar level. These results will definitely hold promising potential in biomedical application and clinical diagnostics