Hamas, Jjihâd islamique et autres “fous de dieu”: Le cas “Israël-Palestine”

Existe un consenso creciente que los elementos constitutivos del conflicto palestino-israelí son más complejos comparado con los de la disputa clásica del tipo “Alsacio-Lorringa”. El presente estudio destaca sus aspectos religiosos y esquilíasticos. El pensamiento mágico islámico por un lado, y las obsesiones judías de la “tierra prometida” por otro. Bajo estos aupicios no queda ningún espacio vital para una solución racional del conflicto. Una vía hacia una pacificación definitiva -tanto para los palestinos como los israelitas- podría aparecer en el horizonte cuando los sufrimientos mutuos -que afectan a las dos partes- alcancen un grado a partir del que el compromiso para la supervivencia se convierte en la única opción que queda.There is growing consensus that the constituents of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict be more sophisticated than a classical territory dispute of the “AlsaceLorraine” type. The present study emphasizes on its religious and chiliastic aspects. Islamic magic thinking here, Jewish “promised land” obsessions there. Under such auspices, no vital space for rational conflict management remains. An opening towards definite conflict settlement -for Palestinians and Israelis alike- may appear on the horizon when mutual sufferings -affecting both parties- reached a degree, that compromise for survival become the only still available option

Spectral properties of coupled cavity arrays in one dimension

Spectral properties of coupled cavity arrays in one dimension are investigated by means of the variational cluster approach. Coupled cavity arrays consist of two distinct "particles," namely, photons and atomiclike excitations. Spectral functions are evaluated and discussed for both particle types. In addition, densities of states, momentum distributions and spatial correlation functions are presented. Based on this information, polariton "quasiparticles" are introduced as appropriate, wave vector and filling dependent linear combinations of photon and atomiclike particles. Spectral functions and densities of states are evaluated for the polariton quasiparticles, and the weights of their components are analyzed.Comment: 17 pages, 16 figures, version as publishe

Caudate Nucleus and Insular Activation During a Pain Suppression Paradigm Comparing Thermal and Electrical Stimulation

Pain modulation is an integral function of the nervous system. It is needed to adapt to chronic stimuli. To gain insights into pain suppression mechanisms, two studies concerning the suppression of the feeling of pain with different stimulation modalities (heat vs. electrical stimuli) but using the same stimulation paradigms were compared: 15 subjects each had been stimulated on both hands under the instruction to suppress the feeling of pain

Polaritonic properties of the Jaynes-Cummings lattice model in two dimensions

Light-matter systems allow to realize a strongly correlated phase where photons are present. In these systems strong correlations are achieved by optical nonlinearities, which appear due to the coupling of photons to atomic-like structures. This leads to intriguing effects, such as the quantum phase transition from the Mott to the superfluid phase. Here, we address the two-dimensional Jaynes-Cummings lattice model. We evaluate the boundary of the quantum phase transition and study polaritonic properties. In order to be able to characterize polaritons, we investigate the spectral properties of both photons as well as two-level excitations. Based on this information we introduce polariton quasiparticles as appropriate wavevector, band index, and filling dependent superpositions of photons and two-level excitations. Finally, we analyze the contributions of the individual constituents to the polariton quasiparticles.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, Proceedings of the Conference on Computational Physics CCP, June 2010, Trondheim, Norwa

mer-Bis[2-(1,3-benzothiazol-2-yl)phenyl-κ2 C 1,N][3-phenyl-5-(2-pyridyl)-1,2,4-triazol-1-ido-κ2 N 1,N 5]iridium(III) deuterochloro­form 3.5-solvate

In the title compound, [Ir(C13H9N4)(C13H8NS)2]·3.5CDCl3, the coordination at iridium is octa­hedral, but with narrow ligand bite angles. The bond lengths at iridium show the expected trans influence, with the Ir—N bonds trans to C being appreciably longer than those trans to N. The chelate rings are mutually perpendicular, the inter­planar angles between them all lying within 6° of 90°. All ligands are approximately planar; the maximum inter­planar angles within ligands are ca 10°. The three ordered deuterochloro­form mol­ecules are all involved in C⋯D—A contacts that can be inter­preted as hydrogen bonds of various types. The fourth deuterochloroform is disordered over an inversion centre

On least-order flow representations for aerodynamics and aeroacoustics

We propose a generalization of proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) for optimal flow resolution of linearly related observables. This Galerkin expansion, termed ‘observable inferred decomposition' (OID), addresses a need in aerodynamic and aeroacoustic applications by identifying the modes contributing most to these observables. Thus, OID constitutes a building block for physical understanding, least-biased conditional sampling, state estimation and control design. From a continuum of OID versions, two variants are tailored for purposes of observer and control design, respectively. Firstly, the most probable flow state consistent with the observable is constructed by a ‘least-residual' variant. This version constitutes a simple, easily generalizable reconstruction of the most probable hydrodynamic state to preprocess efficient observer design. Secondly, the ‘least-energetic' variant identifies modes with the largest gain for the observable. This version is a building block for Lyapunov control design. The efficient dimension reduction of OID as compared to POD is demonstrated for several shear flows. In particular, three aerodynamic and aeroacoustic goal functionals are studied: (i)lift and drag fluctuation of a two-dimensional cylinder wake flow; (ii)aeroacoustic density fluctuations measured by a sensor array and emitted from a two-dimensional compressible mixing layer; and (iii)aeroacoustic pressure monitored by a sensor array and emitted from a three-dimensional compressible jet. The most ‘drag-related', ‘lift-related' and ‘loud' structures are distilled and interpreted in terms of known physical processe

Identification of amino acid determinants in CYP4B1 for optimal catalytic processing of 4-ipomeanol.

Mammalian CYP4B1 enzymes are cytochrome P450 mono-oxygenases that are responsible for the bioactivation of several exogenous pro-toxins including 4-ipomeanol (4-IPO). In contrast with the orthologous rabbit enzyme, we show here that native human CYP4B1 with a serine residue at position 427 is unable to bioactivate 4-IPO and does not cause cytotoxicity in HepG2 cells and primary human T-cells that overexpress these enzymes. We also demonstrate that a proline residue in the meander region at position 427 in human CYP4B1 and 422 in rabbit CYP4B1 is important for protein stability and rescues the 4-IPO bioactivation of the human enzyme, but is not essential for the catalytic activity of the rabbit CYP4B1 protein. Systematic substitution of native and p.S427P human CYP4B1 with peptide regions from the highly active rabbit enzyme reveals that 18 amino acids in the wild-type rabbit CYP4B1 protein are key for conferring high 4-IPO metabolizing activity. Introduction of 12 of the 18 amino acids that are also present at corresponding positions in other human CYP4 family members into the p.S427P human CYP4B1 protein results in a mutant human enzyme (P+12) that is as stable and as active as the rabbit wild-type CYP4B1 protein. These 12 mutations cluster in the predicted B-C loop through F-helix regions and reveal new amino acid regions important to P450 enzyme stability. Finally, by minimally re-engineering the human CYP4B1 enzyme for efficient activation of 4-IPO, we have developed a novel human suicide gene system that is a candidate for adoptive cellular therapies in humans

Forest Fragmentation and Selective Logging Have Inconsistent Effects on Multiple Animal-Mediated Ecosystem Processes in a Tropical Forest

Forest fragmentation and selective logging are two main drivers of global environmental change and modify biodiversity and environmental conditions in many tropical forests. The consequences of these changes for the functioning of tropical forest ecosystems have rarely been explored in a comprehensive approach. In a Kenyan rainforest, we studied six animal-mediated ecosystem processes and recorded species richness and community composition of all animal taxa involved in these processes. We used linear models and a formal meta-analysis to test whether forest fragmentation and selective logging affected ecosystem processes and biodiversity and used structural equation models to disentangle direct from biodiversity-related indirect effects of human disturbance on multiple ecosystem processes. Fragmentation increased decomposition and reduced antbird predation, while selective logging consistently increased pollination, seed dispersal and army-ant raiding. Fragmentation modified species richness or community composition of five taxa, whereas selective logging did not affect any component of biodiversity. Changes in the abundance of functionally important species were related to lower predation by antbirds and higher decomposition rates in small forest fragments. The positive effects of selective logging on bee pollination, bird seed dispersal and army-ant raiding were direct, i.e. not related to changes in biodiversity, and were probably due to behavioural changes of these highly mobile animal taxa. We conclude that animal-mediated ecosystem processes respond in distinct ways to different types of human disturbance in Kakamega Forest. Our findings suggest that forest fragmentation affects ecosystem processes indirectly by changes in biodiversity, whereas selective logging influences processes directly by modifying local environmental conditions and resource distributions. The positive to neutral effects of selective logging on ecosystem processes show that the functionality of tropical forests can be maintained in moderately disturbed forest fragments. Conservation concepts for tropical forests should thus include not only remaining pristine forests but also functionally viable forest remnants