Looking for the Terra di u Cumunu. Genesis, Evolutions and Perspectives of the Collective Lands of the Corsican Mountain

The present-day collective lands of Corsica differ in their origin from those of the rest of France. Probably appeared in the Middle Ages, for the few specialists, historians, or ethnologists, who were interested in theevolution of the nature of island land, they would have disappeared in the 19th century. According to the thesis of this article, it is, on the contrary, currently that they are legally recognized. Indeed, the agreements of delimitation of forests between the state and the municipalities, known as the Blondel Transactions of 1852, lead to the legalization of indivision between each inhabitant of a community on wooded areas. From the 20th century on, the crisis of the island agro-pastoral economy saw the disappearance of certain collective lands, appropriated by municipalities and even individuals. At present, a few survivors still bear witness to the ancient community practices of the Corsican mountain. In an exceptional context of land disorder, the return to common practices of the land is perhaps a solution to combat the rural decline of the interior of the island

L’introuvable Terra di u Cumunu ? Genèse, évolutions et perspectives des terres collectives de la montagne corse

Les actuelles terres collectives de Corse se distinguent dans leur origine des sections de communes du reste de la France. Probablement apparues au Moyen-Âge, pour les quelques spécialistes, historiens ou ethnologues, qui se sont intéressés à l’évolution de la nature du foncier insulaire, elles auraient disparu au XIXe siècle. Or selon la thèse de cet article, c’est, au contraire, à cette période qu’elles sont reconnues juridiquement. En effet, les accords de délimitation des forêts entre l’État et les communes, connues sous le nom de Transactions Blondel de 1852, entrainent la légalisation d’indivision entre chaque habitant d’une communauté sur des espaces boisés. À partir du XXe siècle, la crise de l’économie agropastorale insulaire voit disparaître certaines terres collectives, appropriées par les communes, voire des particuliers. Actuellement, quelques rares survivances témoignent encore des anciennes pratiques communautaires de la montagne corse. Dans un contexte exceptionnel de désordre foncier, le retour à des pratiques communes de la terre est peut-être une solution pour lutter contre la déprise rurale de l’intérieur de l’île.The present-day collective lands of Corsica differ in their origin from those of the rest of France. Probably appeared in the Middle Ages, for the few specialists, historians, or ethnologists, who were interested in theevolution of the nature of island land, they would have disappeared in the 19th century. According to the thesis of this article, it is, on the contrary, currently that they are legally recognized. Indeed, the agreements of delimitation of forests between the state and the municipalities, known as the Blondel Transactions of 1852, lead to the legalization of indivision between each inhabitant of a community on wooded areas. From the 20th century on, the crisis of the island agro-pastoral economy saw the disappearance of certain collective lands, appropriated by municipalities and even individuals. At present, a few survivors still bear witness to the ancient community practices of the Corsican mountain. In an exceptional context of land disorder, the return to common practices of the land is perhaps a solution to combat the rural decline of the interior of the island

CParLà ! : Guidage dynamique multicanal. Améliorer les échanges à bord d’un aéronef pour la Recherche et le Sauvetage

Lorsque deux individus ne sont pas côte à côte et que l’un souhaite amener le regard de l’autre vers un point d’intérêt désigné, et que la seule modalité disponible pour communiquer est la modalité audio, alors le guidage peut se révéler compliqué et source d’erreurs. C’est pourquoi nous proposons CParlà !, un système de guidage qui utilise le canal tactile puis le canal visuel ; vibrations pour emmener l’utilisateur dans une direction, puis encadrement visuel du point d’intérêt dès qu’il se trouve dans le champ visuel.When two peoples are not side by side and one wishes to bring the other’s eyesight to a designated point of interest, and when the only available modality to communicate is the audio one, then the guidance can show itself complicated and source of errors. That is why we propose CParlà !, a guidance system which uses, according to the context, the most relevant modality

Brainstem Respiratory Oscillators Develop Independently of Neuronal Migration Defects in the Wnt/PCP Mouse Mutant looptail

The proper development and maturation of neuronal circuits require precise migration of component neurons from their birthplace (germinal zone) to their final positions. Little is known about the effects of aberrant neuronal position on the functioning of organized neuronal groups, especially in mammals. Here, we investigated the formation and properties of brainstem respiratory neurons in looptail (Lp) mutant mice in which facial motor neurons closely apposed to some respiratory neurons fail to migrate due to loss of function of the Wnt/Planar Cell Polarity (PCP) protein Vangl2. Using calcium imaging and immunostaining on embryonic hindbrain preparations, we found that respiratory neurons constituting the embryonic parafacial oscillator (e-pF) settled at the ventral surface of the medulla in Vangl2Lp/+ and Vangl2Lp/Lp embryos despite the failure of tangential migration of its normally adjacent facial motor nucleus. Anatomically, the e-pF neurons were displaced medially in Lp/+ embryos and rostro-medially Lp/Lp embryos. Pharmacological treatments showed that the e-pF oscillator exhibited characteristic network properties in both Lp/+ and Lp/Lp embryos. Furthermore, using hindbrain slices, we found that the other respiratory oscillator, the preBötzinger complex, was also anatomically and functionally established in Lp mutants. Importantly, the displaced e-pF oscillator established functional connections with the preBötC oscillator in Lp/+ mutants. Our data highlight the robustness of the developmental processes that assemble the neuronal networks mediating an essential physiological function

Mesenchymal Transition and PDGFRA Amplification/Mutation Are Key Distinct Oncogenic Events in Pediatric Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Gliomas

Diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) is one of the most frequent malignant pediatric brain tumor and its prognosis is universaly fatal. No significant improvement has been made in last thirty years over the standard treatment with radiotherapy. To address the paucity of understanding of DIPGs, we have carried out integrated molecular profiling of a large series of samples obtained with stereotactic biopsy at diagnosis. While chromosomal imbalances did not distinguish DIPG and supratentorial tumors on CGHarrays, gene expression profiling revealed clear differences between them, with brainstem gliomas resembling midline/thalamic tumours, indicating a closely-related origin. Two distinct subgroups of DIPG were identified. The first subgroup displayed mesenchymal and pro-angiogenic characteristics, with stem cell markers enrichment consistent with the possibility to grow tumor stem cells from these biopsies. The other subgroup displayed oligodendroglial features, and appeared largely driven by PDGFRA, in particular through amplification and/or novel missense mutations in the extracellular domain. Patients in this later group had a significantly worse outcome with an hazard ratio for early deaths, ie before 10 months, 8 fold greater that the ones in the other subgroup (p = 0.041, Cox regression model). The worse outcome of patients with the oligodendroglial type of tumors was confirmed on a series of 55 paraffin-embedded biopsy samples at diagnosis (median OS of 7.73 versus 12.37 months, p = 0.045, log-rank test). Two distinct transcriptional subclasses of DIPG with specific genomic alterations can be defined at diagnosis by oligodendroglial differentiation or mesenchymal transition, respectively. Classifying these tumors by signal transduction pathway activation and by mutation in pathway member genes may be particularily valuable for the development of targeted therapies

SARS-CoV-2 susceptibility and COVID-19 disease severity are associated with genetic variants affecting gene expression in a variety of tissues

Variability in SARS-CoV-2 susceptibility and COVID-19 disease severity between individuals is partly due to genetic factors. Here, we identify 4 genomic loci with suggestive associations for SARS-CoV-2 susceptibility and 19 for COVID-19 disease severity. Four of these 23 loci likely have an ethnicity-specific component. Genome-wide association study (GWAS) signals in 11 loci colocalize with expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) associated with the expression of 20 genes in 62 tissues/cell types (range: 1:43 tissues/gene), including lung, brain, heart, muscle, and skin as well as the digestive system and immune system. We perform genetic fine mapping to compute 99% credible SNP sets, which identify 10 GWAS loci that have eight or fewer SNPs in the credible set, including three loci with one single likely causal SNP. Our study suggests that the diverse symptoms and disease severity of COVID-19 observed between individuals is associated with variants across the genome, affecting gene expression levels in a wide variety of tissue types

A Solve-RD ClinVar-based reanalysis of 1522 index cases from ERN-ITHACA reveals common pitfalls and misinterpretations in exome sequencing

Purpose Within the Solve-RD project (https://solve-rd.eu/), the European Reference Network for Intellectual disability, TeleHealth, Autism and Congenital Anomalies aimed to investigate whether a reanalysis of exomes from unsolved cases based on ClinVar annotations could establish additional diagnoses. We present the results of the “ClinVar low-hanging fruit” reanalysis, reasons for the failure of previous analyses, and lessons learned. Methods Data from the first 3576 exomes (1522 probands and 2054 relatives) collected from European Reference Network for Intellectual disability, TeleHealth, Autism and Congenital Anomalies was reanalyzed by the Solve-RD consortium by evaluating for the presence of single-nucleotide variant, and small insertions and deletions already reported as (likely) pathogenic in ClinVar. Variants were filtered according to frequency, genotype, and mode of inheritance and reinterpreted. Results We identified causal variants in 59 cases (3.9%), 50 of them also raised by other approaches and 9 leading to new diagnoses, highlighting interpretation challenges: variants in genes not known to be involved in human disease at the time of the first analysis, misleading genotypes, or variants undetected by local pipelines (variants in off-target regions, low quality filters, low allelic balance, or high frequency). Conclusion The “ClinVar low-hanging fruit” analysis represents an effective, fast, and easy approach to recover causal variants from exome sequencing data, herewith contributing to the reduction of the diagnostic deadlock

A first update on mapping the human genetic architecture of COVID-19

peer reviewe

Mobility Strategies based on Virtual Forces for Swarms of Autonomous UAVs in Constrained Environments

International audienceThe usage of autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) has recently become a major question. Forwide area surveillance missions, a swarm of UAVs can be much more efficient than a single vehicle. In thiscase, several aircrafts cooperate in order to fulfill a mission while avoiding collisions between each otherand with obstacles. This article proposes original distributed mobility strategies for autonomous swarms ofUAVs, the goal of which is to fulfill a surveillance mission. Our work is based on virtual forces and ourapproach allows narrow areas crossing that require a compact formation of the autonomous swarm