Risk assessment for subjective evidence-based ethnography applied in high risk environment: improved protocol

Subjective Evidence-Based Ethnography (SEBE) is a family of methods developed for investigation in social science based on subjective audio-video recordings with a miniature video-camera usually worn at eye-level (eye-tracking techniques are included). Facing a lack of tools for SEBE risk assessment when applied to high risk professional environments (e.g. anesthetists, aircraft pilots, nuclear reactor pilots), a protocol (version 1.1) was successfully developed and tested in nuclear industry with N1=59 participants and presented in a previous article. However, further cases were needed to demonstrate the robustness of the risk assessment protocol in other contexts. Further applications were thus undertaken with N2=75 participants from Air Force army, Police, Medicine and Nuclear industry during work activities lasting from 10 minutes to several hours. SEBE equipment was worn and the original risk assessment protocol was applied and/or discussed between participants and researchers for improvement. The protocol was enriched (version 2.3): 37% items were added. This illustrated the context sensitiveness of this sort of risk assessment. Limits of this new series of tests are discussed

Grafted Human Embryonic Progenitors Expressing Neurogenin-2 Stimulate Axonal Sprouting and Improve Motor Recovery after Severe Spinal Cord Injury

7 p.Background: Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a widely spread pathology with currently no effective treatment for any symptom. Regenerative medicine through cell transplantation is a very attractive strategy and may be used in different non-exclusive ways to promote functional recovery. We investigated functional and structural outcomes after grafting human embryonic neural progenitors (hENPs) in spinal cord-lesioned rats.Methods and Principal Findings: With the objective of translation to clinics we have chosen a paradigm of delayed grafting, i.e., one week after lesion, in a severe model of spinal cord compression in adult rats. hENPs were either naive or engineered to express Neurogenin 2 (Ngn2). Moreover, we have compared integrating and non-integrating lentiviral vectors, since the latter present reduced risks of insertional mutagenesis. We show that transplantation of hENPs transduced to express Ngn2 fully restore weight support and improve functional motor recovery after severe spinal cord compression at thoracic level. This was correlated with partial restoration of serotonin innervations at lumbar level, and translocation of 5HT1A receptors to the plasma membrane of motoneurons. Since hENPs were not detectable 4 weeks after grafting, transitory expression of Ngn2 appears sufficient to achieve motor recovery and to permit axonal regeneration. Importantly, we also demonstrate that transplantation of naive hENPs is detrimental to functional recovery.Conclusions and Significance: Transplantation and short-term survival of Ngn2-expressing hENPs restore weight support after SCI and partially restore serotonin fibers density and 5HT1A receptor pattern caudal to the lesion. Moreover, grafting of naive-hENPs was found to worsen the outcome versus injured only animals, thus pointing to the possible detrimental effect of stem cell-based therapy per se in SCI. This is of major importance given the increasing number of clinical trials involving cell grafting developed for SCI patients.This study was supported by the European Union FP6 "RESCUE" STREP; the "Institut pour la Recherche sur la Moelle Epiniere"; the "Academie de Medecine"; the "Societe Francaise de Neurochirurgie"; "Verticale" and the "Association Demain Debout Aquitaine". The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript

New Oligocene–early Miocene microflora from the southwestern Turkana Basin Palaeoenvironmental implications in the northern Kenya Rift

We report five Oligocene–early Miocene pollen assemblages from the Loperot-1 exploration well drilled in the semi-desert Lokichar Basin (latitude 02° 21′ 46.15″ N, longitude 35° 52′ 23.47″ E, ground elevation 615 m above MSL), near Lake Turkana in northern Kenya. They represent the second oldest plant microfossils so far recovered from East Africa and add significantly to the Paleogene–Neogene tropical African fossil plant record. The Loperot pollen indicate a mosaic environment of semi-deciduous forest and humid woodland whose floristic composition presents strong affinities with the vegetation occurring today in the Guinea-Congolia/Zambezia phytogeographical transition zone, with a rainfall more than 1000 mm/year and a well defined dry season. The weak representation of Poaceae and herbaceous taxa characteristic of grassland, dry bushland or savanna and the abundance of shade tolerant plants such as ferns all point to a vegetation composed to a variety of communities with closed forest formations predominant. The lack of typical temperate mountains elements, mainly Podocarpus and Juniperus today widespread on the East African highlands, indicates that the geography of the region was different from that of today. The plateaux or uplands adjacent to the Lokichar basin were probably still not high enough during this period of early rifting in East Africa to support the temperate coniferous forests characteristic of the Plio-Pleistocene

Pollen analyses off Senegal: Evolution of the coastal palaeoenvironment during the last deglaciation

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Modern pollen-based biome reconstructions in East Africa expanded to southern Tanzania

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Abrupt resumption of the African Monsoon at the Younger Dryas-Holocene climatic transition

International audienceA high-resolution sedimentary record from Lake Masoko (Tanzania), based on pollen assemblages and magnetic susceptibility, shows that the most prominent environmental change of the last 45 000 years occurred ca 11.7 cal. ka BP, near the end of the Younger Dryas event. During this climatic transition, the Masoko catchment vegetation changed from being intolerant to a long/severe dry season to being tolerant, while the inferred lake-dynamics indicates strengthened seasonal fluctuations and/or lower levels than before. Comparison of the Masoko record with other regional palaeoclimatic data shows that evidence of this climatic transition is widespread in tropical Africa. The proposed failure of the African Monsoon during the Younger Dryas, associated with a southward position/migration of the meteorological equator in East Africa, was followed by an abrupt and lasting resumption of monsoon activity, and more pronounced migration of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) over the African continent. Such a reorganisation of the atmospheric circulation, equally observed across the whole tropical region (South America, East and West Asia, and Africa), could have been a strong amplifier of northern high latitude changes in temperature and precipitation across this major climatic transition. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Forest-savannah dynamics on the Adamawa plateau (Central Cameroon) during the “African humid period” termination: A new high-resolution pollen record from Lake Tizong

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Altitudinal distribution of pollen, plants and biomes in the Cameroon highlands

Pollen–plant–biome relationships have been studied from 48 new soil surface samples taken along an altitudinal gradient in the Cameroon highlands in order to capture the major features of the tropical montane vegetation. Although our study is based on a relatively feeble number of samples due to difficulties to access natural landscapes in this area, the main vegetation belts are accurately reconstructed. Comparison between pollen and plant distribution has been used to identify taxa characteristic of the mountain forest and to identify eventual bias due to pollen productivity and transport. Taking that into account, we have shown that there is a potential for reliable biome reconstruction of the Afromontane forest the upper and lower limits of which are correctly reconstructed. Our study fills the gap in reconstructing African biomes from pollen data, thus providing elements to capture the vulnerability of Afromontane ecosystems to climate changes