Une nouvelle Constitution tunisienne dans un contexte de crise

Dans un contexte de crise politique, économique et sociale sans précédent, une nouvelle Constitution a été adoptée en Tunisie le 25 juillet 2022, suite à un référendum constitutionnel qui s’est déroulé dans une atmosphère tendue et avec un faible taux de participation (estimé à un peu plus de 30 % des électeurs inscrits). Ce référendum a été organisé un an jour pour jour après le coup de force du Président de la République, lequel avait annoncé dans une allocution télévisée, au soir du 25 jui..

De Nouvelles mesures sociales applicables aux agents publics tunisiens

En Tunisie, deux mesures sociales importantes, applicables aux agents publics du pays, ont été adoptées au premier semestre 2022. Elles concernent d’une part, l’organisation du régime du télétravail dans le secteur public (I) et, d’autre part, la mise à la retraite anticipée (II). I - Organisation du régime du télétravail dans le secteur public Le décret présidentiel n°2022-310 du 5 avril 2022 a permis d’organiser, pour la première fois en Tunisie, le recours au télétravail dans le secteur pu..

Change of Diet, Plasma Lipids, Lipoproteins, and Fatty Acids during Ramadan: A Controversial Association of the Considered Ramadan Model with Atherosclerosis Risk

Different Islamic populations have different alimentary habits, notably during Ramadan. The paper reports the change of diet, lipids, and lipoproteins produced during Ramadan in one Tunisian population. During Ramadan, the study subjects consumed more proteins, cholesterol, vitamin E (p<0.01), and polyunsaturated fatty acids (p<0.05). At the same time, they exhibited an increase in total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (p<0.01) and apoprotein B (p<0.05) and a decrease in the ratio of apoprotein AI to apoprotein B (p<0.01). All assayed saturated fatty acids were unaffected by Ramadan fasting while three unsaturated fatty acids (C18:1cis9, C18:2n-6, and C30:4n-6) increased significantly. A return to the habitual diet for a four-week period was not sufficient to restore the pre-fasting patterns. For the study subjects, Ramadan was clearly associated with a change of diet and biochemical profile but its effective impact on atherosclerosis risk was unclear, perhaps, because other non-alimentary changes ought to be considered too. Future studies considering the non-alimentary factors, such as sleep and physical activity, would be useful to clarify the contribution of dietary change in the observed modification of biological profile

Change of Diet, Plasma Lipids, Lipoproteins, and Fatty Acids during Ramadan: A Controversial Association of the Considered Ramadan Model with Atherosclerosis Risk

Different Islamic populations have different alimentary habits, notably during Ramadan. The paper reports the change of diet, lipids, and lipoproteins produced during Ramadan in one Tunisian population. During Ramadan, the study subjects consumed more proteins, cholesterol, vitamin E (p&lt;0.01), and polyunsaturated fatty acids (p&lt;0.05). At the same time, they exhibited an increase in total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (p&lt;0.01) and apoprotein B (p&lt;0.05) and a decrease in the ratio of apoprotein AI to apoprotein B (p&lt;0.01). All assayed saturated fatty acids were unaffected by Ramadan fasting while three unsaturated fatty acids (C18:1cis9, C18:2n-6, and C30:4n-6) increased significantly. A return to the habitual diet for a four-week period was not sufficient to restore the pre-fasting patterns. For the study subjects, Ramadan was clearly associated with a change of diet and biochemical profile but its effective impact on atherosclerosis risk was unclear, perhaps, because other non-alimentary changes ought to be considered too. Future studies considering the non-alimentary factors, such as sleep and physical activity, would be useful to clarify the contribution of dietary change in the observed modification of biological profile

Prevalence of Pseudoexfoliation Syndrome and Pseudoexfoliation Glaucoma in Upper Egypt

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Pseudoexfoliation (PXF) is a recognized risk factor for developing cataract, glaucoma and lens dislocation. PXF is also associated with increased risk of complications during cataract surgery due to poor mydriasis and zonular weakness. The aim of this study is to report the prevalence of pseudoexfoliation among Upper Egyptians attending the ophthalmology clinic of Assiut University Hospital.</p> <p>Methodology</p> <p>A retrospective, chart review study conducted in the period from February 2002 to August 2009. A total of 7738 patients aged 40 years or older attending the general ophthalmic clinics were included in this study. A detailed evaluation including ophthalmic and general history, slit lamp biomicroscopy, intraocular pressure measurement, gonioscopy and dilated eye examination were performed. Patients with pseudoexfoliative material on the anterior lens surface and ⁄ or the pupillary margin in either or both eyes were labeled as having PXF.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Out of the 7738 patients included, three hundred twenty (4.14%) subjects had PXF. Mean age of PXF group was 68.15 years (SD 8.16, range 40-92 years). PXF was bilateral in 82.2% of cases. It was significantly associated with cataract, glaucoma and hearing loss. Of the PXF patients, 65% had cataract, 30.3% had glaucoma and 8.1% had hearing loss.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Pseudoexfoliation appears to be a common disorder in older individuals in Upper Egypt.</p

Investigation of Magnetic Entropy Change in Intermetallic Compounds SmNi_3−<i>x</i>Fe_<i>x</i> Based on Maxwell Relation and Phenomenological Model

In this study, we investigate the crystal structure, magnetic, and magnetocaloric effect properties in the intermetallic compounds SmNi3−xFex using a phenomenological model based on Landau mean-field theory and Maxwell relation (conventional method). SmNi3−xFex compounds were prepared under high pure argon by arc melting. To minimize the amount of other possible impurity phases, the ingots were heat-treated at 1073 K for seven days. X-ray diffraction (XRD) under and without an applied magnetic field was used for the structural study. Rietveld analysis with FullProf computer code was used to analyze X-ray diffraction data. The magnetization against temperature was measured under several applied magnetic fields. After the partial substitutions of nickel atom with iron one, we notice an increase of cell parameters. In addition, Curie temperature value increases significantly with the increase of iron content. According to the Landau model, SmNi3−xFex compounds exhibit a second-order magnetic phase transition. The magnetic entropy change was determined with theoretical and experimental methods. Finally, a comparison between theoretical magnetic entropy change and the experimental show an agreement between the two methods

Magnetic and spectroscopic properties of Ni–Zn–Al ferrite spinel: from the nanoscale to microscale

International audienceThis article presents the annealing effect on the structural, elastic, thermodynamic, optical, magnetic, and electric properties of Ni 0.6 Zn 0.4 Fe 1.5 Al 0.5 O 4 (NZFAO) nanoparticles (NPs). The samples were successfully synthesized by the sol-gel method followed by annealing of the as-synthesized at 600, 800, 900, 1050, and 1200 C. This approach yielded the formation of a highly crystalline structure with crystallite size ranging from 17 nm to 40 nm. X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) techniques, as well as energy disperse spectroscopy (EDS), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) and Raman spectroscopy, were used in order to determine the structural and morphological properties of the prepared samples. Rietveld XRD refinement reveals that Ni-Zn-Al ferrite nanoparticles crystallize in inverse cubic (Fd 3m) spinel structure. Using FTIR spectra, the elastic and thermodynamic properties were estimated. It was observed that the particle size had a pronounced effect on elastic and thermodynamic properties. Magnetic measurements were performed up to 700 K. The prepared ferrite samples present the highest Curie temperature, which decreases with increasing particle size and which is consistent with finite-size scaling. The thickness of the surface shell of about 1 nm was estimated from size-dependent magnetization measurements using the core-shell model. Besides, spin resonance, magnetostriction, temperature coefficient of resistance (TCR), and electrical resistivity properties have been scientifically studied and appear to be different according to their size. The optical properties of synthesized NZFAO nanoparticles were investigated, and the differences caused by the particle sizes are discussed on the basis of the phonon confinement effect. This effect was also inspected by the Raman analysis. Tuning of the physical properties suggests that the Ni-Zn-Al ferrite samples may be promising for multifunctional diverse applications

Effect of spatial resolution of satellite images on estimating the greenness and evapotranspiration of urban green spaces

Urban green spaces (UGS), like most managed land covers, are getting progressively affected by water scarcity and drought. Preserving, restoring and expanding UGS require sustainable management of green and blue water resources to fulfil evapotranspiration (ET) demand for green plant cover. The heterogeneity of UGS with high variation in their microclimates and irrigation practices builds up the complexity of ET estimation. In oversized UGS, areas too large to be measured with in situ ET methods, remote sensing (RS) approaches of ET measurement have the potential to estimate the actual ET. Often in situ approaches are not feasible or too expensive. We studied the effects of spatial resolution using different satellite images, with high-, medium- and coarse-spatial resolutions, on the greenness and ET of UGS using Vegetation Indices (VIs) and VI-based ET, over a 780-ha urban park in Adelaide, Australia. We validated ET with the ground-based ET method of Soil Water Balance. Three sets of imagery from WorldView2, Landsat and MODIS, and three VIs including the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI) and Enhanced Vegetation Index 2 (EVI2), were used to assess long-term changes of VIs and ET calculated from the different imagery acquired for this study (2011–2018). We found high correspondence between ET-MODIS and ET-Landsat (R2 > 0.99 for all VIs). Landsat-VIs captured the seasonal changes of greenness better than MODIS-VIs. We used artificial neural network (ANN) to relate the RS-ET and ground data, and ET-MODIS (EVI2) showed the highest correlation (R2 = 0.95 and MSE =0.01 for validation). We found a strong relationship between RS-ET and in situ measurements, even though it was not explicable by simple regressions; black box models helped us to explore their correlation. The methodology used in this research makes a strong case for the value of remote sensing in estimating and managing ET of green spaces in water-limited cities

Crop water use dynamics over arid and semi-arid croplands in the lower Colorado River Basin

ABSTRACTNumerous studies have evaluated the application of Remote Sensing (RS) techniques for mapping actual evapotranspiration (ETa) using Vegetation-Index-based (VI-based) and surface energy balance methods (SEB). SEB models computationally require a large effort for application. VI-based methods are fast and easy to apply and could therefore potentially be applied at high resolution; however, the accuracy of VI-based methods in comparison to SEB-based models remains unclear. We tested the ETa computed with the modified 2-band Enhanced Vegetation Index (METEVI2) implemented in the Google Earth Engine – for mapping croplands’ water use dynamics in the Lower Colorado River Basin. We compared METEVI2 with the well-established RS-based products of OpenET (Ensemble, eeMETRIC, SSEBop, SIMS, PT_JPL, DisALEXI and geeSEBAL). METEVI2 was then evaluated with measured ETa from four wheat fields (2017–2018). Results indicated that the monthly ETa variations for METEVI2 and OpenET models were comparable, though of varying magnitudes. On average, METEVI2 had the lowest difference rate from the average observed ETa with 17 mm underestimation, while SIMS had the highest difference rate (82 mm). Findings show that METEVI2 is a cost-effective ETa mapping tool in drylands to track crop water use. Future studies should test METEVI2’s applicability to croplands in more humid regions