Icytomine: A User-Friendly Tool for Integrating Workflows on Whole Slide Images

International audienceWe present Icytomine, a user-friendly software platform for processing large images from slide scanners. Icytomine integrates in one unique framework the tools and algorithms that were developed independently on Icy and Cytomine platforms to visualise and process digital pathology images. We illustrate the power of this new platform through the design of a dedicated program that uses convolutional neural network to detect and classify glomeruli in kidney biopsies coming from a multicentric clinical study. We show that by streamlining the analytical capabilities of Icy with the AI tools found in Cytomine, we achieved highly promising results

It's not (all) about efficiency: Powering and organizing technology from a degrowth perspective

Transgressions of ecological boundaries and increasing social inequality question the paradigm of continual economic growth guided by technological efficiency - often cited as the only solution to these crises. This paper develops a critical and diversified viewpoint on technology for degrowth. 'Classical perspectives' of Illich's convivial society, Elull's critique of technique, Mumford's tools and machines, and Schumacher's critique of gigantic technoinfrastructures are explored and combined with Arendt's instrumentality of technologies and Marxist perspectives on ownership. Two questions are posed regarding technology. First, which technologies are 'suitable' for a degrowth context? Previous frameworks by Illich and Schumacher are extended by ecological aspects to assess the suitability of technologies. Second, how should 'suitable' technologies be structured to enable egalitarian utilization? Here, Schumacher's "intermediate technologies" and ownership are central elements. The frameworks and analysis add value for degrowth activists and bridge the gap scientifically between Marxist views and those of degrowth. In conclusion, technologies in degrowth are suitable if they reduce ecological impact, enhance autonomy and conviviality, and are structurally available in an egalitarian way based on open-access regimes. In the discussion further research questions are posed regarding transforming agents and power relations between grassroots and the state. Limitations of the framework include the role of digital technologies for communication, here treated as electric tools, and the focus on industrialized societies

The Impacts of Household Consumption and Options for Change

This introductory article situates the contributions that comprise this special issue within the field of sustainable consumption and production (SCP) studies. After a brief review of the policy history surrounding SCP, we organize our discussion and the subsequent collection of articles into two groups. The first suite of articles views the environmental impacts associated with household consumption from the perspectives of different consumer groups, income levels, and geographic areas. This work confirms and refines several insights that have been developing over the past several years, namely that food and beverages, mobility, housing, and energy-using products are the most critical consumption domains from the standpoint of environmental sustainability and that higher household income leads to greater (but less than proportional) impacts. The second subset of articles analyzes the potential for mitigating these impacts through behavioral changes and innovation strategies. Though the contributions to this special issue describe several noteworthy examples of information- and team-based initiatives to catalyze behavioral changes, the state of knowledge pertaining to this aspect of the consumption problematique is much more inchoate. Research on the formulation and implementation of effective "change management for sustainable consumption" should be treated as an area of priority attention for industrial ecologists