Les grandes tendances de l’européanisation des systèmes pénaux nationaux

Cette étude a pour objet de décrire, en ce qui concerne le droit pénal matériel et formel, un phénomène original : celui d’un rapprochement entre des droits nationaux d’un continent et comme ce continent est l’Europe, on peut parler d’une européanisation des droits pénaux nationaux.Le thème est complexe pour plusieurs raisons. D’abord car ce phénomène d’européanisation affecte une criminalité transfrontalière organisée que l’on  saisit mal. La complexité vient ensuite de ce qu’il y a deux Europes, celle du Conseil de l’Europe (47 États) et celle de l’Union européenne (27 des 47). Or ces deux Europes sont productrices de normes considérables de nature textuelle pour les unes (conventions, décisions-cadres…) et jurisprudentielles pour les autres (arrêts de la Cour européenne des droits de l’homme et de la Cour de justice des Communautés européennes).Complexe, le thème est aussi dual. L’européanisation est faite en effet d’harmonisation et de coopération, la première étant la condition de la seconde. Au titre de l’harmonisation, il faut citer les nombreux textes évoqués ci-dessus qui, par leur transposition dans les droits nationaux, provoquent un rapprochement de ceux-ci. Au titre de la coopération, on doit évoquer au moins ces deux institutions phares de l’Union européenne que sont Europol et Eurojust. Ce dernier invite les États à mener des enquêtes pour des affaires lourdes et pourrait peut-être un jour, sur la base du Traité de Lisbonne (non encore en vigueur), déclencher certaines poursuites.The purpose of this study consists in illuminating an original phenomenon with regard to material and formal penal law, namely the narrowing gap between national legal systems on one continent… and since the continent in question is Europe, we may refer to this as the Europeanization of such national penal legal systems.This theme is an intricate one for many reasons. First, because the Europeanization phenomenon has an impact on organized cross-border criminality that eludes easy analysis. Further intricacy emanates from the existence of two Europes, on the one hand, the Council of Europe (47 Member States) and on the other, the European Union (27 of the 47). Notably, these two Europes are high-volume producers of textual standards (agreements, framework decisions) in the first case and in the second, voluminous jurisprudential rulings handed out by the European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Justice of the European Communities.Beyond intricacy, the theme is also two tiered. Europeanization is in fact the product of harmonization and cooperation, the first tier being a condition for the second one. Harmonization issues from the many aforementioned texts which, when transposed into national legal systems, ultimately draw the latter together. As for cooperation, two outstanding European Union examples are worthy of mention : Europol and Eurojust. The latter invites Member States to join together for enquiries into major cases and this may one day — based upon the Treaty of Lisbon (presently not in force) — result in the taking of criminal proceedings

M-lines characterization of selenide and telluride waveguides for mid-infrared interferometry

Nulling interferometry is an astronomical technique that combines equal wavefronts to achieve a deep rejection ratio of an on-axis star, and that could permit to detect Earth-like planets in the mid-infrared band 5 -- 20 microns. Similarly to what is done in the near-infrared, high frequencies spatial filtering of the incoming beams can be achieved using single-mode waveguides operating in the mid-infrared. An appreciable reduction of the instrumental complexity is also possible using integrated optics (IO) devices in this spectral range. The relative lack of single-mode guided optics in the mid-infrared has motivated the present technological study to demonstrate the feasibility of dielectric waveguides functioning at longer wavelengths. We propose to use selenide and telluride components to pursue the development of more complex IO functions.Comment: accepted in OSA Optics Express, 11 pages, 4 figure

¿En qué estado se encuentra actualmente el debate entre el sistema acusatorio y el sistema inquisitorio?: aspectos de derecho comparado

Inquisitorio o acusatorio, notas utilizadas casi mágicamente y de una indudable complejidad dado que atraviesan todo el procedimiento penal y porque son difíciles de definir. En el sistema acusatorio, el más antiguo, las partes inician la acusación (víctima, aún Ministerio Público) y reúnen contradictoriamente las pruebas de la audiencia ante un juez neutral que estatuye de acuerdo con un sistema preestablecido de pruebas legales. En el sistema inquisitorio, contrariamente, el juez está en primer plano: se hace cargo, busca las pruebas (figura del juez de instrucción) y juzga con íntima convicción. Subsidiariamente, podemos agregar que la fase de búsqueda de la prueba es pública en el sistema acusatorio (audiencia) y secreta en el sistema inquisitorio (instrucción antes de la audiencia). Inquisitorio y acusatorio constituyen un tema apasionante hasta explosivo. En un número de la revista Pouvoirs (1990), J.L. Sauron, juez de instrucción, escribió un artículo "Vertus de l’inquisitoire" (Virtudes del Inquisitorio) y el Doctor Soulez-Larivière, abogado, le responde por una "Nécessité de l’accusatoire" (Necesidad del acusatorio). Hay en todo esto un gran trasfondo político: la acusación es el niño mimado de los liberales, mientras que el inquisitorio es el sistema preferido de los defensores del autoritarismo. Es lo que habían sentido a fines del siglo XIX los penalistas franceses cuyos esfuerzos convergen en la fe del 8 de diciembre de 1897 que introduce al abogado en la instrucción: el debate había durado 27 años y ocupado cuatro períodos legislativos. Inquisitorio y acusatorio son una cuestión evolutiva. Actualmente, con el intercambio de ideas, los dos sistemas se acercan sensiblemente. Pero ¿cómo y por qué?Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Sociale

Tendencias actuales del procedimiento penal francés

La importancia del procedimiento penal no se debe demostrar. A cualquier persona que deseara visitar una isla desconocida y que quisiera conocer las instituciones de los habitantes del lugar, tendríamos que recomendarle la lectura de dos monumentos jurídicos, la Constitución y … el Código de procedimiento penal. Dicho esto, señalaremos que el procedimiento penal es importante, pero debemos decir, también, que está en constante cambio, especialmente en Francia. Las razones son múltiples: • Desarrollo de la criminalidad juvenil en los barrios, especialmente (robos y violencias ligadas a la droga…); • Fortalecimiento del derecho europeo, derecho que se impone a los Estados que componen Europa; • Frecuentes y rápidos cambios políticos. El procedimiento penal está ligado a ciertas opciones políticas. Estudiemos las tendencias actuales tomando como ejemplo los cinco o seis últimos años y teniendo en cuenta dos aspectos: la organización judicial y el desarrollo del proceso.Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Sociale

Estimation of lifetime reproductive success when reproductive status cannot always be assessed

International audienceThe Lifetime Reproductive Success (LRS) of an individual i.e. the number of young raised during its lifespan is an indicator of its contribution t o future generations and thus a measure of fitness. Nevertheless, the LRS is hard to estimate because of the difficulty to keep track of the outcome of each breed- ing attempt (successful or failed and, if successful, number of young raised). We propose two new methods to estimating the LRS that takes into account the uncertainty about the reproductive status when the individuals are not de- tected or when the reproductive status cannot be assessed. We illustrate these two methods using roe deer reproductive histories and discuss their advantages and disadvantages

LCA-assisted conception of a digestate recovery by micro-algae production

The digestate produced by anaerobic digestion process is a source of nutrients (N, P, K) and organic matter (C content), generally used as spreading in culture to ideally substitute for the use of mineral fertilizers. This type of digestate recovery presents some weaknesses as for example the poor effective substitution due to the relative low content of bio-available nutrients. Thenceforth, a higher benefit for the recovery of digestate could be thought to increase the effective use of nutrients. Instead of direct spreading, a higher quantity of the digestate and the CO2 contained in the biogas could be used in a micro-algae culture. To this end, the BIOMSA system is based on the coupling of anaerobic digestion and micro-algae culture (Figure 1). To assist the eco-design of BIOMSA, the life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology is used. The first system (A) was studied to identify the environmental hotspots according to the functional unit, defined as the anaerobic digestion of 25 000 tones/year of agricultural residues and the production of micro-algae from digestate, in order to highlight the performances of the whole system. The data collection and the inventory building are based on experts’ knowledge and experiments. As the first results show that the digestate spreading is the most impacting step, one of the eco-design options is to send more nutrients and CO2 in micro-algae culture to maximize the recovery through the micro-algae and not through direct spreading of digestate (liquid and solid phases). The system B is based on these modifications (Figure 1). So both systems (A and B) provide different functions and especially different quantities of micro-algae produced. In order, to allow a comparison between both systems, we studied several allocation rules based on the economic value of the outputs, their LHV (Low Heating Value) or based on their compositions in C, N, P. The novelty of our approach is the management of nutrients from digestate and C from biogas to increase the micro-algae production and to improve the effectiveness of the nutrients recovery through a biogas plant. The discussion of results focuses on the difficulty of overcoming the comparability, thanks to LCA, of both systems. The allocation rules used are difficult to perform because biogas, digestate and micro-algae are very different types of products with different C contents, nutrients contents, ICP and economic values. The combination of allocation rules could be a solution. Please click Additional Files below to see the full abstract

High catalytic efficiency of palladium nanoparticles immobilized in a polymer membrane containing poly(ionic liquid) in Suzuki–Miyaura cross-coupling reaction

The elaboration of a polymeric catalytic membrane containing palladium nanoparticles is presented. The membrane was prepared using a photo-grafting process with imidazolium-based ionic liquid monomers as modifying agent and microPES® as support membrane. Ionic liquid serves as a stabilizer and immobilizer for the catalytic species, i.e. palladium nanoparticles. The Suzuki–Miyaura cross-coupling reaction was carried out on the catalytic membrane in flow-through configuration. Complete conversion was achieved in 10 s through one single filtration, without formation of byproducts. The apparent reaction rate constant was three orders of magnitude greater than in a batch reactor. No catalyst leaching was detected. This membrane offers the possibility of continuous production with no need for a separation step of the catalyst from the reaction medium

Looking for a needle in a haystack: inference about individual fitness components in a heterogeneous population

Studies of wild vertebrates have provided evidence of substantial differences in lifetime reproduction among individuals and the sequences of life history ‘states’ during life (breeding, nonbreeding, etc.). Such differences may reflect ‘fixed’ differences in fitness components among individuals determined before, or at the onset of reproductive life. Many retrospective life history studies have translated this idea by assuming a ‘latent’ unobserved heterogeneity resulting in a fixed hierarchy among individuals in fitness components. Alternatively, fixed differences among individuals are not necessarily needed to account for observed levels of individual heterogeneity in life histories. Individuals with identical fitness traits may stochastically experience different outcomes for breeding and survival through life that lead to a diversity of ‘state’ sequences with some individuals living longer and being more productive than others, by chance alone. The question is whether individuals differ in their underlying fitness components in ways that cannot be explained by observable ‘states’ such as age, previous breeding success, etc. Here, we compare statistical models that represent these opposing hypotheses, and mixtures of them, using data from kittiwakes. We constructed models that accounted for observed covariates, individual random effects (unobserved heterogeneity), first-order Markovian transitions between observed states, or combinations of these features. We show that individual sequences of states are better accounted for by models incorporating unobserved heterogeneity than by models including first-order Markov processes alone, or a combination of both. If we had not considered individual heterogeneity, models including Markovian transitions would have been the best performing ones. We also show that inference about age-related changes in fitness components is sensitive to incorporation of underlying individual heterogeneity in models. Our approach provides insight into the sources of individual heterogeneity in life histories, and can be applied to other data sets to examine the ubiquity of our results across the tree of life