Proof-of-concept modular robot platform for cauliflower harvesting

This paper presents a proof-of-concept platform for demonstrating robotic harvesting of summer-varieties of cauliflower, and early tests performed under laboratory conditions. The platform is designed to be modular and has two dexterous robotic arms with variable-stiffness technology. The bi-manual configuration enables the separation of grasping and cutting behaviours into separate robot manipulators. By exploiting the passive compliance of the variable-stiffness arms, the system can operate with both grasping and cutting tool close to the ground. Multiple 3D vision cameras are used to track the cauliflowers in real-time, and to attempt to assess the maturity. Early experiments with the platform in the laboratory highlight the potential and challenges of the platform

Suicide à l'hélium : les erreurs à éviter [Suicide with helium: Mistakes to avoid!]

Introduction. — L’hélium est un gaz rare dont l’utilité se retrouve dans l’industrie et les loisirs en particulier. On note une recrudescence des cas de suicide avec utilisation de l’hélium à des fins autolytiques. Description du cas. — Cas de suicide à l’hélium d’un homme de 84 ans. Lors de la levée de corps il a été trouvé des bonbonnes d’hélium reliées à un sac plastique qu’il porte sur la tête. Durant l’autopsie, le gaz pulmonaire a été prélevé selon le protocole mis en place à Montpellier. Les prélèvements ont par la suite été analysés dans un laboratoire Suisse spécialisé. Discussion. — Les résultats des analyses toxicologiques de dépistage de l’hélium se sont avérés négatifs dans toutes les matrices prélevées. Nous avons donc remis en cause nos méthodes de prélèvement, de conservation et d’envoi. Nous avons réalisé une description du protocole en vigueur selon les dernières recommandations trouvées dans la littérature spécialisée

A robust optimization methodology for preliminary aircraft design

International audienceThis paper focuses on a robust optimization of an aircraft preliminary design under operational constraints. According to engineers know-how, the aircraft preliminary design problem can be modeled as an uncertain optimization problem whose objective (the cost or the fuel consumption) is almost affine, and whose constraints are convex. It is shown that this uncertain optimization problem can be approximated in a conservative manner by an uncertain linear optimization program, which enables the use of the techniques of robust linear programming from Ben-Tal, El Ghaoui, and Nemirovski (2009). This methodology is then applied to two real cases of aircraft design and numerical results are presented

High prevalence of psychiatric disorders in patients with skin-restricted lupus: a case-control study

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Agreement between self-, mother and father proxy-reports on health-related quality of life in adolescents with Tourette Syndrome

International audienceThis study aimed to investigate agreement and discrepancies between parent proxy- and adolescent self-reports on assessments of adolescents’ health-related quality of life (HRQoL), and the role that individual factors may play in parent-adolescent agreement, in a sample of adolescents with Tourette syndrome (TS) compared to a control group of healthy adolescents. Adolescents aged 12–18 years diagnosed with TS were recruited with their parents from primary and secondary referral centres. Adolescent healthy controls were matched for gender and age. Adolescents and each of their parents completed a set of questionnaires including a HRQoL evaluation of adolescent, the ‘Vécu et Santé Perçue de l’Adolescent’. Mother-adolescent, father-adolescent and mother-father agreements on adolescents’ HRQoL scores were investigated at individual and group level, both in TS and control groups. Data were available for 75 adolescents, 75 mothers and 63 fathers, in the TS group. Agreement between mother, father proxy-reports and TS adolescents self-reports of HRQoL varied from poor to good, without significant difference with the control group. In TS group, mothers and fathers underestimated adolescents’ HRQoL in ‘Psychological well-being’ subscale and mothers underestimated it in ‘Physical ‘well-being’ subscale, while controls overestimated adolescents’ HRQoL in these subscales. Larger mother-adolescent discrepancies for ‘Psychological well-being’ and ‘Physical well-being’ subscales were associated with internalizing symptoms. Regarding future studies, comprehensive evaluation of the various dimensions of adolescents’ HRQoL with TS requires the integration of the perspectives of both adolescents, mothers and fathers. Clinicians should take into account this point to provide comprehensive care and services