Book Review: Eating in the Side Room: Food, Archaeology, and African American Identity, by Mark S. Warner

Eating in the Side Room: Food, Archaeology, and African American Identity, by Mark S. Warner, 2015, University Press of Florida, Gainesville, 208 pages, black and white illustrations, references, index, $74.95 (cloth)

Fare-free public transportation effects’ assessment on french economy

This dissertation uses a single event - the implementation of Fare Free Public Transportation (FFPT) in 140 French cities between 1965 and 2018 - to measure thanks to a staggered Difference-in-Differences regression approach, the socioeconomic effects of this policy. The treatment group includes all cities with FFPT. The control group represents all other cities with a public transport network. Our work consisted in the verification of 3 hypotheses: first, free public transport reduces unemployment in the cities concerned. Second, it makes these cities more attractive. The population rate changes are more favourable (said differently, population is growing more or shrinking less) in those places compared to the control group. Finally, this policy would reduce the number of cars per household. Three main lessons can be drawn for this work. First, we found a reduction in unemployment of 0.517% on average when the city has implemented FFPT for more than 5 years for the active population 15-64- years-old and up to -18% unemployment for all municipalities for the 25-54-years-old. This is consistent with our hypothesis. Second, we found no statistically significant effect of FFPT on population growth in city. This frown on our second hypothesis. Finally, our findings indicate a slight but statistically significant impact of FFPT on household’s car ownership (-0.8%). Thus, this confirms the third hypothesis.Esta dissertação utiliza um único evento - a implementação do Transporte Público Sem Tarifas (FFPT) em 140 cidades francesas entre 1965 e 2018 - para medir, graças a uma abordagem de regressão escalonada da Difference-in-Differences, os efeitos socioeconómicos desta política. O grupo de tratamento inclui todas as cidades com FFPT. O grupo de controlo representa todas as outras cidades com uma rede de transportes públicos. O nosso trabalho consistiu na verificação de 3 hipóteses: primeiro, o transporte público gratuito reduz o desemprego nas cidades em questão. Segundo, torna estas cidades mais atractivas. As alterações na taxa de população são mais favoráveis (dito de forma diferente, a população está a crescer mais ou a diminuir menos) nesses locais, em comparação com o grupo de controlo. Finalmente, esta política reduziria o número de carros por agregado familiar. Três lições principais podem ser tiradas para este trabalho. Primeiro, encontramos uma redução do desemprego de 0.517% em média quando a cidade implementou a FFPT durante mais de 5 anos para a população activa de 15-64 anos e até -18% de desemprego para todos os municípios para os 25-54 anos. Isto é consistente com a nossa hipótese. Em segundo lugar, não encontramos qualquer efeito estatisticamente significativo da FFPT no crescimento da população na cidade. Este desaprovamento da nossa segunda hipótese. Finalmente, as nossas conclusões indicam um impacto ligeiro mas estatisticamente significativo da FFPT sobre a propriedade do automóvel do agregado familiar (-0.8%). Assim, isto confirma a terceira hipótese

Stable-Isotope Bone Chemistry and Human/Animal Interactions in Historical Archaeology

Stable isotope–based paleodietary work is ideally suited for answering questions about a wide variety of human/animal relationships in historical archaeological contexts in northeastern North America and farther afield. To date, very few published studies have approached historical animal husbandry and trade from an isotopic perspective. We advocate for increased attention to the possibilities of stable-isotope work by (1) explaining why the technique is well suited to address some problems of human/animal relations encountered by historical archaeologists, (2) presenting a literature review of previous stable-isotope work on human/ animal interaction in historical North America, and (3) offering a short case study on the dietary life history of an individual pig raised at the archaeological site of Ferryland, Newfoundland, Canada, based on stable carbon- and nitrogen-isotope data from serially sectioned dental collagen

Can species richness be maintained in logged endemic Acacia Heterophylla forests (Reunion Island, Indian Ocean) ?

It is assumed that forests can serve multiple uses, including wood production and maintenance of high biodiversity level. We tested this hypothesis by studying eradication methods of invasive plants currently implemented in exploited endemic Acacia heterophylla forests located in a tropical highland forest region on the island of Réunion. We also compared species richness in logged (over time) and natural forests. Our results show that all individuals of the widespread alien invasive plant Rubus alceifolius were generated from cuttings. We quantifi ed the high growth capability of this species by comparing with those of Acacia heterophylla along with Rubus apetalus var. apetalus, a close non-invasive congener. The substantial multiplicative and vegetative growth ability of R. alceifolius enabled it to form monospecific patches in only 2.5 years. The species richness of the exploited Acacia heterophylla forest was thus very affected. Although the species richness increased over time after logging, the extent of the resulting richness was not as great as that in natural forests which, moreover, included numerous exotic plants. The authors assess the impact of highly disturbing logging operations and, based on the results of the comparisons, are very pessimistic about the possibility of maintaining species richness in logged forests. Nevertheless, the results indicate that the situation is not beyond hope and an eradication program specifi cally tailored to this kind of forest is proposed if exploitation will stop

Patient-specific simulation of stent-graft deployment within an abdominal aortic aneurysm

In this study, finite element analysis is used to simulate the surgical deployment procedure of a bifurcated stent-graft on a real patient's arterial geometry. The stent-graft is modeled using realistic constitutive properties for both the stent and most importantly for the graft. The arterial geometry is obtained from pre-operative imaging exam. The obtained results are in good agreement with the post-operative imaging data. As the whole computational time was reduced to less than 2 hours, this study constitutes an essential step towards predictive planning simulations of aneurysmal endovascular surger

Simulation du déploiement d'endoprothèses dans des anévrismes iliaques tortueux

National audienceLe traitement des anévrismes par voie endovasculaire avec pose d'une endoprothèse (EP) est une technique de choix face à la chirurgie ouverte conventionnelle, mais elle reste à fiabiliser. Dans cette étude, une simulation complète par éléments finis de la pose d'EP est proposée afin d'évaluer et comparer les performances mécaniques de cinq dispositifs du marché. Les résultats confirment l'importance de la flexibilité des EPs et offrent une avancée notable dans la simulation de la chirurgie endovasculaire

A Joint Linearization/Companding Approach for Improving a CO-OFDM Transmitter

International audience—The joint use of peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) reduction and linearization via digital predistortion is investigated in this letter, with the view to improve the performances of coherent optical OFDM (CO-OFDM) systems employing a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA). PAPR reduction is performed via Wang's nonlinear companding transform (WNCT), which has been recently pointed out as a pertinent choice for optical communications, and a Filter Lookup Table (FLUT) scheme is considered for linearizing the transmitter. Experimental results prove the effectiveness of the proposed scheme, as a lower EVM is achieved with respect to system implementations using only PAPR reduction or linearization

Étude ethnobotanique des plantes médicinales utilisées dans le traitement du diabète dans le Département de Zouénoula (Côte d’Ivoire)

Objectif : Le but de cette étude est de contribuer à une meilleure connaissance des plantes médicinales antidiabétiques utilisées dans le Département de Zouénoula.Méthodologie et résultats : Des enquêtes ethnobotaniques ont été réalisées à l’aide de questionnaires auprès des guérisseurs du Département. Les résultats obtenus ont permis d’inventorier dix-sept espèces de plantes médicinales appartenant à quatorze familles botaniques et réparties en seize genres. Parmi ces espèces, Ageratum conyzoides (Herbe aux sorciers), Anthocleista djalonensis (Arbre chou) et Bidens pilosa (Piquant noir) sont les plus recommandées. Les feuilles sont les organes les plus utilisés. La décoction est le mode de préparation le plus sollicité et l’administration se fait majoritairement par voie orale.Conclusion et application des résultats: Ce travail constitue une source d’informations pouvant servir de base pour des études pharmacologiques afin d’évaluer l’efficacité thérapeutique et l’innocuité de ces trois plantes à effet antidiabétique traditionnel.Mots- clés : Ethnobotanique, plantes médicinales, diabète, Zouénoul

Patient-specific numerical simulation of stent-graft deployment: Validation on three clinical cases.

International audienceEndovascular repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms faces some adverse outcomes, such as kinks or endoleaks related to incomplete stent apposition, which are difficult to predict and which restrain its use although it is less invasive than open surgery. Finite element simulations could help to predict and anticipate possible complications biomechanically induced, thus enhancing practitioners' stent-graft sizing and surgery planning, and giving indications on patient eligibility to endovascular repair. The purpose of this work is therefore to develop a new numerical methodology to predict stent-graft final deployed shapes after surgery. The simulation process was applied on three clinical cases, using preoperative scans to generate patient-specific vessel models. The marketed devices deployed during the surgery, consisting of a main body and one or more iliac limbs or extensions, were modeled and their deployment inside the corresponding patient aneurysm was simulated. The numerical results were compared to the actual deployed geometry of the stent-grafts after surgery that was extracted from postoperative scans. We observed relevant matching between simulated and actual deployed stent-graft geometries, especially for proximal and distal stents outside the aneurysm sac which are particularly important for practitioners. Stent locations along the vessel centerlines in the three simulations were always within a few millimeters to actual stents locations. This good agreement between numerical results and clinical cases makes finite element simulation very promising for preoperative planning of endovascular repair