The Mahāvastu and the Vinayapiṭaka of the Mahāsāṃghika-Lokottaravādins

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Review of: Gérard Fussman, Choix d’articles. Réunis par Denis Matringe, Éric Ollivier et Isabelle Szelagowski. (Réimpressions, no. 14) 598 pp. Paris: École française d’Extrême-Orient, 2014.

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Mahākāśyapa, His Lineage, and the Wish for Buddhahood: Reading Anew the Bodhgayā Inscriptions of Mahānāman

This article investigates the religious message of a set of inscriptions from Bodhgayā issued by Sinhalese monks in the 5th and 6th centuries ce. The long inscription of the hierarch Mahānāman, in particular, allows an in-depth understanding of this monk’s self-representation as the heir of a virtuous lineage descending from the Elder Mahākāśyapa, committed to the transmission of the Saṃyukta-Āgama, and related to the ruling dynasty of Laṅkā. Moreover, it provides the rationale behind Mahānāman’s aspiration to Buddhahood, as the donor dedicates to this aim the merits of the erection of a temple on the Bodhimaṇḍa itself, hosting a representation of Śākyamuni’s Awakening. I argue that Mahānāman is part of a milieu sharing common origins, monastic background, and aspirations, a milieu that was later labelled as *Mahāyāna-Sthavira by the Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang

La formation du Mahāvastu et la mise en place des conceptions relatives à la carrière du bodhisattva

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A Tide of Merit: Royal Donors, Tāmraparṇīya Monks, and the Buddha’s Awakening in 5th–6th-century Āndhradeśa

Stressing the importance of 5th–6th-century copper-plate charters connected to the Viṣṇukuṇḍin dynasty for the history of Buddhism in Āndhradeśa, this article demonstrates that, contrary to earlier scholarly assumptions, and despite the paucity of archeological evidence for Buddhist activity at that time, Buddhist lineages still benefitted from lavish donations by ruling families. This study consists of three parts: the first explores the representation of two Viṣṇukuṇḍin rulers as Buddhist kings, and shows how their portraits and their aspirations are permeated by the ideology of the Bodhisattvayāna. The second part examines one of the main recipients of royal donations, the Sthā̆vira/Theriya lineage of the Tāmraparṇīyas, already known from inscriptions issued under the previous Ikṣvāku dynasty. The analysis of these earlier records from Nagarjunakonda in light of little-studied copper plates shows that the Tāmraparṇīyas had a strong institutional presence in Āndhradeśa from the mid-3rd to the late 6th century. The lineage’s connections with Laṅkā and with other Theriya centres along the Bay of Bengal are delineated through a close examination of the terminology used in the inscriptions under scrutiny, in light of co-eval records, and especially of Pāli Vinaya literature and historical narratives. The last part of this article focuses on a poetic allusion to the episode of the Buddha’s victory over Māra included in the opening stanza of a grant issued by king Pr̥thivīśrīmūla. The evidence suggests that this record connects for the first time the water poured by Śākyamuni in his previous lives as a Bodhisattva with a flood that drove away Māra’s army from the seat of Awakening, a motif that grew—like a tide—and spread across Southeast Asia

Addressing the problem of plastic waste: Development of an enzymatic process for PET recycling

Every day, media and NGOs describe the society\u27s disaffection for plastics accused of polluting the planet. All major brand-owners made commitments to solve this problem (e.g. Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Danone, PepsiCo, Suntory, Unilever, L’Oréal, Nike) and announced a future with less plastic waste by 2025. Nevertheless, only 6 years before the announced term, no effective solution is yet available to meet these goals. Indeed, existing technologies like thermo-mechanical recycling leads to loss in mechanical properties of the polymer and even if several chemical recycling processes are under development, they suffer from the disadvantages of using organic solvents, high reaction temperatures and the need of an intensive waste sorting. Consequently, enzymatic recycling appears as a pertinent solution notably because the enzyme selectivity avoids a drastic sorting of waste and enables the recycling of complex plastics (multi-layers construction in some bottles of sparkling water for instance), it is an eco-friendly reaction in water and because of savings in energy consumption due to a low temperature of reaction. Using a computer-aided engineering strategy, we drastically improved the depolymerizing performance of the best identified enzyme candidate. Utilizing site-directed mutagenesis targeted at the active site, combined with three-dimensional fold stabilization, we engineered an enzyme variant, demonstrating an astounding increase in thermostability combined with a high activity. This enzyme is able to depolymerize 90% of PET waste (200g/kg) into monomers, terephthalic acid and ethylene glycol, in less than 10 hours. The downstream processing was developed and optimized leading to the demonstration that this enzymatic technology could enable the use of an industrial plastic waste to produce again PET monomers and ultimately a bottle from this recycled PET. We hope to demonstrate the strong potential of the enzymatic technology jointly developed by CARBIOS and LISBP to provide a breakthrough solution to help solve society’s growing plastic waste problem

Pet recycling: From enzyme and process optimization to an industrial plant

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Les transformations culturelles et la France des valeurs. Quelles évolutions ?

International audienceCette conférence a présenté deux ouvrages parus aux Presses universitaires de Grenoble (PUG), collection Libres cours Politique : * Inglehart Ronald, Les transformations culturelles. Comment les valeurs des individus bouleversent le monde?, 2018, * Bréchon Pierre, Gonthier Frédéric, Astor Sandrine (direction), La France des valeurs, Quarante ans d'évolutions, 2019,Inglehart est un politiste internationalement connu, qui a notamment développé la théorie du post-matérialisme. Dans cet ouvrage il relit son itinéraire de recherche sur une cinquantaine d'années. Livre très utile pour comprendre les très nombreux travaux de l'auteur sur le changement culturel dans le monde.Le deuxième ouvrage présente les résultats de l'enquête sur les valeurs des Français en 2018 comparés à ceux des vagues précédentes