ADOLPHE NOURRIT, GILBERT-LOUIS DUPREZ, AND TRANSFORMATIONS OF TENOR TECHNIQUE IN THE EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY: HISTORICAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS

The April 1837 debut of tenor Gilbert-Louis Duprez at the Paris Opéra sparked uproarious applause and inspired a new group of tenors with a different vocal technique from tenors of the previous generation. Whereas previous tenors of the nineteenth century sang in a graceful, light, and flexible style that complemented the operatic compositions of Gluck, Rossini, and Bellini, Duprez sang in a powerful, forceful voice that brought new dramatic fervor to the existing repertoire of French Grand Opera. Duprez’ stentorian vocal representations of Arnold in Rossini’s Guillaume Tell and Robert in Meyerbeer’s Robert le diable, among others, inspired composers to write more prominent and dramatic tenor roles, eventually leading to the tenor roles in the operas of Verdi and Wagner. Duprez’ 1837 debut also marked the end of Adolphe Nourrit’s eleven-year reign as the sole leading tenor at the Paris Opéra. Threatened by the prospect of competition, Nourrit eventually left France for Italy in pursuit of the same vocal technique that insured Duprez’ fame. Nourrit studied with Donizetti and debuted at the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, but grew impatient with his slow progress, disliked the sound of his new voice, and tried to turn back to his old way of singing. He failed to do so and lost his high notes, as well as his head voice. Nourrit’s pursuit ended in 1839 as he threw himself from the third floor of his residence, his voice, his health, and his psyche all in shambles. The shift in vocal technique involved a lowered laryngeal position, a raised velum, and a greater use of chest voice muscles in the higher ranges of the tenor voice. The resulting voix sombrée or “closed” or “covered” timbre, offers distinct hygienic and acoustic advantages, resulting in healthier vocalization and greater amplification of the upper harmonics of the voice. The voix sombrée allows the singer to sing at higher pitch levels with lower levels of tension in the vocal folds and the harmonics from the voice source are greatly enhanced at 2500-3200 Hz, the “singer’s formant,” the range at which the human ear is most sensitive. By reviewing the writings of singers, teachers, and critics of the early nineteenth century and comparing their descriptions of singers’ voices, and then comparing those descriptions with modern studies on the physiology and acoustics of the voice, one can paint a more informed picture concerning the nature and sound of the voices of Nourrit and Duprez. Analysis seems to show that Adolphe Nourrit utilized the lighter vocal production typical of earlier Rossinian tenors, combined with the nasal vocalization of French singers of the early 1800’s. His technique included a low velum, raised larynx, and a pure head voice in the high register. Conversely, Duprez sang with a lowered larynx and a larger degree of chest voice function in his high register. Duprez also incorporated Italian ideals of emphasis on the sound of the voice, rather than the French tendency to emphasize the words. Duprez’s innovations, based in the vocal technique already being used in Italy in the early 1830’s, propelled the voix sombrée technique into the French spotlight, and led to the eventual globalized use of the technique in the opera world

Epigenetics may characterize asymptomatic COVID-19 infection.

RT-PCR is the foremost clinical test for diagnosis of COVID-19. Unfortunately, PCR-based testing has limitations and may not result in a positive test early in the course of infection before symptoms develop. Enveloped RNA viruses, such as coronaviruses, alter peripheral blood methylation and DNA methylation signatures may characterize asymptomatic versus symptomatic infection. We used Illumina's Infinium MethylationEPIC BeadChip array to profile peripheral blood samples from 164 patients who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 by RT-PCR, of whom 8 had no symptoms. Epigenome-wide association analysis identified 10 methylation sites associated with infection and a quantile-quantile plot showed little inflation. These preliminary results suggest that differences in methylation patterns may distinguish asymptomatic from symptomatic infection

Search for Scalar Diphoton Resonances in the Mass Range 65−60065-600 GeV with the ATLAS Detector in pppp Collision Data at s\sqrt{s} = 8 TeVTeV

A search for scalar particles decaying via narrow resonances into two photons in the mass range 65–600 GeV is performed using $20.3\text{}\text{}{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ of $\sqrt{s}=8\text{}\text{}\mathrm{TeV}$ $pp$ collision data collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The recently discovered Higgs boson is treated as a background. No significant evidence for an additional signal is observed. The results are presented as limits at the 95% confidence level on the production cross section of a scalar boson times branching ratio into two photons, in a fiducial volume where the reconstruction efficiency is approximately independent of the event topology. The upper limits set extend over a considerably wider mass range than previous searches

Measurement of the W±ZW^{\pm}Z boson pair-production cross section in pppp collisions at s=13\sqrt{s}=13 TeV with the ATLAS Detector

The production of $W^{\pm}Z$ events in proton--proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV is measured with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The collected data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 3.2 fb$^{-1}$. The $W^{\pm}Z$ candidates are reconstructed using leptonic decays of the gauge bosons into electrons or muons. The measured inclusive cross section in the detector fiducial region for leptonic decay modes is $\sigma_{W^\pm Z \rightarrow \ell^{'} \nu \ell \ell}^{\textrm{fid.}} = 63.2 \pm 3.2$ (stat.) $\pm 2.6$ (sys.) $\pm 1.5$ (lumi.) fb. In comparison, the next-to-leading-order Standard Model prediction is $53.4^{+3.6}_{-2.8}$ fb. The extrapolation of the measurement from the fiducial to the total phase space yields $\sigma_{W^{\pm}Z}^{\textrm{tot.}} = 50.6 \pm 2.6$ (stat.) $\pm 2.0$ (sys.) $\pm 0.9$ (th.) $\pm 1.2$ (lumi.) pb, in agreement with a recent next-to-next-to-leading-order calculation of $48.2^{+1.1}_{-1.0}$ pb. The cross section as a function of jet multiplicity is also measured, together with the charge-dependent $W^+Z$ and $W^-Z$ cross sections and their ratio

Search for Higgs and ZZ Boson Decays to J/ψγJ/\psi\gamma and Υ(nS)γ\Upsilon(nS)\gamma with the ATLAS Detector

A search for the decays of the Higgs and $Z$ bosons to $J/\psi\gamma$ and $\Upsilon(nS)\gamma$ ($n=1,2,3$) is performed with $pp$ collision data samples corresponding to integrated luminosities of up to $20.3\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ collected at $\sqrt{s}=8\mathrm{TeV}$ with the ATLAS detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. No significant excess of events is observed above expected backgrounds and 95% CL upper limits are placed on the branching fractions. In the $J/\psi\gamma$ final state the limits are $1.5\times10^{-3}$ and $2.6\times10^{-6}$ for the Higgs and $Z$ bosons, respectively, while in the $\Upsilon(1S,2S,3S)\,\gamma$ final states the limits are $(1.3,1.9,1.3)\times10^{-3}$ and $(3.4,6.5,5.4)\times10^{-6}$, respectively

Finska tingsdomares bedömningar av partsutlåtanden givna på plats i rätten eller via videokonferens

Professionals within the judicial system sometimes believe they can assess whether someone is lying or not based on cues such as body language and emotional expression. Research has, however, shown that this is impossible. The Finnish Supreme Court has also given rulings in accordance with this demonstrated fact. There has also been previous research on whether party or witness statements are assessed differently in court depending on whether they are given live, via videoconference, or via prerecorded video. In the present study, we investigated how a Finnish sample of district judges (N=47) assigned probative value to different variables concerning the statement or the statement giver, such as body language and emotional expression. We also investigated the connection between the judges’ beliefs about the relevance of body language and emotional expression and their preference for live statements or statements via videoconference. The judges reported assigning equal amounts of probative value to statements given live and statements given via videoconference. However, judges found it easier to detect deception live, and this preference correlated with how relevant they thought body language is when assessing the probative value of the statement. In other words, a slight bias to assess live statements more favorably than statements given via videoconference might still exist. More effort needs to be put into making judges and Supreme Courts aware of robust scientific results that have been the subject of decades of research, such as the fact that one cannot assess whether someone is lying or not based on cues such as body language