Does the centrality of human values in the lisbon treaty promise more than it can actually offer? Biometrics law and policy as a case study

DINÂMIA'CET, Agosto de 2010The adoption of the Treaty of Lisbon and the granting to the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the same legal force as the Treaty lent a new impulse to the consideration of fundamental human values by the European Union (EU). The question remains, however, of how this legal discourse centred on human values is actually shaping the EU regulatory framework in specific policy domains. The aim of this paper is to critically appraise the ways that certain values rendered explicit through the Charter’s rights and principles are being construed in the context of EU policy and law on biometrics, an ethically and morally sensitive security technology whose development and use are being actively promoted by the EU. We conclude that the interpretation of the pertinent Charter’s rights and principles as well as their balancing owes to a great deal to the goals of EU policies, shaped largely by political and economic considerations. In respect of biometrics, research priorities, combined with those of EU security policy, then tend to prevail over ethically or morally based legal claims.FC

Hard Law, Soft Law and Self-regulation: Seeking Better Governance for Science and Technology in the EU

Abstract There is a pretty wide belief that ‘soft law’ together with self-regulation provide suitable regulatory tools for emerging science and technology (S&T), possibly better tools than ‘hard law’ to cope with the need for both flexibility and adjustment to novelty and prevailing uncertainties. Soft law and self-regulation, it is argued, may also respond more adequately to increased pressure for opening up regulation to new governance modes arising from mounting public unease with S&T in ethically and socially sensitive or controversial domains. However, doubts have also accompanied the use of soft law, as well as of self-regulation: although often designed to enhance more active participation and dialogue with the civil society, and ultimately to increase decision-making legitimacy, they are perceived as lacking transparency and accountability too. Our overview of the EU regulatory response to various emerging technologies in recent decades led us to the conclusion that the overall picture is more complex than these beliefs may suggest. Actually, soft law and self-regulation have been resorted to as regulatory tools mostly as preparatory or complementary tools to ‘hard law’.European Union’s the 7th Framework Programme for Research and Development

Rigorous computation of smooth branches of equilibria for the three dimensional Cahn-Hilliard equation

In this paper, we propose a new general method to compute rigorously global smooth branches of equilibria of higher-dimensional partial differential equations. The theoretical framework is based on a combination of the theory introduced in Global smooth solution curves using rigorous branch following (van den Berg et al., Math. Comput. 79(271):1565-1584, 2010) and in Analytic estimates and rigorous continuation for equilibria of higher-dimensional PDEs (Gameiro and Lessard, J. Diff. Equ. 249(9):2237-2268, 2010). Using this method, one can obtain proofs of existence of global smooth solution curves of equilibria for large (continuous) parameter ranges and about local uniqueness of the solutions on the curve. As an application, we compute several smooth branches of equilibria for the three-dimensional Cahn-Hilliard equation

Efficient rigorous numerics for higher-dimensional PDEs via one-dimensional estimates

We present an efficient rigorous computational method which is an extension of the work Analytic Estimates and Rigorous Continuation for Equilibria of Higher-Dimensional PDEs (M. Gameiro and J.-P. Lessard, J. Differential Equations, 249 (2010), pp. 2237-2268). The idea is to generate sharp one-dimensional estimates using interval arithmetic which are then used to produce high-dimensional estimates. These estimates are used to construct the radii polynomials which provide an efficient way of determining a domain on which the contraction mapping theorem is applicable. Computing the equilibria using a finite-dimensional projection, the method verifies that the numerically produced equilibrium for the projection can be used to explicitly define a set which contains a unique equilibrium for the PDE. A new construction of the polynomials is presented where the nonlinearities are bounded by products of one-dimensional estimates as opposed to using FFT with large inputs. It is demonstrated that with this approach it is much cheaper to prove that the numerical output is correct than to recompute at a finer resolution. We apply this method to PDEs defined on three- and four-dimensional spatial domains

Facing the wind of the pre-FUor V1331 Cyg

The mass outflows in T Tauri stars (TTS) are thought to be an effective mechanism to remove angular momentum during the pre-main-sequence contraction of a low-mass star. The most powerful winds are observed at the FUor stage of stellar evolution. V1331 Cyg has been considered as a TTS at the pre-FUor stage. We analyse high-resolution spectra of V1331 Cyg collected in 1998-2007 and 20-d series of spectra taken in 2012. For the first time the photospheric spectrum of the star is detected and stellar parameters are derived: spectral type G7-K0 IV, mass 2.8 Msun, radius 5 Rsun, vsini < 6 km/s. The photospheric spectrum is highly veiled, but the amount of veiling is not the same in different spectral lines, being lower in weak transitions and much higher in strong transitions. The Fe II 5018, Mg I 5183, K I 7699 and some other lines of metals are accompanied by a `shell' absorption at radial velocity of about -240 km/s. We show that these absorptions form in the post-shock gas in the jet, i.e. the star is seen though its jet. The P Cyg profiles of H-alpha and H-beta indicate the terminal wind velocity of about 500 km/s, which vary on time-scales from several days to years. A model of the stellar wind is developed to interpret the observations. The model is based on calculation of hydrogen spectral lines using the radiative transfer code TORUS. The observed H-alpha and H-beta line profiles and their variability can be well reproduced with a stellar wind model, where the mass-loss rate and collimation (opening angle) of the wind are variable. The changes of the opening angle may be induced by small variability in magetization of the inner disc wind. The mass-loss rate is found to vary within (6-11)x10^{-8} Msun/yr, with the accretion rate of 2.0x10^{-6} Msun/yr.Comment: 11 pages, 12 figures; accepted for publication in MNRAS. Typographical errors have been corrected after the proof stag

Childhood hypopigmented mycosis fungoides: a commonly delayed diagnosis

Primary cutaneous lymphomas (PCLs) are exceedingly rare in children and adolescents, with mycosis fungoides (MF) being the most frequent PCL diagnosed in childhood. There are numerous unusual clinical variants of MF, including the hypopigmented type form (HMF). HMF is exceptional overall, but comparatively common among children. We present an 8-year-old boy with a 3-year history of progressive, generalised, scaly, hypopigmented round patches and few erythematous papules. He was first diagnosed with pityriasis alba (PA), and moisturisers were prescribed with no improvement. Skin biopsy showed typical features of MF, and the patient was successfully treated with narrowband ultraviolet B. HMF may simulate atopic dermatitis, PA, pityriasis lichenoides, tinea versicolour, vitiligo, postinflammatory hypopigmentation or leprosy. Therefore, persistent and unusual hypopigmented lesions should be biopsied to rule out this rare variant of MF