Étudier les lieux de culte du polythéisme dans la Rome du IV^e s. apr. J.-C. : réflexions sur les sources et la méthode autour du temple de la <i>Mater Magna</i>

International audienceA new topographical phenomenon: the visible emergence and increase of Christian cult buildings. However, the areas marking the presence of divinities did not disappear or were not deserted overnight. Furthermore, to the contrary of some accepted ideas, there is no absolute synchrony between the development of Christian monuments and the abandonment of polytheistic cult sites. But yet before going on a tentative historical reconstruction we must take time to consider the kinds of data being collected (available sources, their contribution and limits), in particular when these sources provide various samples. Written sources – the Regionary Catalogues (on which we will focus) and other more selective (casual) sources – form the main base to which epigraphic data must be added, and also few iconographical sources from diverse materials (low-reliefs, mosaic, coins). Coinage can be very useful for the interpretation and dating of archaeological discoveries. They of course form another important part of such an investigation, modifying or corroborating the information brought from the previous sources. Let us not forget some references to traditional feasts that can be included to this range of evidence. The utilization of certain cases will provide a preliminary approach of the topographical reality of polytheism in the Vrbs along the 4th c. The exceptional case of the Mater Magna temple on the Palatine reveals the abundance of sources as well as their complex conditions of use, as is shown with the gap between Zosimus, being conditioned by an historiographical model and archaeological evidence.L’historiographie de la Rome tardive a certainement eu tendance à se focaliser sur ce qui apparaît, à juste titre, comme un phénomène topographique neuf : l’émergence visible et la multiplication des édifices du culte chrétien. Pour autant, les espaces de matérialisation de la présence des dieux n’y ont pas disparu, ni n’ont été désertés du jour au lendemain. Il n’existe pas non plus, contrairement à certaines idées reçues, de synchronie parfaite entre une floraison monumentale chrétienne et un abandon des lieux de culte du polythéisme. Il convient néanmoins, avant d’entrer dans un laborieux essai de reconstitution historique, de consacrer quelques réflexions à la nature des informations récoltées (les différents types de sources disponibles, leurs apports, leurs limites, etc.), en particulier quand ces sources constituent un panel fort diversifié. Les sources littéraires, avec les Régionnaires (auxquels nous porterons une attention plus soutenue) et d’autres occurrences plus ponctuelles, constituent un socle essentiel, auquel il faut ajouter quelques données épigraphiques, ainsi que de rares sources iconographiques présentes sur différents supports (bas-reliefs, mosaïques ou monnaies). La numismatique peut se révéler utile pour l’interprétation et la datation des résultats archéologiques. Ceux-ci forment naturellement un autre pan important d’une telle enquête, venant nuancer ou corroborer les informations issues des champs précédents. Sans oublier que certaines références à des fêtes traditionnelles peuvent, dans une certaine mesure, être intégrées à ce faisceau d’indices. Le recours à certains exemples, en particulier le cas exceptionnel du temple de la Mater Magna sur le Palatin, révélateur de la richesse des sources autant que de la complexité de leur exploitation, comme le révèle l’intéressant décalage mis en évidence entre un Zosime conditionné par un modèle historiographique orienté et les données archéologiques (et écrites), permettra de fournir une première approche de la réalité topographique du polythéisme dans l’Vrbs du IVe s

Possible Application of Short Range Communication Technologies in the Digital Tachograph System to Support Vehicles Filtering during Road Controls

The existing Digital Tachograph is a regulatory instrument (mandatory by Council Regulation since 1st May 2006) to enforce the application of social regulations in road transport especially with the view to increase traffic safety. It records the work and the rest times of drivers as well as the vehicle speed over time with the aim to ensure that appropriate rest periods are taken by drivers and that a maximum of permissible speed is not exceeded. The original and prime functionality of the Digital Tachograph is to document, i.e. to record, the driving history of a driver and his vehicle. Nevertheless controls by the road safety authorities are rather inefficient while time-consuming. The proposed update to the existing regulation would rather guarantee the Digital Tachograph as a compliance device rather than as an accurate recorder of driving history. Basic innovation is the application of short range communication technologies (like RFID) allowing the road authorities to scan by-passing vehicles and thus increasing the throughput by the order of ten.JRC.DG.G.7-Traceability and vulnerability assessmen

Cryptographic security mechanism of the next generation digital tachograph system

JRC is in the process of evaluating the impact of update of the cryptographic security mechanisms for the next generation Digital Tachograph. The purpose of this document is to give background information about the cryptographic security mechanisms and vulnerabilities regarding the security mechanisms of the current Digital Tachograph System along with suggestions for the next generation Digital Tachograph security mechanisms. This document can be referred as an important reference to update the technical appendixes of the Tachograph regulation.JRC.G.7-Digital Citizen Securit

SELF BROADENING COEFFICIENTS AND IMPROVED LINE INTENSITIES FOR THE v7 BAND OF C2H4 NEAR 10.5 µm, AND IMPACT ON ETHYLENE RETRIEVALS FROM JUNGFRAUJOCH SOLAR SPECTRA

Relying on high-resolution Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra, the present work involved extensive measurements of individual line intensities and self-broadening coefficients for the ν7 band of 12C2H4. The measured self-broadening coefficients exhibit a dependence on both J and Ka. Compared to the corresponding information available in the latest edition of the HITRAN spectroscopic database, the measured line intensities were found to be higher by about 10 % for high J lines in the P branch and lower by about 5 % for high J lines of the R branch, varying between these two limits roughly linearly with the line positions. The impact of the presently measured line intensities on retrievals of atmospheric ethylene in the 949.0–952.0cm 1 microwindow was evaluated using a subset of ground-based high-resolution FTIR solar spectra recorded at the Jungfraujoch station. The use of HITRAN 2012 with line intensities modified to match the present measurements led to a systematic reduction of the measured total columns of ethylene by -4.1 +/- 0.1 %

Fight against counterfeiting of goods related to IP infringing: Technical report of DG JRC.G.06 on analysis of Due Diligence for fight against counterfeiting of goods related to IP infringing

This report analyses how Due Diligence concepts, which includes Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Supply Chain Management Responsibility (SCMR) can be applied to the fight against counterfeit related to IP infringing. We intentionally decided to limit the study in this report to the market portion of counterfeit products related to IP infringing. Counterfeit products can be a wider set than just IP infringing products.JRC.G.6-Digital Citizen Securit

Subsequent and simultaneous electrophysiological investigation of the retina and the visual cortex in neurodegenerative and psychiatric diseases: what are the forecasts for the medicine of tomorrow?

Visual electrophysiological deficits have been reported in neurodegenerative disorders as well as in mental disorders. Such alterations have been mentioned in both the retina and the cortex, notably affecting the photoreceptors, retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) and the primary visual cortex. Interestingly, such impairments emphasize the functional role of the visual system. For this purpose, the present study reviews the existing literature with the aim of identifying key alterations in electroretinograms (ERGs) and visual evoked potentials electroencephalograms (VEP-EEGs) of subjects with neurodegenerative and psychiatric disorders. We focused on psychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases due to similarities in their neuropathophysiological mechanisms. Our research focuses on decoupled and coupled ERG/VEP-EEG results obtained with black-and-white checkerboards or low-level visual stimuli. A decoupled approach means recording first the ERG, then the VEP-EEG in the same subject with the same visual stimuli. The second method means recording both ERG and VEP-EEG simultaneously in the same participant with the same visual stimuli. Both coupled and decoupled results were found, indicating deficits mainly in the N95 ERG wave and the P100 VEP-EEG wave in Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and major depressive disorder. Such results reinforce the link between the retina and the visual cortex for the diagnosis of psychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases. With that in mind, medical devices using coupled ERG/VEP-EEG measurements are being developed in order to further investigate the relationship between the retina and the visual cortex. These new techniques outline future challenges in mental health and the use of machine learning for the diagnosis of mental disorders, which would be a crucial step toward precision psychiatry

Predicting Hospital-Acquired Infections by Scoring System with Simple Parameters

BACKGROUND: Hospital-acquired infections (HAI) are associated with increased attributable morbidity, mortality, prolonged hospitalization, and economic costs. A simple, reliable prediction model for HAI has great clinical relevance. The objective of this study is to develop a scoring system to predict HAI that was derived from Logistic Regression (LR) and validated by Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) simultaneously. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: A total of 476 patients from all the 806 HAI inpatients were included for the study between 2004 and 2005. A sample of 1,376 non-HAI inpatients was randomly drawn from all the admitted patients in the same period of time as the control group. External validation of 2,500 patients was abstracted from another academic teaching center. Sixteen variables were extracted from the Electronic Health Records (EHR) and fed into ANN and LR models. With stepwise selection, the following seven variables were identified by LR models as statistically significant: Foley catheterization, central venous catheterization, arterial line, nasogastric tube, hemodialysis, stress ulcer prophylaxes and systemic glucocorticosteroids. Both ANN and LR models displayed excellent discrimination (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUC]: 0.964 versus 0.969, p = 0.507) to identify infection in internal validation. During external validation, high AUC was obtained from both models (AUC: 0.850 versus 0.870, p = 0.447). The scoring system also performed extremely well in the internal (AUC: 0.965) and external (AUC: 0.871) validations. CONCLUSIONS: We developed a scoring system to predict HAI with simple parameters validated with ANN and LR models. Armed with this scoring system, infectious disease specialists can more efficiently identify patients at high risk for HAI during hospitalization. Further, using parameters either by observation of medical devices used or data obtained from EHR also provided good prediction outcome that can be utilized in different clinical settings

Joint EUCAR/JRC/CONCAWE Study on: Effects of Gasoline Vapour Pressure and Ethanol Content on Evaporative Emissions from Modern Cars

A test programme designed to investigate the influence of gasoline vapour pressure and ethanol content on evaporative emissions from modern passenger cars has been carried out by the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission jointly with CONCAWE and EUCAR. Seven gasoline passenger cars representative of current EURO 3/4 emissions technology were tested for evaporative emissions with ten different test fuels. The test fuel matrix comprised 60 and 70 kPa hydrocarbon base fuels with 5 and 10% ethanol splash blends and 5 and 10% ethanol matched volatility blends. The evaporative emission tests were carried out according to a test protocol based on the European homologation test procedure, with no additional vehicle conditioning. Although this test protocol turned out to have a considerable influence on the results, the programme has provided valuable information and several clear conclusions can be drawn. The programme confirmed that vapour pressure (DVPE) is a key fuel variable for evaporative emissions. However the effect of vapour pressure is strongly non-linear; the ethanol blends with final DVPE around 75 kPa gave considerably higher evaporative emissions than the lower volatility fuels in most of the vehicles. Differences between fuels with DVPE in the range 60-70 kPa were small. Additional tests on two vehicles performed after the main programme have raised some questions about possible effects of ethanol on carbon canister working capacity and on the role of permeation in determining evaporative emissions.JRC.H.4-Transport and air qualit

DUX4c Is Up-Regulated in FSHD. It Induces the MYF5 Protein and Human Myoblast Proliferation

Facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) is a dominant disease linked to contractions of the D4Z4 repeat array in 4q35. We have previously identified a double homeobox gene (DUX4) within each D4Z4 unit that encodes a transcription factor expressed in FSHD but not control myoblasts. DUX4 and its target genes contribute to the global dysregulation of gene expression observed in FSHD. We have now characterized the homologous DUX4c gene mapped 42 kb centromeric of the D4Z4 repeat array. It encodes a 47-kDa protein with a double homeodomain identical to DUX4 but divergent in the carboxyl-terminal region. DUX4c was detected in primary myoblast extracts by Western blot with a specific antiserum, and was induced upon differentiation. The protein was increased about 2-fold in FSHD versus control myotubes but reached 2-10-fold induction in FSHD muscle biopsies. We have shown by Western blot and by a DNA-binding assay that DUX4c over-expression induced the MYF5 myogenic regulator and its DNA-binding activity. DUX4c might stabilize the MYF5 protein as we detected their interaction by co-immunoprecipitation. In keeping with the known role of Myf5 in myoblast accumulation during mouse muscle regeneration DUX4c over-expression activated proliferation of human primary myoblasts and inhibited their differentiation. Altogether, these results suggested that DUX4c could be involved in muscle regeneration and that changes in its expression could contribute to the FSHD pathology