Engineering of non-linear optical crystals displaying a quasi perfect polar alignment of chromophores

Four non-linear optically active crystals based on organic salts obtained by bis-protonation of four diamines (trans-(± )-1,2-, trans-(1R,2R)-(-)-, cis-1,2-diaminocyclohexane or R-(-)-2-methylpiperazine) by 2-methoxy-4-nitrophenol have been prepared. Their crystal structures and non-linear optical efficiencies have been studied. The two adjacent proton acceptor sites in 1,2-diaminocyclohexanes play an important role in aligning the 2-methoxy-4-nitrophenolate chromophores in a quasi-perfect polar arrangement by anchoring through short hydrogen bonds. In the case of the methylpiperazinium derivative the symmetrical 1,4 location of proton acceptor sites directs the chromophores to near antiparallel alignment by forming short hydrogen bonds. The second harmonic generation efficiencies at 1.064 μ m of Nd3+:YAG laser light are equivalent to that of POM (3-methyl-4-nitropyridine-1-oxide) for the three diammoniocyclohexane derivatives and equivalent to twice that of urea for the methylpiperazinium derivative

Metabolic counterparts of sodium accumulation in multiple sclerosis: A whole brain 23Na-MRI and fast 1H-MRSI study

Increase of brain total sodium concentrations (TSC) is present in multiple sclerosis (MS), but its pathological involvement has not been assessed yet. To determine in vivo the metabolic counterpart of brain sodium accumulation. Whole brain Na-MR imaging and 3D- H-EPSI data were collected in 21 relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS) patients and 20 volunteers. Metabolites and sodium levels were extracted from several regions of grey matter (GM), normal-appearing white matter (NAWM) and white matter (WM) T lesions. Metabolic and ionic levels expressed as Z-scores have been averaged over the different compartments and used to explain sodium accumulations through stepwise regression models. MS patients showed significant Na accumulations with lower choline and glutamate-glutamine (Glx) levels in GM; Na accumulations with lower N-acetyl aspartate (NAA), Glx levels and higher Myo-Inositol (m-Ins) in NAWM; and higher Na, m-Ins levels with lower NAA in WM T lesions. Regression models showed associations of TSC increase with reduced NAA in GM, NAWM and T lesions, as well as higher total-creatine, and smaller decrease of m-Ins in T lesions. GM Glx levels were associated with clinical scores. Increase of TSC in RRMS is mainly related to neuronal mitochondrial dysfunction while dysfunction of neuro-glial interactions within GM is linked to clinical scores

SUBARU prime focus spectrograph: integration, testing and performance for the first spectrograph

The Prime Focus Spectrograph (PFS) of the Subaru Measurement of Images and Redshifts (SuMIRe) project for Subaru telescope consists in four identical spectrographs fed by 600 fibers each. Each spectrograph is composed by an optical entrance unit that creates a collimated beam and distributes the light to three channels, two visibles and one near infrared. This paper presents the on-going effort for the tests & integration process for the first spectrograph channel: we have developed a detailed Assembly Integration and Test (AIT) plan, as well as the methods, detailed processes and I&T tools. We describe the tools we designed to assemble the parts and to test the performance of the spectrograph. We also report on the thermal acceptance tests we performed on the first visible camera unit. We also report on and discuss the technical difficulties that did appear during this integration phase. Finally, we detail the important logistic process that is require to transport the components from other country to Marseille

The ambivalent shadow of the pre-Wilsonian rise of international law

The generation of American international lawyers who founded the American Society of International Law in 1906 and nurtured the soil for what has been retrospectively called a “moralistic legalistic approach to international relations” remains little studied. A survey of the rise of international legal literature in the U.S. from the mid-19th century to the eve of the Great War serves as a backdrop to the examination of the boosting effect on international law of the Spanish American War in 1898. An examination of the Insular Cases before the US Supreme Court is then accompanied by the analysis of a number of influential factors behind the pre-war rise of international law in the U.S. The work concludes with an examination of the rise of natural law doctrines in international law during the interwar period and the critiques addressed.by the realist founders of the field of “international relations” to the “moralistic legalistic approach to international relation

The 18 kDa Translocator Protein (Peripheral Benzodiazepine Receptor) Expression in the Bone of Normal, Osteoprotegerin or Low Calcium Diet Treated Mice

The presence of the translocator protein (TSPO), previously named as the mitochondrial or peripheral benzodiazepine receptor, in bone cells was studied in vitro and in situ using RT-qPCR, and receptor autoradiography using the selective TSPO ligand PK11195

Entomological Surveillance of Behavioural Resilience and Resistance in Residual Malaria Vector Populations.

The most potent malaria vectors rely heavily upon human blood so they are vulnerable to attack with insecticide-treated nets (ITNs) and indoor residual spraying (IRS) within houses. Mosquito taxa that can avoid feeding or resting indoors, or by obtaining blood from animals, mediate a growing proportion of the dwindling transmission that persists as ITNs and IRS are scaled up. Increasing frequency of behavioural evasion traits within persisting residual vector systems usually reflect the successful suppression of the most potent and vulnerable vector taxa by IRS or ITNs, rather than their failure. Many of the commonly observed changes in mosquito behavioural patterns following intervention scale-up may well be explained by modified taxonomic composition and expression of phenotypically plastic behavioural preferences, rather than altered innate preferences of individuals or populations. Detailed review of the contemporary evidence base does not yet provide any clear-cut example of true behavioural resistance and is, therefore, consistent with the hypothesis presented. Caution should be exercised before over-interpreting most existing reports of increased frequency of behavioural traits which enable mosquitoes to evade fatal contact with insecticides: this may simply be the result of suppressing the most behaviourally vulnerable of the vector taxa that constituted the original transmission system. Mosquito taxa which have always exhibited such evasive traits may be more accurately described as behaviourally resilient, rather than resistant. Ongoing national or regional entomological monitoring surveys of physiological susceptibility to insecticides should be supplemented with biologically and epidemiologically meaningfully estimates of malaria vector population dynamics and the behavioural phenotypes that determine intervention impact, in order to design, select, evaluate and optimize the implementation of vector control measures

Association of the CpG Methylation Pattern of the Proximal Insulin Gene Promoter with Type 1 Diabetes

The insulin (INS) region is the second most important locus associated with Type 1 Diabetes (T1D). The study of the DNA methylation pattern of the 7 CpGs proximal to the TSS in the INS gene promoter revealed that T1D patients have a lower level of methylation of CpG -19, -135 and -234 (p = 2.10−16) and a higher methylation of CpG -180 than controls, while methylation was comparable for CpG -69, -102, -206. The magnitude of the hypomethylation relative to a control population was 8–15% of the corresponding levels in controls and was correlated in CpGs -19 and -135 (r = 0.77) and CpG -135 and -234 (r = 0.65). 70/485 (14%) of T1D patients had a simultaneous decrease in methylation of CpG -19, -135, -234 versus none in 317 controls. CpG methylation did not correlate with glycated hemoglobin or with T1D duration. The methylation of CpG -69, -102, -180, -206, but not CpG -19, -135, -234 was strongly influenced by the cis-genotype at rs689, a SNP known to show a strong association with T1D. We hypothesize that part of this genetic association could in fact be mediated at the statistical and functional level by the underlying changes in neighboring CpG methylation. Our observation of a CpG-specific, locus-specific methylation pattern, although it can provide an epigenetic biomarker of a multifactorial disease, does not indicate whether the reported epigenetic pattern preexists or follows the establishment of T1D. To explore the effect of chronic hyperglycemia on CpG methylation, we studied non obese patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D) who were found to have decreased CpG-19 methylation versus age-matched controls, similar to T1D (p = 2.10−6) but increased CpG-234 methylation (p = 5.10−8), the opposite of T1D. The causality and natural history of the different epigenetic changes associated with T1D or T2D remain to be determined

Metabolic fate, mass spectral fragmentation, detectability, and differentiation in urine of the benzofuran designer drugs 6-APB and 6-MAPB in comparison to their 5-isomers using GC-MS and LC-(HR)-MSn techniques

The number of so-called new psychoactive substances (NPS) is still increasing by modification of the chemical structure of known (scheduled) drugs. As analogues of amphetamines, 2-aminopropyl-benzofurans were sold. They were consumed because of their euphoric and empathogenic effects. After the 5-(2-aminopropyl)benzofurans, the 6-(2-aminopropyl)benzofuran isomers appeared. Thus, the question arose whether the metabolic fate, the mass spectral fragmentation, and the detectability in urine are comparable or different and how an intake can be differentiated. In the present study, 6-(2-aminopropyl)benzofuran (6-APB) and its N-methyl derivative 6-MAPB (N-methyl-6-(2-aminopropyl)benzofuran) were investigated to answer these questions. The metabolites of both drugs were identified in rat urine and human liver preparations using GC-MS and/or liquid chromatography-high resolution-mass spectrometry (LC-HR-MSn). Besides the parent drug, the main metabolite of 6-APB was 4-carboxymethyl-3-hydroxy amphetamine and the main metabolites of 6-MAPB were 6-APB (N-demethyl metabolite) and 4-carboxymethyl-3-hydroxy methamphetamine. The cytochrome P450 (CYP) isoenzymes involved in the 6-MAPB N-demethylation were CYP1A2, CYP2D6, and CYP3A4. An intake of a common users’ dose of 6-APB or 6-MAPB could be confirmed in rat urine using the authors’ GC-MS and the LC-MSn standard urine screening approaches with the corresponding parent drugs as major target allowing their differentiation. Furthermore, a differentiation of 6-APB and 6-MAPB in urine from their positional isomers 5-APB and 5-MAPB was successfully performed after solid phase extraction and heptafluorobutyrylation by GC-MS via their retention times

La educación inclusiva frente a las desigualdades sociales: un estado de la cuestion y algunas reflexiones geograficas

Este artículo establece un estado de la cuestión e la educación inclusiva en el mundo y sugiere algunas reflexiones al respecto. El primer apartado recuerda las conexiones ineludibles entre las preocupaciones educativas por la educación inclusiva y las preocupaciones más generales por la desigualdad. El segundo consigna los criterios de búsqueda de las publicaciones académicas, y observa dos grandes temas en sus contenidos: sobre todo, el cambio interno de las escuelas atrae las miradas, pero en segundo plano también el entorno territorial despierta algunas inquietudes. El tercero anota los criterios de búsqueda de la documentación del Banco Mundial, la OCDE y la UNESCO. En este ámbito los simposios de la Oficina Internacional de la Educación de UNESCO revelan una interpretación dispar, aunque convergente, del concepto de educación inclusiva en las distintas regiones mundiales. Asimismo, todas las publicaciones oficiales muestran una atención prioritaria a las dinámicas internas de las escuelas, puesto que apenas algunas esbozan ciertas relaciones entre la educación inclusiva y las políticas públicas. El último apartado adelanta varios argumentos a favor de una mayor consideración de las escalas local y estatal de la educación inclusiva. Las principales razones para atender a la dimensión local provienen de la causalidad acumulativa de las privaciones sociales, de la necesidad de articular la acción de las escuelas y de la posibilidad de abrir un espacio significativo para la participación ciudadana. Asimismo, las principales razones para atender a la dimensión estatal surgen de las posibles sinergias entre la educación inclusiva y la expansión educativa (p. ej. ¿es correlativo el avance de la escolarización en los distintos ciclos escolares?) como también entre la educación inclusiva y la protección social (p. ej. ¿tienen una implicación pedagógica consistente las abundantes condiciones educativas de las transferencias sociales?

Prime Focus Spectrograph (PFS) for the Subaru telescope: Its start of the last development phase

PFS (Prime Focus Spectrograph), a next generation facility instrument on the Subaru telescope, is now being tested on the telescope. The instrument is equipped with very wide (1.3 degrees in diameter) field of view on the Subaru’s prime focus, high multiplexity by 2394 reconfigurable fibers, and wide waveband spectrograph that covers from 380nm to 1260nm simultaneously in one exposure. Currently engineering observations are ongoing with Prime Focus Instrument (PFI), Metrology Camera System (MCS), the first spectrpgraph module (SM1) with visible cameras and the first fiber cable providing optical link between PFI and SM1. Among the rest of the hardware, the second fiber cable has been already installed on the telescope and in the dome building since April 2022, and the two others were also delivered in June 2022. The integration and test of next SMs including near-infrared cameras are ongoing for timely deliveries. The progress in the software development is also worth noting. The instrument control software delivered with the subsystems is being well integrated with its system-level layer, the telescope system, observation planning software and associated databases. The data reduction pipelines are also rapidly progressing especially since sky spectra started being taken in early 2021 using Subaru Nigh Sky Spectrograph (SuNSS), and more recently using PFI during the engineering observations. In parallel to these instrumentation activities, the PFS science team in the collaboration is timely formulating a plan of large-sky survey observation to be proposed and conducted as a Subaru Strategic Program (SSP) from 2024. In this article, we report these recent progresses, ongoing developments and future perspectives of the PFS instrumentation