Edible insects – defining knowledge gaps in biological and ethical considerations of entomophagy

While seeking novel food sources to feed the increasing population of the globe, several alternatives have been discussed, including algae, fungi or in vitro meat. The increasingly propagated usage of farmed insects for human nutrition raises issues regarding food safety, consumer information and animal protection. In line with law, insects like any other animals must not be reared or manipulated in a way that inflicts unnecessary pain, distress or harm on them. Currently, there is a great need for research in the area of insect welfare, especially regarding species-specific needs, health, farming systems and humane methods of killing. Recent results from neurophysiological, neuroanatomical and behavioral sciences prompt caution when denying consciousness and therefore the likelihood of presence of pain and suffering or something closely related to it to insects. From an animal protection point of view, these issues should be satisfyingly solved before propagating and establishing intensive husbandry systems for insects as a new type of mini-livestock factory farming

A scavenging double mask to reduce workplace contamination during mask induction of inhalation anesthesia in dogs

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Workplace contamination by the use of volatile anesthetic agents should be kept to a minimum if a potential health hazard is to be minimised. Mask induction of animals is a common procedure. The present study investigates the efficiency of a novel scavenging double mask in reducing waste gas concentrations in the breathing zone of the anesthetist performing this procedure.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Twelve beagle dogs (ASA I) undergoing general anesthesia for a dental procedure were intravenously premedicated with medetomidine and butorphanol (10 μg/kg and 0.2 mg/kg). Anesthesia was induced via a custom-made scavenging mask using isoflurane in oxygen. In six dogs (group S), scavenging from the mask was performed whereas in six other dogs (group NS) the scavenging function was disabled. Isoflurane concentration was continuously measured with photoacoustic spectroscopy at the level of the shoulder of the anesthetist before and during mask induction and additionally during intubation. Statistical analysis was performed with a Student t- test and a Mann-Whitney U test (p < 0.05 for significance).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mean isoflurane concentration during baseline (premedication) was 1.8 ± 0.8 ppm and 2.3 ± 0.6 ppm in group S and NS respectively. This increased during mask induction to 2.0 ± 0.8 ppm and 11.2 ± 6.0 ppm respectively (p < 0.01). The maximum isoflurane concentration ranged from 0.7 ppm to 2.8 ppm and from from 8.3 ppm to 43.7 ppm in group S and NS respectively.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This double mask can be used to induce inhalation anesthesia in dogs. Scavenging from the mask significantly decreases the amount of waste anaesthetic gas concentrations in the breathing zone of the anesthetist. Therefore, such a system can be recommended whenever induction or maintenance of general anesthesia by mask is considered.</p

Comparison of Bayesian and interval uncertainty quantification : application to the AIRMOD test structure

This paper concerns the comparison of two inverse methods for the quantification of uncertain model parameters, based on experimentally obtained measurement data of the model's responses. Specifically, Bayesian inference is compared to a novel method for the quantification of multivariate interval uncertainty. The comparison is made by applying both methods to the AIRMOD measurement data set, and comparing their results critically in terms of obtained information and computational expense. Since computational cost of the application of both methods to high-dimensional problems and realistic numerical models can become intractable, an Artificial Neural Network surrogate is used for both methods. The application of this ANN proves to limit the computational cost to a large extent, even taking the generation of the training dataset into account. Concerning the comparison of both methods, it is found that the results of the Bayesian identification provide less over-conservative bounds on the uncertainty in the responses of the AIRMOD model

Structural interpretation of the amino acid sequence of a second domain from the Artemia covalent polymer globin

Artemia has a complex extracellular hemoglobin of Mr 260,000 comprising two globin chains (Mr 130,000) each of which is a polymer of eight covalently linked domains of Mr 16,000. The primary structure of this polymeric globin was studied to understand how globin folded domains are ordered within a globin chain and, in turn, how the latter associate into a functional hemoglobin molecule. Here we report the amino acid sequence of a second domain, E7 (Mr 16,081, excluding the heme), and interpretations of sequence data by computer-assisted alignment and modeling. This clearly shows that, as with domain E1 (Moens, L. Van Hauwaert, M.-L. De Smet, K. Geelen, D. Verpooten, G. Van Beeumen, J. Wodak, S. Alard, P. & Trotman, C. (1988) J. Biol. Chem. 263, 4679-4685), domain E7 is compatible with a globin folded structure of the β-type chain. Several specific differences of domains E7 and E1 from the classic globins are identified. They possibly can be interpreted in terms of specific requirements for a double octameric functional molecule.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Inverse quantification of epistemic uncertainty under scarce data: Bayesian or Interval approach?

This paper introduces a practical comparison of a newly introduced inverse method for the quantification of epistemically uncertain model parameters with the well-established probabilistic framework of Bayesian model updating via Transitional Markov Chain Monte Carlo. The paper gives a concise overview of both techniques, and both methods are applied to the quantification of a set of parameters in the well-known DLR Airmod test structure. Specifically, the case where only a very scarce set of experimentally obtained eigenfrequencies and eigenmodes are available is considered. It is shown that for such scarce data, the interval method provides more objective and robust bounds on the uncertain parameters than the Bayesian method, since no prior definition of the uncertainty is required, albeit at the cost that less information on parameter dependency or relative plausibility of different parameter values is obtained.Matthias Faes is a post-doctoral researcher of the Flemish Research Foundation under grant number 12P3519N ("Generalized Inverse Uncertainty Quantification")

Distributed Contact and Identity Management

Contact management is a twofold problem involving a local and global level where the separation between them is rather fuzzy. Locally, users need to deal with contact management, which refers to a local need to store, organize, maintain up to date, and find information that will allow them contacting or reaching other people, organizations, etc. Globally, users deal with identity management that refers to peers having multiple identities (i.e., profiles) and the need of staying in control of them. In other words, they should be able to manage what information is shared and with whom. We believe many existing applications try to deal with this problem looking only at the data level and without analyzing the underlying complexity. Our approach focus on the complex social relations and interactions between users, identifying three main subproblem: (i) management of identity, (ii) search, and (iii) privacy. The solution we propose concentrates on the models that are needed to address these problems. In particular, we propose a Distributed Contact Management System (DCM System) that: Models and represents the knowledge of peers about physical or abstract objects through the notion of entities that can be of different types (e.g., locations, people, events, facilities, organizations, etc.) and are described by a set of attributes; By representing contacts as entities, allows peers to locally organize their contacts taking into consideration the semantics of the contact’s characteristics; By describing peers as entities allows them to manage their different identities in the network, by sharing different views of themselves (showing possibly different in- formation) with different people. The contributions of this thesis are, (i) the definition of a reference architecture that allows dealing with the diversity in relation with the partial view that peers have of the world, (ii) an approach to search entities based on identifiers, (iii) an approach to search entities based on descriptions, and (iv) the definition of the DCM system that instantiates the previously mentioned approaches and architecture to address concrete usage scenarios

A PCR-microarray method for the screening of genetically modified organisms

A new method to screen and to identify genetically modified organisms (GMO) is presented in this paper. It is based on the detection of multiple genetic elements common to GMO by their amplification via PCR followed by direct hybridisation of the amplicons on microarray. The pattern of the elements is then compared to a database of the composition of EU-approved GMO and an identification of the GMO is then proposed. The limit of detection of the method was ≤0.1% GMO content (w/w) expressed as the amount of target DNA present in the template for single unprocessed material. The DNA targets were detected both in reference materials and in mixtures with the same detection limit. The specificity for the detection of the different elements was found to be very good with no cross-reaction even in samples with two GMO present at different concentrations. The paper presents examples of GMO identification and discusses the potential and limitation of such approaches and how they can facilitate the work of private and enforcement detection laboratories.This study was supported by the European Commission through the FP5 program “GMOchips” (contract G6RD-CT2000-00419 2000-2003), the Belgian SSCT program and the Integrated Project “Co-Extra”, contract no. 007158 2005-2009, under the 6th Framework Programme, priority 5, food quality and safety.Peer reviewe

Special Care and School Difficulties in 8-Year-Old Very Preterm Children: The Epipage Cohort Study

OBJECTIVES: To investigate school difficulties, special care and behavioral problems in 8 year-old very preterm (VPT) children. PATIENT AND METHODS: Longitudinal population-based cohort in nine regions of France of VPT children and a reference group born at 39-40 weeks of gestation (WG). The main outcome measures were information about school, special care and behavioral problems using Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire from a questionnaire to parents. RESULTS: Among the 1439 VPT children, 5% (75/1439) were in a specialised school or class, 18% (259/1439) had repeated a grade in a mainstream class and 77% (1105/1439) were in the appropriate grade-level in mainstream class; these figures were 1% (3/327) , 5% (16/327) and 94% (308/327) , respectively, for the reference group. Also, 15% (221/1435) of VPT children in a mainstream class received support at school versus 5% (16/326) of reference group. More VPT children between the ages of five and eight years received special care (55% (794/1436)) than children born at term (38% (124/325)); more VPT children (21% (292/1387)) had behavioral difficulties than the reference group (11% (35/319)). School difficulties, support at school, special care and behavioral difficulties in VPT children without neuromotor or sensory deficits varied with gestational age, socioeconomic status, and cognitive score at the age of five. CONCLUSIONS: Most 8-year-old VPT children are in mainstream schools. However, they have a high risk of difficulty in school, with more than half requiring additional support at school and/or special care. Referral to special services has increased between the ages of 5 and 8 years, but remained insufficient for those with borderline cognitive scores

Cent scientifiques répliquent à SEA (Suppression des Expériences sur l’Animal vivant) et dénoncent sa désinformation

La lutte contre la maltraitance animale est sans conteste une cause moralement juste. Mais elle ne justifie en rien la désinformation à laquelle certaines associations qui s’en réclament ont recours pour remettre en question l’usage de l’expérimentation animale en recherche