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Increases in arterial stiffness and pulse pressure are typical features of the arterial stiffness during aging and are associated with increased risk of cardiovascular complications. Cellular and molecular determinants of arterial stiffness have not been completely elucidated. Clinically, the carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity (PWV) is the gold standard parameter of arterial stiffness. A recent genome-wide scan of the Framingham Heart Study population has shown that arterial stiffness and mean and pulsatile components of blood pressure are heritable and map to separate the genetic loci in humans, suggesting that distinct genes may modulate these two phenotypes. This chapter details the recent knowledge on the influence of genetic determinants and telomere length on the development of age-related phenotypes. Recent genetic studies have revealed specific genes contributing to arterial stiffening. Available data on genome-wide association (GWA) have been initiated on PWV and have identified common genetic variation in specific loci or single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) significantly associated with PWV. Telomere length at birth is strongly determined genetically and is the main determinant of leukocytes’ telomere length (LTL) later in life. Short LTL is associated with increased risk of stiffness and atherosclerosis of the carotid artery, atherosclerotic heart disease, and diminished survival in the elderly.

International audience; Toxoplasma gondii is a highly successful parasite that is thought to infect nearly one third of the world's population. Molecular epidemiology studies have illuminated the population structure of T. gondii strains world-wide and enabled insights into how the parasite is transmitted and the frequency of genetic exchange. Toxoplasma population genetics studies have shown that in North America and Europe, three genotypes have predominated whereas other diverse genotypes have propagated in other parts of the world, particularly in Central and South America. This chapter summarizes the techniques used to understand the population structure of T. gondii and how these techniques have also been helpful in understanding outbreaks of toxoplasmosis. As technology has advanced, more in-depth studies have facilitated our understanding of how differing genotypes can be linked to biological phenotypes including human disease.

International audience; Over the long run, sustained growth is central to poverty reduction. The rapid growth seen in much of the world over the past few decades — notably, but not only, in China and India — has led to an unprecedented reduction in poverty. And, in general, increases in per capita income tend to translate into proportionate increases in income of the poor. As Dollar and Kraay (2002) memorably put it, “Growth Is Good for the Poor.” All the more reason, then, to place sustainability of growth at the center of any poverty reduction strategy.

Private Set Intersection Cardinality (PSI-CA) allows two parties, each holding a set of items, to learn the size of the intersection of those sets without revealing any additional information. To the best of our knowledge, this work presents the first protocol that allows one of the parties to delegate PSI-CA computation to untrusted servers. At the heart of our delegated PSI-CA protocol is a new oblivious distributed key PRF (Odk-PRF) abstraction, which may be of independent interest.

Abstract The serotonergic system plays a key modulatory role in the brain. This system is critical in many drug developments for brain disorders via interactions with the 14 subtypes of 5-HT receptors or through reuptake blockade. Positron emission tomography (PET) is an efficient tool for in vivo studies of physiological and pathological processes. Because of its pertinent radiochemical properties, fluorine-18 is one of the most used radioisotopes in PET imaging. This chapter will propose an overview of the 18F-radioligands targeting serotonin receptors, which have been developed over the last few years. Both radiosyntheses and pharmacological properties of these radiotracers will be described, with a specific emphasis on their potential medical applications.

International audience

Most planispirally and regularly coiled ammonoid species show to varying degrees continuous morphological intraspecific variation of their shell. In many species, individuals range from slender, involute, compressed, and weakly ornamented forms to “robust” forms, which are more evolute, more depressed, and with coarser ornamentation. Additionally, more compressed shells tend to have more complex sutures. Within a species from a single sample, the frequency of these variants is represented by a continuous unimodal distribution (often normal). These covariation patterns of intraspecific variation have been abundantly documented and were coined “Buckman’s Laws of Covariation”. These rules help to delineate ammonoid morphospecies. This interdependent morphological variation suggests that shell morphogenesis may not be random but constrained either by adaptive constraints or simple constructional scaling rules. The cause(s) remain debated. Hence, although Buckman’s rules of covariation are now widely documented and acknowledged, several aspects of their scope and limits still remain to be investigated.

Climate change is predicted to increase the occurrence of extreme droughts, which are associated with elevated mortality rates in tropical trees. Drought-induced mortality is thought to occur by two main mechanisms: hydraulic failure or carbon starvation . This chapter focuses on the strategies that plants use to survive these two drought-induced mortality mechanisms and how these mechanisms are distributed among the immense diversity of tropical tree species. The traits that tropical trees may use to survive drought include (1) xylem that is resistant to drought-induced cavitation , (2) high sapwood capacitance that protects xylem from critically low water potentials , (3) drought deciduousness, (4) photosynthetic stems that have the potential to assimilate carbon at greater water-use efficiency than leaves, (5) deep roots, (6) regulation of gas exchange to reduce leaf water loss or to maintain photosynthesis at low leaf water potential and (7) when all else fails, low cuticular conductance from exposed tissues during extended drought. To date, most research has focused on deciduousness, resistant xylem, soil water, gas exchange behavior and sapwood capacitance, whereas little is known about the role of photosynthetic stems or cuticular conductance during extreme extended drought, making these processes a high priority for a complete understanding of tropical tree physiology during drought.

International audience; The extracellular matrix (ECM) is the most important regulator of cell-cell communication within tissues. ECM is a complex structure, made up of a wide variety of molecules including proteins, proteglycans and glycoaminoglycans. It contributes to cell signaling through the action of both its constituents and their proteolytic cleaved fragments called ma-tricryptins [Hynes and Naba, 2012, Ricard-Blum and Vallet, 2019]. In addition , ECM acts as a "reservoir" of growth factors and cytokines and regulates their bioavailability at the cell surface. By controlling cell signaling inputs, ECM plays a key role in regulating cell phenotype (differentiation, proliferation, migration, etc.). In this context, signaling networks associated with the polypeptide transforming growth factor TGF-β are unique since their activation are controlled by ECM and TGF-$β$ is a major regulator of ECM remodeling in return .