Data Platforms and Cities

This section offers a series of joint reflections on (open) data platform from a variety of cases, from cycling, traffic and mapping to activism, environment and data brokering. Data platforms play a key role in contemporary urban governance. Linked to open data initiatives, such platforms are often proposed as both mechanisms for enhancing the accountability of administrations and performing as sites for 'bottom-up' digital invention. Such promises of smooth flows of data, however, rarely materialise unproblematically. The development of data platforms is always situated in legal and administrative cultures, databases are often built according to the standards of existing digital ecologies, access always involves processes of social negotiation, and interfaces (such as sensors) may become objects of public contestation. The following contributions explore the contested and mutable character of open data platforms as part of heterogeneous publics and trace the pathways of data through different knowledge, skills, public and private configurations. They also reflect on the value of STS approaches to highlight issues and tensions as well as to shape design and governance

Où est passée la smart city ? Firmes de l’économie numérique et gouvernement urbain

En présentant le (re)positionnement des firmes de l’économie numérique vis-à-vis des villes, cet article vise à apporter des éléments de compréhension de l’économie politique de la ville numérique, et présenter les configurations plurielles entre acteurs publics et privés qui se mettent en place. Il développe l’hypothèse que les stratégies et les offres des firmes de l’économie numérique, affectées par le politique, évoluent vers un encastrement institutionnel. L’article revient tout d’abord sur l’émergence de la notion de smart city, l’imaginaire urbain associé et la stratégie des firmes IT IBM et Cisco. Puis, il présente quelques éléments d’analyse sur les limites de ce modèle, son déclin et le repositionnement de ces entreprises dans une logique de sectorialisation et de partenariats avec des entreprises de services urbains. Dans une seconde partie, l’analyse se centre sur les plateformes de l’économie numérique en présentant les principales caractéristiques de ces acteurs, les enjeux et modalités de régulation de leur activité et leurs initiatives partenariales avec les acteurs publics. L’article conclut par un appel au développement d’études empiriques sur les relations entre entreprises de l’économie numérique et institutions publiques en proposant quelques pistes de recherche

Odeurs et représentations de l’Autre pendant la Première Guerre mondiale

During the Great War, the figure of German animality is used to great effect in French portrayals, because it brings into play most of the critiques of the enemy and serves to cut him off from humanity. In this symbolic act of violence, smell, the sense of contact, plays a particular role. During the invasion, scent is indirectly viewed as a Germanic effect, because troops intentionally leave excrement behind them in the houses they invade. This is a cruel practice of great violence through what is said to and of the other. However, victims’ interpretations are completely different from the message addressed to them through this act. Instead, they read here the absence of control of the adversary as a sign of his animality. Moreover, when directly confronted with the German, whether in invaded areas or at the front, the French spontaneously point out an intrinsic smell of the enemy. Through its personal dimension, olfactory feeling allows the bringing together of modes of perception with the experience of war. The indisputable nature of olfactory speech contributes to the violence of the culture of war and allows us to outline it further.Pendant la Grande Guerre, la figure de l’animalité allemande rencontre un large succès dans les représentations françaises, car elle permet de mettre en système la plupart des reproches adressés à l’ennemi et de le retrancher de l’humanité. Une violence symbolique dans laquelle l’odeur, sens du contact, occupe une place particulière. Lors de l’invasion, l’odeur est perçue de manière indirecte comme une manifestation allemande, car les troupes laissent à dessein derrière elles des excréments dans les maisons envahies. Il s’agit là d’une pratique de cruauté d’une grande violence par ce qui est dit à l’Autre, ce qui est dit de l’Autre. Or l’interprétation des victimes est exactement opposée au message qui leur est adressé. Elles y lisent l’absence de contrôle de l’adversaire, un signe de son animalité. Par ailleurs, confrontés à la présence allemande dans les régions envahies ou au front, des Français dénoncent de façon spontanée une odeur intrinsèque de l’ennemi. Par sa dimension personnelle, la sensation olfactive permet d’approcher les modalités de perception de l’expérience de guerre. Présentant un caractère irréfutable, le discours olfactif contribue, lui, à la violence de la culture de guerre et nous permet d’en esquisser un peu plus les contours

Color My World: Deterministic Tagging for Memory Safety

Hardware-assisted memory protection features are increasingly being deployed in COTS processors. ARMv8.5 Memory Tagging Extensions (MTE) is a recent example, which has been used to provide probabilistic checks for memory safety. This use of MTE is not secure against the standard adversary with arbitrary read/write access to memory. Consequently MTE is used as a software development tool. In this paper we present the first design for deterministic memory protection using MTE that can resist the standard adversary, and hence is suitable for post-deployment memory safety. We describe our compiler extensions for LLVM Clang implementing static analysis and subsequent MTE instrumentation. Via a comprehensive evaluation we show that our scheme is effective

Chine. Le déploiement des projets d’infrastructures de l’ « Initiative Belt and Road ». Une stratégie opportuniste ?

Grand projet géoéconomique, voire géopolitique, la BRI n’est cependant pas un grand projet conçu par la seule Chine. Celle-ci s’est inspirée de projets antérieurs, puis a intégré de nombreux projets antérieurs de manière opportuniste et habile. Dans la coordination globale de ces projets, le gouvernement central et la NDRC disposent certes d’un poids considérable, mais cela ne veut pas dire que la mise en œuvre de tous les projets labellisés BRI réponde à une stratégie savamment conçue et planifiée. Relèvent-ils d’une véritable vision régionale ou restent-ils fragmentés ? Voici des réponses très documentées, avec une carte. Les co-auteurs de l’article viennent de publier une référence : Frédéric Lasserre, Éric Mottet, Barthélémy Courmont, (sous la direction de) « Les nouvelles routes de la soie. Géopolitique d’un grand projet chinois » collection Asies contemporaines, Presses de l’Université de Québec, 2019

Data Platforms and Cities

This section offers a series of joint reflections on (open) data platform from a variety of cases, from cycling, traffic and mapping to activism, environment and data brokering. Data platforms play a key role in contemporary urban governance. Linked to open data initiatives, such platforms are often proposed as both mechanisms for enhancing the accountability of administrations and performing as sites for 'bottom-up' digital invention. Such promises of smooth flows of data, however, rarely materialise unproblematically. The development of data platforms is always situated in legal and administrative cultures, databases are often built according to the standards of existing digital ecologies, access always involves processes of social negotiation, and interfaces (such as sensors) may become objects of public contestation. The following contributions explore the contested and mutable character of open data platforms as part of heterogeneous publics and trace the pathways of data through different knowledge, skills, public and private configurations. They also reflect on the value of STS approaches to highlight issues and tensions as well as to shape design and governance

Lemierre's syndrome due to Klebsiella pneumoniae in a 63-year-old man with diabetes: a case report

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>Lemierre's syndrome was originally documented to be caused by <it>Fusobacterium necrophorum</it>. It is a very rare condition with a prevalence of one to 14.4 instances per million. Its presentation is varied, not only in composition but also in the infecting organism. Treatment with anticoagulants has been controversial and applied only on a case-by-case basis.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>A 63-year-old Saudi man who had had uncontrolled diabetes mellitus for 47 years presented to our facility with a five-day history of swelling on the right side of his neck and fever. The swelling progressively increased in size and was associated with pain, dysphagia, odynophagia, change of voice ('hot potato voice'), and reduced appetite. Abscess content culture and sensitivity testing revealed <it>Klebsiella pneumoniae</it>. However, blood culture results were repeatedly negative. The abscess was incised and drained without any complication. Our patient was treated with clindamycin and cefuroxime. Warfarin was also administered concurrently for six weeks, for an isolated internal jugular vein thrombosis (IJV), with complete resolution of the thrombus. Normoglycemia was achieved and our patient was discharged after complete wound healing and the return of his biochemical parameters to normal.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Only two cases of Lemierre's syndrome in patients with diabetes due to <it>K. pneumoniae </it>have been reported previously. A review of the literature suggested that an association exists between deep neck infections due to <it>K. pneumoniae </it>and diabetes mellitus. The reasons for this association are still not clear. This poses a question as to whether diabetes mellitus specifically predisposes these patients to infection with this organism. It is suggested that clinicians should consider infectious agents other than <it>F. necrophorum </it>in the causation of Lemierre's syndrome, especially in patients with diabetes.</p

Integrated single-cell RNA-seq analysis reveals mitochondrial calcium signaling as a modulator of endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition

Endothelial cells (ECs) are highly plastic, capable of differentiating into various cell types. Endothelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EndMT) is crucial during embryonic development and contributes substantially to vascular dysfunction in many cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). While targeting EndMT holds therapeutic promise, understanding its mechanisms and modulating its pathways remain challenging. Using single-cell RNA sequencing on three in vitro EndMT models, we identified conserved gene signatures. We validated original regulators in vitro and in vivo during embryonic heart development and peripheral artery disease. EndMT induction led to global expression changes in all EC subtypes rather than in mesenchymal clusters. We identified mitochondrial calcium uptake as a key driver of EndMT; inhibiting mitochondrial calcium uniporter (MCU) prevented EndMT in vitro, and conditional Mcu deletion in ECs blocked mesenchymal activation in a hind limb ischemia model. Tissues from patients with critical limb ischemia with EndMT features exhibited significantly elevated endothelial MCU. These findings highlight MCU as a regulator of EndMT and a potential therapeutic target