Éditeur(s) : HAL CCSD
Résumé : International audience
Background: Everyone is subject to environmental exposures from various sources, with negative health impacts (air, water and soil contamination, noise...) or with positive effects (e.g. green space). Studies considering such complex environmental settings in a global manner are rare.Aims: We propose to use data mining techniques to create a composite exposure index with a data-driven approach, in view to assess the environmental burden experienced by populations. We illustrate this approach on a large French metropolitan area.Methods: The study was carried out in the Great Lyon area (France, 1,260,348 inhabitants in 2007, 527 km²) at the census block group (BG) scale. Indicators on NO2 annual concentrations, noise levels, proximity to green spaces and to industrial plants, and road traffic were synthetized using Multiple Factor Analysis (MFA), which allows to explore the relations between exposures and BGs without a priori knowledge, and to synthetize indicators of different types. Hierarchical clustering was then used to create BG classes. Results: The four first components of the MFA explained respectively 23, 14, 13 and 12% of the total variance. Clustering in 3 classes group: 1) BGs far from industries, greener and with less noise and air pollution than the average; 2) BGs close to industries with less green spaces and air pollution than the average; and 3)BGs far from industries but with higher levels of noise, air pollution and traffic. Greater numbers of classes were tested in order to assess a variety of clustering.Conclusions: We present a data driven approach using data mining techniques, which seem overlooked for cumulative exposure assessment in complex environmental settings. Although it cannot be applied directly for risk or health effect assessment, the resulting index can help to identify hot spots of cumulative exposure, to prioritize urban policies or to compare the environmental burden across study areas in an epidemiological framework.
Environment and Health – Bridging South, North, East and West. Conference of ISEE, ISES and ISIAQ.
Basel, Switzerland

hal-01432884
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01432884
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01432884/document
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01432884/file/Poster_2013_ISEE_20130711.pdf

Éditeur(s) : HAL CCSD Landes Bioscience
Résumé : International audience
In 2008 we published the first set of guidelines for standardizing research in autophagy. Since then, research on this topic has continued to accelerate, and many new scientists have entered the field. Our knowledge base and relevant new technologies have also been expanding. Accordingly, it is important to update these guidelines for monitoring autophagy in different organisms. Various reviews have described the range of assays that have been used for this purpose. Nevertheless, there continues to be confusion regarding acceptable methods to measure autophagy, especially in multicellular eukaryotes. A key point that needs to be emphasized is that there is a difference between measurements that monitor the numbers or volume of autophagic elements (e.g., autophagosomes or autolysosomes) at any stage of the autophagic process vs. those that measure flux through the autophagy pathway (i.e., the complete process); thus, a block in macroautophagy that results in autophagosome accumulation needs to be differentiated from stimuli that result in increased autophagic activity, defined as increased autophagy induction coupled with increased delivery to, and degradation within, lysosomes (in most higher eukaryotes and some protists such as Dictyostelium) or the vacuole (in plants and fungi). In other words, it is especially important that investigators new to the field understand that the appearance of more autophagosomes does not necessarily equate with more autophagy. In fact, in many cases, autophagosomes accumulate because of a block in trafficking to lysosomes without a concomitant change in autophagosome biogenesis, whereas an increase in autolysosomes may reflect a reduction in degradative activity. Here, we present a set of guidelines for the selection and interpretation of methods for use by investigators who aim to examine macroautophagy and related processes, as well as for reviewers who need to provide realistic and reasonable critiques of papers that are focused on these processes. These guidelines are not meant to be a formulaic set of rules, because the appropriate assays depend in part on the question being asked and the system being used. In addition, we emphasize that no individual assay is guaranteed to be the most appropriate one in every situation, and we strongly recommend the use of multiple assays to monitor autophagy. In these guidelines, we consider these various methods of assessing autophagy and what information can, or cannot, be obtained from them. Finally, by discussing the merits and limits of particular autophagy assays, we hope to encourage technical innovation in the field.
Autophagy

hal-00735751
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00735751
PUBMED : 22966490