ACTION-FRANCE: Insights into Perceptions, Attitudes, and Barriers to Obesity Management in France.

ACTION-FRANCE (Awareness, Care, and Treatment In Obesity maNagement in France) aims to identify the perceptions, attitudes, behaviors, and potential barriers to effective obesity management in France and guide collaborative actions. ACTION-FRANCE is a cross-sectional survey of people with obesity (PwO) and healthcare professionals (HCPs) in France. The PwO and HCP survey questionnaire periods ran from 27 September 2022 to 1 February 2023 and from 19 December 2022 to 31 March 2023, respectively.

Globe-LFMC 2.0, an enhanced and updated dataset for live fuel moisture content research.

Globe-LFMC 2.0, an updated version of Globe-LFMC, is a comprehensive dataset of over 280,000 Live Fuel Moisture Content (LFMC) measurements. These measurements were gathered through field campaigns conducted in 15 countries spanning 47 years.

Screening for drought tolerance and genetic diversity of wheat varieties using agronomic and molecular markers.

Background: The future predictions for frequent and severe droughts will represent a significant threat to wheat yield and food security. In this context, breeding has proven to be the most efficient approach to enhance wheat productivity in dry environments.

Methods And Results: In this study, both agronomic and molecular-based approaches were used to evaluate the response of twenty-eight Tunisian wheat varieties to drought stress.

Drought responsiveness in six wheat genotypes: identification of stress resistance indicators.

Introduction: Wheat ( L.) is among the world's most important staple food crops. In the current climate change scenario, a better understanding of wheat response mechanisms to water stress could help to enhance its productivity in arid ecosystems.

Structural, Thermal, and Optical Studies of Gamma Irradiated Polyvinyl Alcohol-, Lignosulfonate-, and Palladium Nanocomposite Film.

Nanocomposite (NC) films of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), lignosulfonate (Lg), and nanosized palladium (Pd) were synthesized by ex-situ casting method. Samples from the synthesized PVA-Lg/Pd NC films were irradiated with 5-100 kGy γ doses. The effect of γ doses on the structural, thermal, and optical characteristics of the NC films were studied using different characterization techniques.

Does the ICU Requirement Score allow the poisoned patient to be safely managed without admission to the intensive care unit? - a validation cohort study.

Background: The Intensive care unit (ICU) Requirement Score (IRS) has been defined as identifying poisoned patients on hospital admission who do not require ICU referral, in an effort to reduce health expenses. However, this score has been poorly validated. We aimed to evaluate the IRS in a large cohort of poisoned patients.

Correction of the chemical composition effect for soil samples in gamma spectrometry.

Correction of the chemical composition effect for soil samples in gamma spectrometry is very important to perform at low emission energy (<100 keV). This study presents an intensive Monte Carlo simulation using Geant4 code of CERN which investigates several items in this subject. First, it is confirmed that for soil samples, in presence of chemical composition effect, correction of the density effect at low energy is not sufficient to produce an accurate efficiency calibration of the detector.

Combination of 137Cs and 210Pb Radioactive Atmospheric Fallouts to Estimate Soil Erosion for the Same Time Scale.

Naturally occurring Pb and artificial Cs fallouts are widely used as radioactive tracers for the determination of water-induced soil erosion for different time scales equal to 50 and 100 years, respectively. There exist several calibration models useful to convert the variation of the inventory of these radiotracers in cultivated soil compared to its value on non-disturbed soil to a soil erosion rate. The most comprehensive calibration models are based on a mass balance approach.

Correction of the chemical composition effect on the activity measurement of gamma emitters in environmental samples at low energy.

If the sample and the calibration standard are identical in geometry and in density, many laboratories of radioactivity measurement using gamma spectrometry, do not proceed to the correction of the effect of the possible difference in chemical composition between them. Some laboratories proceed to the correction of this effect using the usual simple ratio between the self absorption factor of the sample and the calibration standard based on the linear attenuation coefficients obtained using transmission experiments. In this work we studied this question by conducting Monte Carlo simulation of several typical environmental samples with different chemical compositions.

Efficiency transfer using the GEANT4 code of CERN for HPGe gamma spectrometry.

In this work we apply the GEANT4 code of CERN to calculate the peak efficiency in High Pure Germanium (HPGe) gamma spectrometry using three different procedures. The first is a direct calculation. The second corresponds to the usual case of efficiency transfer between two different configurations at constant emission energy assuming a reference point detection configuration and the third, a new procedure, consists on the transfer of the peak efficiency between two detection configurations emitting the gamma ray in different energies assuming a "virtual" reference point detection configuration.

Effects of nickel hyperaccumulation on physiological characteristics of Alyssum murale grown on metal contaminated waste amended soil.

A pot experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of nickel concentration on physiological characteristics of Alyssum murale when grown in a soil mixed with sewage sludge (at the rate of 2.8%). Two types of sludge were used: agricultural sewage sludge (S1) and industrial sewage sludge with an increasing nickel concentration (S2, S3, and S4).

Exposure to radiation from the natural radioactivity in Tunisian building materials.

Building materials can expose public and workers to radiation because of their content of radium, thorium and potassium isotopes. This is why it is very important from the radiological point of view to survey the natural radioactivity content of commonly used building materials in any country. This work consists of the measurement of (226)Ra, (232)Th and (40)K activity concentrations in a variety of commonly used building materials in Tunisia and on the estimation of their radiological hazard.

Stimulated growth rate by restriction of P availability at moderate salinity but insensitive to P availability at high salinity in Crithmum maritimum.

The halophyte Crithmum maritimum thrives in cracks of calcareous rocks or cliffs at seashores, a situation which associates limited phosphorus availability and high salinity. In order to understand the common patterns of colonization and zonation of this species, seedlings were cultivated for 34 d in inert sandy soil irrigated with a nutrient solution containing or not phosphorus at moderate (50 mM) or high (250 mM) NaCl level. Net assimilation rate and consequently relative growth rate increased in response to P deprivation at moderate saline level, but not at high salinity level.

Uranium isotopes in Tunisian bottled mineral waters.

(234)U and (238)U activity concentrations and their relative effective doses have been determined in 10 bottled mineral waters in Tunisia. Alpha spectrometry was used as technique to measure uranium isotopes. The obtained isotopic ratio (234)U/(238)U varies between 1.

Efficacy of low-dose oral sulodexide in the management of diabetic nephropathy.

Background: Diabetic nephropathy (DN) is the single greatest cause of end-stage renal disease (ESRD). Without specific interventions, microalbuminuria (incipient nephropathy) gradually progresses to macroalbuminuria (overt nephropathy) within 10-15 years in about 80% of type 1 and 30% of type 2 diabetic patients, and to ESRD within further 20 years in about 75% and 20%, respectively. A primary alteration in DN consists of decreased concentration of glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) in the glomerular extracellular matrix.

Monte Carlo studies of the Tunisian gamma irradiation facility using GEANT4 code.

This paper describes a complete Monte Carlo study of the Tunisian gamma irradiation facility (CNSTN) using the GEANT4 CERN's code. The work focused on the optimization of the absorbed dose distribution inside the irradiation cell, with and without product. For this purpose, 32 different points at the middle plane of the source rack, 29 positions along Z axis and 7 critical points, were carried out using PMMA dosimeters.

[Widened retrolabyrinthine approach: application to the surgery of acoustic neuroma].

For a long time, the role of the widened retrolabyrinthine approach (WRLA) in surgery of the posterior fossa was restricted to functional surgery of the erebellopontine angle (CPA). The widening technique described makes it possible to adapt it to surgery for the exeresis of APC tumors, irrespective of their histological nature. We have used this approach to treat 19 neurinomas of the VIII and 11 other lesions.

[Post-traumatic facial paralysis without any fracture of the petrous bone].

Post-traumatic facial palsies are generally observed after a transverse, longitudinal or comminuted fracture of the pars petrosa. Occasionally, the fracture does not involve the Fallopian aqueduct and another mechanism must be sought. The authors present a case of facial palsy that occurred after a Le Fort's fracture of the base of the skull, not involving the Fallopian aqueduct on the CT scan.

[The value of cellulo-adenectomy in the treatment of pharyngolaryngeal cancers without clinical adenopathy].

The term cellulo-adenectomy involves dissection of all the neck jugulo-carotid lymph nodes below the digastric muscle and above the omo-hyoid muscle. From the study of 133 cases treated by primary surgery, it can be said that this technique is essentially diagnosis to verify the actual integrity of the jugulo-carotid lymph trunk in patients who are clinically NO and who present a lymphophile ENT tumour. Such a technique necessitates a macroscopic lymph examination with an extemporaneous anatomical and pathological examination.