LE STUDIUM Multidisciplinary Journal

Originally created in the Tsarist Empire, the Yiddish-language company the Vilna Troupe received international recognition due to its large national appeal to worldwide Jewish (especially Yiddish-speaking) communities and to its innovative performances for the non-Jewish audience. Aside from its strong ideological impact for the Jewish public, the company suceeded in transferring cultural trends and theatrical practices across Europe, becoming an international brand and a facilitator of crosscultural cooperation. While the importance of the company for the history of Yiddish theatre and for the Jewish cultural life in general has been recently documented (I. Bercovici, D. Caplan, A. Chiriac, Camelia Crăciun, N. Underwood), the impact of the Vilna Troupe beyond the Jewish community has been neglected, despite being remarkable. Therefore, my research focused on the impact that the Vilna Troupe had on the non-Jewish audience across Europe in terms of cultural transfer and political reception using mainly the mainstream press (but also archival sources and memoirs).

In this way, the research interaction with the ICOA (Institute of Organic and Analytical Chemistry) of the University of Orleans emerges with a strong desire to develop common projects, with great attraction for internationalization, in and allow consolidation of existing search links. The aim of the research development period at ICOA is to identify active compounds in vegetable oils and insect oils with strong appeal to the cosmetic industry.

Larix decidua, the European larch, is an excellent model to evaluate the association between genetic and phenotypic variation with environmental gradients in forest species. In the present work we evaluated the genetic variation of neutral and selective SNP markers together with the variation of eight quantitative traits along an altitudinal gradient in a natural population of this species located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Region (France). Four samples of about 200 trees each were obtained respectively from plots situated at 1350, 1700, 2000, and 2300 m above sea level. In each sampled individual four tree ring variables and four plasticity variables were evaluated. The molecular dataset consisted of the individual patterns of 46388 SNP loci. The joint analysis of molecular and quantitative trait data allowed evaluating population structure, detecting presumptively selective loci, and demonstrating the adaptive significance of the quantitative variables considered.

The environmental monitoring and its efficient management highly dependent upon the integration of heterogeneous data sources, followed by advanced numerical approaches and artificial intelligence techniques. In alignment with the objectives of JUNON programme, this fellowship focused on design and development of operational Digital Twin (DT) for environmental monitoring dedicated to groundwater and air quality systems. The aim of this project is to propose a Digital Twin architecture which is capable of integrating diverse data from in-situ sensors, satellite observations, physics-based and data driven models and to map them in web platform. The proposed system allows historical visualization, prediction, forecasting, 2d spatial mapping, and model-oriented simulation through services and ensures extensibility and long-term maintainability. A major contribution of the fellowship was consolidation and extension of an initial Digital Twin architecture into fully functional web application, incorporates data manager, scheduler for periodic updates, modeling services and user-friendly web interface. The proposed architecture was validates using real-world data across Centre-Val de Loire region, demonstrating its capability to handle heterogeneous temporal and spatial resolutions, and data quality constraints. Along with the technical development, this fellowship also contributed towards methodological design for hybrid modeling policies, operational robustness, and Digital Twins role for natural resource management. The outcome of this work offers a solid foundation for future research publications, technology transfer, and continued collaboration within the JUNON programme.

Follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) and luteinizing hormones (LH), the gonadotropins are the regulators of follicle growth, ovulation, and oocyte maturation. An imbalance in their levels or activity is known to cause subfertility or infertility, especially in women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). In many of these women, LH levels are high along with untimely LH receptor (LHR) expression in granulosa cells in the follicular phase of menstrual cycles. Here, we demonstrate that high LHR activity due to high LH stimulate abnormal cAMP levels. The interaction between FSHR and IRS proteins (IRS-1 or IRS-2) is altered due to high LH/LHR expression/activity. This study demonstrates novel therapeutic targets in women with PCOS. The inhibition of high LHR activity with antagonistic peptides or LHR specific nanobodies would pave a way towards management of hormonal imbalance in women with PCOS.

The research focussed on a monophonic chansonnier compiled after 1500 in the context of earlier, contemporary and later musical sources transmitting polyphonic and monophonic concordances and variants of its repertoire, without forgetting the repertoire uniquely transmitted by it. The resulting monograph on the manuscript will include a historical introduction and an online transcription of the melodies with their texts. It will moreover examine a group of songs shared with another monophonic chansonnier, exploring their polyphonic arrangements in related sources and the transformations of music-poetic forms, like the virelai. In examining the spread of various songs from the late fifteenth to the early sixteenth century, this study explores the significance of monophonic songs within the musical landscape of late medieval and early Renaissance France and Europe. Moreover, it reconsiders the concept of ‘variant’, proposing a more nuanced and open conception of ‘musical work’, existing well beyond the traces left in the sources.

If undercover police incite someone to break the law, to make an arrest, this is state entrapment. If a private citizen incites someone to break the law, to report them, we have private entrapment. State entrapment usually compromises prosecution. Private entrapment usually does not. The police and the courts respond to it in disparate, unpredictable ways. The research project is primarily interested in state entrapment; private entrapment is of secondary interest. The focus is on three questions: definition; permissibility; implications. Rather than stemming from innocuous conventional differences, disagreements about entrapment are at heart philosophical conflicts. Philosophy has a key role to play in deepening our understanding of the assumptions that underlie debates about entrapment, the concept of entrapment, and the ethics of entrapment. This project is the first sustained, comprehensive, and specifically philosophical study of the topic. During the research stay at Tours, one chapter of a forthcoming book (Oxford) was written.

The booming field of diffusion chronometry allows geoscientists to extract the timing and duration of subsurface magmatic processes that occur prior to volcanic eruptions. The technique relies on modeling step-wise, concentric chemical gradients that form within magmatic minerals as they grow or get perturbed by new incoming magma prior to volcanic unrest. These chemical ‘tree rings’ are smeared with time by element diffusion, so that the amount of time between perturbation and eruption can be recovered if the mobility (diffusivity) of elements is calibrated in the lab at magma temperatures. This project aims to resolve recently uncovered discrepancies between widely-used element diffusivities obtained in simplified systems (e.g., mineral-mineral couples) and those obtained in melt bearing systems (mineral-melt couples). The new experiments carried out during a STUDIUM-supported sabbatical in 2024-2025 confirmed that the presence of melt is responsible for important differences in element mobilities for olivine, perhaps via the presence of H2O. Diffusivities in plagioclase, by contrast, are not influenced by melt or H2O, implying that current community practices are robust. The underlying mechanisms by which these differences in element behavior appear are still being investigated, and new tools recently tested (hyperspectral cathodoluminescence) may hold important clues as to the presence and distribution of point defects in these minerals.