École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

About: École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne is a facility organization based out in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Catalysis. The organization has 44041 authors who have published 98296 publications receiving 4372092 citations. The organization is also known as: EPFL & ETHL.

The Cosmic Linear Anisotropy Solving System (CLASS) I: Overview

Abstract: The Cosmic Linear Anisotropy Solving System (CLASS) is a new accurate Boltzmann code, designed to offer a more user-friendly and flexible coding environment to cosmologists. CLASS is very structured, easy to modify, and offers a rigorous way to control the accuracy of output quantities. It is also incidentally a bit faster than other codes. In this overview, we present the general principles of CLASS and its basic structure. We insist on the friendliness and flexibility aspects, while accuracy, physical approximations and performances are discussed in a series of companion papers.

Interannual and seasonal variability of biomass burning emissions constrained by satellite observations

Abstract: We present a methodology for estimating the seasonal and interannual variation of biomass burning designed for use in global chemical transport models. The average seasonal variation is estimated from 4 years of fire-count data from the Along Track Scanning Radiometer (ATSR) and 1-2 years of similar data from the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) World Fire Atlases. We use the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) Aerosol Index (AI) data product as a surrogate to estimate interannual variability in biomass burning for six regions: Southeast Asia, Indonesia and Malaysia, Brazil, Central America and Mexico, Canada and Alaska, and Asiatic Russia. The AI data set is available from 1979 to the present with an interruption in satellite observations from mid-1993 to mid-1996; this data gap is filled where possible with estimates of area burned from the literature for different regions. Between August 1996 and July 2000, the ATSR fire-counts are used to provide specific locations of emissions and a record of interannual variability throughout the world. We use our methodology to estimate mean seasonal and interannual variations for emissions of carbon monoxide from biomass burning, and we find that no trend is apparent in these emissions over the last two decades, but that there is significant interannual variability.

Perspectives for dye‐sensitized nanocrystalline solar cells

Abstract: Reference LPI-ARTICLE-2000-012View record in Web of Science Record created on 2006-02-21, modified on 2017-05-12

Focal adhesion size controls tension-dependent recruitment of α-smooth muscle actin to stress fibers

Abstract: Expression of α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) renders fibroblasts highly contractile and hallmarks myofibroblast differentiation. We identify α-SMA as a mechanosensitive protein that is recruited to stress fibers under high tension. Generation of this threshold tension requires the anchoring of stress fibers at sites of 8–30-μm-long “supermature” focal adhesions (suFAs), which exert a stress approximately fourfold higher (∼12 nN/μm2) on micropatterned deformable substrates than 2–6-μm-long classical FAs. Inhibition of suFA formation by growing myofibroblasts on substrates with a compliance of ≤11 kPa and on rigid micropatterns of 6-μm-long classical FA islets confines α-SMA to the cytosol. Reincorporation of α-SMA into stress fibers is established by stretching 6-μm-long classical FAs to 8.1-μm-long suFA islets on extendable membranes; the same stretch producing 5.4-μm-long classical FAs from initially 4-μm-long islets is without effect. We propose that the different molecular composition and higher phosphorylation of FAs on supermature islets, compared with FAs on classical islets, accounts for higher stress resistance.