NCube/papyrus huggingface dataset:
Mitochondrial dysfunction in survivors of acute lymphoblastic leukemia

Childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (cALL) is the most prevalent form of paediatric cancer. Fortunately, advances in treatment have allowed for approximately 90% of those diagnosed with cALL to survive at least 5 years post treatments. However, almost two thirds of cALL survivors present at least one considerable complication due to long-term secondary effects following aggressive treatments. The metabolic syndrome (metS) and its components are present among this group of paediatric cancer survivors and are risk factors of cardiovascular diseases. Surprisingly, little information is available on mitochondrial status in paediatric cancer survivors even if these organelles display central roles in metabolic processes and their dysfunction has been connected to the development of cardiometabolic complications. The objective of this study is to determine if the appearance of cardiometabolic complications in cALL survivors is associated with alterations in the composition and functions of key mitochondrial proteins leading to dysfunctional mitochondria. Methods. We evaluated the cardiometabolic profile of a group of 52 cALL survivors classing them as either metabolically healthy or metabolically unhealthy. Mitochondria from white blood cells were isolated, assessed in several of their characteristic functions, and analyzed by the proteomic approach. Lipid peroxidation was measured and the expression of functional proteins was examined by western blot analysis and commercial ELISA kits. Results. Our findings demonstrated differences in protein expression among controls and the cALL survivor group. cALL survivors expressed lower antioxidant superoxide dismutase along with increased oxidative stress as reflected by raised malondialdehyde levels. Increased cytochrome c indicated elevated apoptosis whereas decreased expression of PGC1-α transcription factor revealed mitochondrial biogenesis reduction. Proteomic analysis identified 957 proteins within our groups. Furthermore we could evidence alterations among groups in the regulation of mitochondrial proteins including those related to signalling pathways, inflammation, apoptosis, energy production, β-oxidation, oxidoreduction, and protein transport and metabolism. Conclusion. Our proteomic and functional analysis among cALL survivors reveal differences in the presence, concentration and function of mitochondrial proteins compared to controls. These results may indicate an association between dysfunctional mitochondria and cardiometabolic complications among cALL survivors. Further studies are necessary to confirm whether mitochondrial dysfunctions are responsible for the development of cardiometabolic complications in this population.

Keyphrases: Hypertension, Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia, Cancer Survivors, Paediatric, Mitochondria, Cardiometabolic, Metabolic Syndrome, Obesity, Dyslipidemia, Insulin Resistance
Syndrome métabolique affectant les survivants de la leucémie lymphoblastique aiguë pédiatrique : rôle et dysfonctions des lipoprotéines « HDL »

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia is the most frequent malignancy in children. With the use of more modern, efficient treatments, 5-year survival has reached more than 90% in this population. However, this achievement comes with many long-term effects: more than 65% of the survivors experience at least one severe complication, including the metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular diseases. In this context, a significant proportion of pediatric cancer survivors have low HDL-Cholesterol levels. The causes of such an abnormality remain so far unknown. HDLs are multifunctional particles, which are primordial in maintaining cardiovascular health given their antioxidative, anti-atherosclerosis, anti-inflammatory and anti- thrombotic capacities, to name but a few functions. Accordingly, studies on HDL functionality in diverse pathologies have revealed some important losses of functions linked to an altered composition. The main objective of the present work was to characterize the composition and functionality of HDLs isolated from pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia survivors. The HDL fractions from the survivors contained less cholesterol than the controls. In addition, proteomic analyses using mass spectrometry revealed an enrichment of pro-thrombotic (e.g. fibrinogen) and pro-inflammatory (e.g. serum amyloid A) proteins in the HDLs deriving from metabolically unhealthy survivors. The cholesterol efflux and antioxidant capacities of these HDLs were similar to those of the controls. These results indicate an alteration in the composition of lipid and protein content of HDLs from childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia survivors with metabolic disorders. Although more work is needed to validate the functionality of these HDLs, the data seem relevant for survivor health given the detection of potential biomarkers related to HDL metabolism and functionality in cancer.

Keyphrases: HDL, Lipoproteins, Cancer survivors, Metabolic syndrome, Proteomics
L'exploitation des ressources halieutiques dans les eaux internationales : équité et protection de l'environnement

For almost 35 years, since its first signature, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea which eventually came into force on the 16th of November 1994, was originally drafted to set guidelines for both rights and responsibilities for different nations all over the world regarding the use of world's oceans, setting specific standards for the management of marine natural resources. Nevertheless, the Convention continues to supply the discussions and the negotiations on the exploitation regulations of offshore fishery resources. Except some ships in transit and offshore fishing, distant parts of oceans that have long been protected from human intrusion, are now under considerable pressures.                            Indeed, freedom of fishing in international waters is enshrined in the legal framework, unlike marine areas under the sovereignty (territorial sea) or under the jurisdiction of the coastal state (exclusive economic zone). Therefore, all states must potentially benefit from the freedom of fishing in international waters, whether coastal or non-coastal, with a non-tolerance for any legal discrimination. However, on a practical level, this freedom is undermined; for instance, some states possessing significant means of fishing make this principle illusory; hence, it leads some states to excessively overfish, leading to unreasonable exploitation of fisheries resources. And thus, questions are raised about respect for equity as well as the fate of the sustainable management of such resources. Therefore, how to reconcile freedom of fishing in international waters with a sustainable management of these resources so that all states can benefit from it? Beyond the influence of political and legal considerations that have distorted the very essence of the (notion of common heritage of mankind attributed to the mineral resources of the high seas), in dissociation of the fishery resources belonging to the same marine space, the achievement of this imperative requires the allocation of offshore fisheries management to an international public service organization.

Keyphrases: Exploitation, Service public international, Equity, High Sea, Jurisdiction, Environmental protection, Freedom of fishing, Common heritage of manking, Fisheries resources, International public service, Sovereignty
Les contrats collectifs en droit québécois

Collective contracts in Quebec law are presented as bilateral acts with the particularity that one of the cocontracting parties detains the power of binding many persons, neither parties, nor represented, nor successor, and such, without obtaining from these persons a personal consent. This particularity creates an important derogation to the relativity of contract principle, a derogation for which the rules for mandate and those of stipulation for another cannot account for. Notwithstanding the term "contract", it is tempting to doubt the true bilateral nature of these acts.  After following the evolution of the notion of the collective act, (or unilateral collective act), of which the origins emanate from Germany, then spread to Italy, and subsequently to French law, it is clear that this notion and that of the collective contract are mistakenly mingled.  In Quebec, considering that the notion of a juridical collective act is not yet part of doctrine or jurisprudence, the term collective contract seems to encompass acts, that may well be collectively formed, but that do not necessarily constitute contracts.  This thesis undertakes to adequately categorize three acts, presently assimilated by doctrine and jurisprudence as collective contracts: i) the declaration of co-ownership; ii) the Tendering Code, and iii) group insurance, by classifying them within one of the two classic juridical acts in Quebec's obligation law. To this end, a detailed analysis of the formation of each of these acts is carried out herein, exposing the various privities between the different parties concerned by each of these acts. If the reader is convinced that group insurance truly constitutes a bilateral act, the same is not so for the declaration of co-ownership and the Tendering Code, which rather seem to correspond to unilateral acts.

Keyphrases: Assurance collective, Tiers, Agreement, Bilateral act, Collective act, Contract, Declaration of co-ownership, Group insurance, Relativity of contract, Tendering code, Third party, Unilateral act
Traque-moi si je le veux : à
 la recherche d'un cadre juridique entourant la publicité comportementale

The emergence of online advertising has allowed advertisers to increase their visibility and to extend their control over the simplest decisions we make every day, ranging from the purchase of a cereal box to the media we consume. To better understand the consumers and to reach them with an unparalleled simplicity, technology has evolved and now allows online tracking of Internet users through the use of tracking cookies. Data aggregators collect unprecedented amount of information about each and everyone, which they use to deliver targeted ads, reflecting the interests and preferences of the individual who receives them. This tracking, generally carried out without the knowledge and consent of the users, often frighten those who discover its existence. The commercial practices surrounding behavioural advertising are little known and the industry seems to want to pursue its activities in the shadows. As a result, it can more easily circumvent its legal obligations with respect to consumer and privacy law. This thesis aims to shed light on corporate practices regarding behavioural advertising, the technologies that support it and the legal framework that governs it.

Keyphrases: Profilage, Online behavioural advertising, Targeted advertising, Privacy, Consumer protection, Personal information, Data collection, Tracking, Profiling, Cookies
Le travail précaire, les femmes et le droit

Over the past few years, the labour market has been profoundly changed and the worker’s conditions have been increasingly precarious. This thesis focuses more specifically on the fact that this rise in precarious work has an adverse effect mainly on women because they are overrepresented inside precarious employment. Therefore, this thesis puts forward the following question: does precarious work reveal systemic discrimination by virtue of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms? The answer to this question is built around three demonstrations. Firstly, labour and employment law, in its present form, participates to the increase in precarious employment due to its inadequacy. Secondly, precarious employment is a gendered phenomenon. Indeed, a breakdown of employment reveals a relationship between women and forms atypical employment most likely to be precarious. Lastly, as the law is imputable in part for the increase in precarious employment, the one resulting from atypical work, it constitutes systemic discrimination against women and the State, which is responsible for ensuring that the laws treat every society member equally, is obliged to legislate to that end.

Keyphrases: obligation positive, precarious work, nonstandard work, women, right to equality, systemic discrimination, positive obligation
L’économique de la pauvreté au cœur d'une ville prospère : perceptions d'usagers d'aide alimentaire

This memoir takes food aid services in Drummondville, an economically prosperous city, as an observatory to make light of the economic social representations of people living a situation of impoverishment and the way these social representations influence how they appropriate food aid. Therefore, we have worked on three levels of observation of the food aid relationship.   The first level of observation was constructed with social-historic and statistical documents about the city and the food aid environments in order to reveal its social morphology. The second level of observation of the food aid relationship was based upon periods of participant observation within two food aid organizations in Drummondville with the goal of grasping the social interactions taking place there. The third and final level of observation consisted of a series of individual open structure interviews with food aid users specifically selected in order to represent a variety of impoverishment types and social appropriation of food aid.  Among other things, we learn that when the social use of food aid is strictly merchant, it can contribute to the reduction of the social network, harming a potential social appropriation of the economy which would be better adapted to a situation of impoverishment. However, in cases where a merchant social use of food aid is accompanied or is gradually replaced with a use more akin to re-socialisation to the environment, resorting to food aid may promote the development of new social regularities and a renewed social appropriation of the economy. Social representations of the economy and the relation to dominant socioeconomic norms preceding the impoverishment situation become altered after facing a situation of impoverishment. A transformation of the relation to the economy occurs.

Keyphrases: Food assistance, Economy, Social representations, Poverty, Food security, Food banks
Le choix alimentaire des Québécois : quand la santé s’invite à table

This Master’s thesis focuses on questions regarding the evolution of Quebecer’s food choice. Our goals are to analyze why and how the food choice of Quebecers evolves and to what extent the food choice of Quebecers is medicalized and healthicized. As part of this dissertation, we chose to conduct fifteen interviews with men and women aged 60 and over. From the thematic analysis of the interviews we conducted, it emerges that the men and women in our sample who speak about health and nutrition generally use medicalized and healthicized discourse. In addition, several factors influence the evolution of the food choice; the most important of which are the family and the state of health. Although the small size of our sample does not allow us to conclude in a general way about the differences between men's and women's discourse, the men interviewed in this research tend to justify their food choices according to their health problems and therefore base their food choices on biomedical concepts. The women in our sample justify their food choices by referring to a wider range of factors such as the environment, agriculture, their family members, health problems and alternative medicine. Thus, their choices are part of a dynamic of medicalization and of healthicization. This distinction suggests an interesting track for further research.

Keyphrases: Genre, Food choice, Medicalization, Healthicization, Gender, Feminity, Masculinity
La conciliation études-travail chez les jeunes Québécois : travailler pour étudier, étudier pour travailler ou concilier pour étudier?

This thesis aims to suggest different reflections on the propensity of Quebecois students to have a paid job while completing their university studies. Recent statistics show that Quebecois students are more likely to take on this dual role than students in the rest of Canada, and that they also tend to devote more hours to it. Why? To answer this question, the conciliation of studying and working will be considered beyond the number of hours that can be devoted to them and will focus on highlighting the constitutive dispositions of this phenomenon, thus making it possible to display the importance or the value of any of its activities. To do this, we must examine five elements that are likely to influence these dispositions: age, gender, social origin, the constraints of the curriculum and the responsibilities taken by students. In this survey, the notion of "disposition" as developed by Bourdieu will be solicited in order to translate practical knowledge (mainly resulting from semi- directive interviews) into theoretical knowledge. For Bourdieu, the notion of "disposition" corresponds to "attitudes, inclinations to be perceived, felt and thought, internalized by individuals because of their objective conditions of existence and which then function as unconscious principles of action, perception and of reflection "(Bourdieu, 1980, p.88-89). The analysis is mainly based on a series of comprehensive interviews conducted using the latest work by Elsa Ramos as reference. The students targeted for this project come from differentiated programs and hold a position that is not related to their field of study. The qualities of this sample provide a relatively diverse portrait of the student population. The dispositions that emerge from the interviews highlight the (expressive / instrumental) values that enable us to explain the phenomenon of school-work conciliation amongst young Quebecers through a sociological lens.

Keyphrases: Conciliation, Études, Studies, Work, Employment, Student, Quebec
Pure water in the city covering the reservoirs on Mount Royal

The questions of how and why water has disappeared in the urban landscape are explored in this study of the uncovered reservoirs of the Montreal water supply system that were destined to be covered. A case study of three reservoirs, the McTavish (open from 1856 to 1948), the Côte-des-Neiges (from 1893 to 1938), and the Vincent d’Indy (from 1915 to 1964), considers how the form and function of these reservoirs changed, as the relationship between environmental factors, technological means and social concerns evolved in the developing city. In response to advantages and challenges of the city’s topography, the reservoirs were built on the flanks of Mount Royal. The potential the reservoirs offer to expand the mountain’s conservation core is explored in a reconsideration of their situation within a belt of institutional properties that delimit the heart of this principal natural and cultural landscape of the city. A shift in the focus of water supply development from quantitative to qualitative concerns, related to the rise of both public health and environmental perspectives, was a principal incentive to covering water supply reservoirs. Nevertheless, the expense of rebuilding the basins as reinforced concrete boxes covered in earth and sod, and the lack of regulations requiring covers on all reservoirs, lead to the process being delayed for decades. Furthermore, the city was in full expansion throughout this period, so that the pressure to increase the capacity of water storage rivalled that of guaranteeing water quality. The resulting focus on efficiency is embodied in the landscapes of the transformed reservoirs, in which little funds or planning resources were invested. Certain unplanned but critical consequences of this transformation are examined: the disassociation of water supply from the urban ecosystem; the loss of visibility of the waterworks; the decreased recognition of their collective value; the confusion about responsibility for these open spaces and a related lack of upkeep; the concealment of water supply and other technological functions in the mountain landscape; and the lack of integration of the reservoir sites in plans for the mountain’s conservation.

Keyphrases: Conservation, Water supply reservoirs, History, Conservation, Mount Royal, Landscape
L’université québécoise en mutation : entre valorisation du savoir et recherche partenariale

This thesis focuses on the transformation of universities and, more specifically, the impact of their research partnerships with private companies on the role of universities in contemporary Quebec society. To achieve this, the evolution of university research is described: from its integration in the Humboldtian University as an institutional mission, to the valorization of its results in accordance with the discourse emerging from knowledge economy theories. The qualitative analysis is based on semi-directed interviews with professors-researchers experienced in partnership research projects and their designs. These interviews retrace these professors’ daily life as they work in those partnerships. Different topics such as academic freedom, the relationship with the industrial partners and the training of students were discussed. The data collected was analysed from an Habermasian’s perspective which is particularly adapted for studying science and technology development in higher education institutions.

Keyphrases: transformation of universities, exploitation of research, university-company research partnerships, knowledge society, knowledge economy
Les Valoristes : étude sociologique du cas de la récupération informelle des matériaux à Montréal

With this master’s thesis, I propose an analysis of the mutations of labour, by looking at the reality of the Valoristes, Montreal workers who collect refundable containers in the streets, alleys and parks of the city. I describe the workers and the activity itself, but I also look at the different dynamics of this type of informal activity, while analyzing the process who got the Valoristes to collects these containers in the first place. From the start, I define these individuals as workers who have an informal and atypical economic activity, but who are not substantially different from other kinsd of more traditional wage workers. This leads me to study their work not as a “mean to climb out of poverty”, but as the result of a multitude of exclusion dynamics and actors who create marginalized and precarized forms of labour. From this definition, it is possible to study the mutations of the labour market in new ways, different from the traditional work structure, while linking this reality with other forms of atypical or precarious work, which are growing to be a large part of today’s labour market. The study of the “Coopérative de solidarité Les Valoristes”, a cooperative that tries to organize these workers, then leads me to take a look at new forms of collective organization, that can improve the situation of marginalized workers while positioning itself outside the traditional codes of collective action.

Keyphrases: Consigne, Sociology of labour, Atypical work, Precarity, Refundable containers, Marginality, Collective organization, Cooperative movement