Belgian Science Policy Office Research Articles

Planktonic, benthic and sympagic copepods collected from the desalination unit of Mario Zucchelli Research Station in Terra Nova Bay (Ross Sea, Antarctica).

Distributional data on planktonic, benthic and sympagic copepods collected in the framework of the XXXIVth Expeditions of the Italian National Antarctic Programme (PNRA) to the Ross Sea sector from 2018-2019 are here provided. These occurrences correspond to specimens collected from the 25 μm filters used in the desalination plant of the Italian research station "Mario Zucchelli" (MZS), located in the Terra Nova Bay area (TNB; Ross Sea, Antarctica). This dataset is a contribution to the Antarctic Biodiversity Portal, the thematic Antarctic node for both the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (AntOBIS) and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility Antarctic Biodiversity Information Facility (ANTABIF). The dataset was uploaded and integrated with the SCAR-AntOBIS database (the geospatial component of SCAR-MarBIN). Please follow the guidelines from the SCAR Data Policy (ISSN 1998-0337) when using the data. If you have any questions regarding this dataset, please contact us via the contact information provided in the metadata or via data-biodiversity-aq@naturalsciences.be. Issues with the dataset can be reported at the biodiversity-aq GitHub project. We describe the diversity of marine copepods Terra Nova Bay sampled by the filters installed in the desalination unit (DU) of the Italian research station "Mario Zucchelli" described in recent work. The opening of the intake pipe of the DU is positioned at a depth of 4 m and allowed a total of 2,116 specimens to be sampled and recognised. In addition, new occurrence records of copepod genera and species are reported in the same zone. We provide an overview of the marine copepod diversity reported for TNB. The total of 2,116 individuals corresponds to 14 genera and 15 species and is represented by 136 occurrence records in this dataset. Around 52% of the total number of species are new records for the TNB area. The publication of this data paper was funded by the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO, contract n°FR/36/AN1/AntaBIS) in the Framework of EU-Lifewatch as a contribution to the SCAR Antarctic biodiversity portal (biodiversity.aq).

Laevilacunaria (Mollusca, Gastropoda) in the Southern Ocean: A comprehensive occurrence dataset.

The present dataset is a compilation of georeferenced occurrences of the littorinid genus Laevilacunaria Powell, 1951 (Mollusca, Gastropoda) in the Southern Ocean. Occurrence data were obtained from field expeditions (Antarctic and sub-Antarctic sampling) between 2015 and 2022, together with a review of published literature including records from 1887 to 2022. Three Laevilacunaria species have been recorded from the Southern Ocean: Laevilacunariabennetti, L.antarctica and L.pumilio. The present dataset includes 75 occurrences, representing the most exhaustive database of this Antarctic and sub-Antarctic littorinid genus. The publication of this data paper was funded by the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO, contract n°FR/36/AN1/AntaBIS) in the Framework of EU-Lifewatch as a contribution to the SCAR Antarctic biodiversity portal (biodiversity.aq).

MetaBelgica Project

Trustworthy metadata about entities related to cultural heritage is important to correctly identify bibliographic meta-data, attribute works, identify works of public domain (based on contributors’ date of death), or to support Named Entity Linking (NEL) for digitised documents. However, in Belgium such data is currently dispersed between numerous institutions, modelled with different ontologies, represented in different formats and curated in different languages. GLAM institutions would profit from data about Belgian entities to correctly annotate their collections.Furthermore, this would facilitate research in Belgium and abroad. The current situation does not only complicate data exchange in a national and international setting, but also leads to duplicate data curation efforts and data quality issues, negatively impacting the users’ experience. This paper introduces the MetaBelgica project, coordinated by KBR - The Royal Library of Belgium with the Royal Museums of Fine Arts, the Royal institute for Cultural Heritage, and the Royal Museum of Art and History, to improve the status quo. The aforementioned Federal Scientific Institutes (FSIs), belonging to the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO), joined forces to develop a shared Linked Data platform for managing shared entities. This platform, based on Wikibase (the technology behind Wikidata), aims to ensure FAIR data about persons, organisations, time/events and locations related to Belgian cultural heritage. We will integrate data about millions of Belgian entities from the four participating FSIs into a Wikibase instance and make it accessible by using Persistent Identifiers. This will not only professionalize our own data management and improve data quality, but according to received project support letters, also impact other regional, national and European institutions.

Revealing the hidden biodiversity of Antarctic and the Magellanic Sub-Antarctic Ecoregion: A comprehensive study of aquatic invertebrates from the BASE Project.

Antarctica, its outlying archipelagoes and the Magellanic Subantarctic (MSA) ecoregion are amongst the last true wilderness areas remaining on the planet. Therefore, the publication, citation and peer review of their biodiversity data are essential. The new Millennium Institute Biodiversity of Antarctic and Subantarctic Ecosystems (BASE), a Chilean scientific initiative funded by the National Agency of Research and Innovation, contributes 770 new records of aquatic invertebrates as a point of reference for present-day biodiversity research at these latitudes. The occurrence dataset presented here has never been released before and is the result of the systematic recording of occurrences of several taxa across the Antarctic, Subantarctic and Magellanic Subantarctic ecoregions. We collected data from marine and freshwater invertebrates across numerous samplings from 2008 to 2023. From the 770 occurrences, we identified 160 taxa, 125 at species level and 35 at the genus level. The database has been registered in the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). The publication of this data paper was funded by the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO, contract n°FR/36/AN1/AntaBIS) in the Framework of EU-Lifewatch as a contribution to the SCAR Antarctic biodiversity portal (biodiversity.aq).

HOME project and the creation of an ethical policy – two Belgian initiatives

Starting in December 2019, the “HOME: Human Remains Origin(s) Multidisciplinary Evaluation” project has been granted funding for a duration of 2 years, focusing on historical collections of human remains in a network of seven institutional partners. Through the BRAIN-be 2.0 Pillar 2 “Heritage science”, call, the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO) provided funding for Provenance research. The call “Heritage Science” concerns scientific research in support of the federal – scultural, scientific and historical – heritage and in particular that in Belgian Federal Scientific Institutions (FSIs). The HOME project will result in a multidisciplinary evaluation of the historical collections of human remains in Belgium, particularly in the FSIs. The deliverables of the project include reports on the collections in the different institutions detailing the inventories. The reports will also advise on how to best manage the diverse human remains collections in Belgium as well as propose management scenarios in response to existing and future requests of repatriation . There is also no best practice in Belgium on how to manage human remains collections. As a separate initiative but with parallel aims of the HOME project, an independent group from the Royal Museum of Art and History (RMAH) is establishing a Belgian policy about the study, preservation and exhibition of human remains in a museum context.

Loading constraints in vehicle routing problems: a focus on axle weight limits

This work is supported by the Interuniversity Attraction Poles Programme initiated by the Belgian Science Policy Office (COMEX project: Combinatorial Optimization: Metaheuristics and Exact methods). The computational resources and services used in this work were provided by the VSC (Flemish Supercomputer Center), funded by the Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO) and the Flemish Government - department EWI.

Optimizing operational costs and service quality in dial-a-ride systems

This research was funded by FWO (Research Foundation Flanders) and fits in the COMEX project (Combinatorial Optimization: Metaheuristics & Exact Methods) of the Belgian Science Policy Office.

Contrast Induced by a Static Magnetic Field for Improved Detection in Nanodiamond Fluorescence Microscopy

The authors are grateful to D. Van Dyck, M. Wijnants, and P. Casteels for technical assistance, and B. Yavkin for contributions to the implementation of ODMR measurements. Financial support for this research is kindly acknowledged from the Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO, Grant No. G.088812N), the European Commission (FP7-PEOPLE-IEFINCA-NANEP, Contract No. 328214, and the FP7/2007-2013 project DIADEMS, Grant Agreement No. 611143), the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO), the Ministry of Science and Education of the Czech Republic (Contract No. CZ.1.07/2.3.00/20.0306).

Data acquisition with the APEX hyperspectral sensor

Abstract APEX (Airborne Prism EXperiment) is a high spectral and spatial resolution hyperspectral sensor developed by a Swiss-Belgian consortium on behalf of the European Space Agency. Since the acceptance of the instrument in 2010, it has been operated jointly by the Flemish Institute for Technological Research (VITO, Mol, Belgium) and the Remote Sensing Laboratories (RSL, Zurich, Switzerland). During this period, several flight campaigns have been performed across Europe, gathering over 4 Terabytes of raw data. Following radiometric, geometric and atmospheric processing, this data has been provided to a multitude of Belgian and European researchers, institutes and agencies, including the European Space Agency (ESA), the European Facility for Airborne Research (EUFAR) and the Belgian Science Policy Office (BelSPO). The applications of APEX data span a wide range of research topics, e.g. landcover mapping (mountainous, coastal, countryside and urban regions), the assessment of important structural and (bio)physical characteristics of vegetative and non-vegetative species, the tracing of atmospheric gases, and water content analysis (chlorophyll, suspended matter). Recurrent instrument calibration, accurate flight planning and preparation, and experienced pilots and instrument operators are crucial to successful data acquisition campaigns. In this paper, we highlight in detail these practical aspects of a typical APEX data acquisition campaign.

Nanostructured ECM-like biointerfaces for regenerative medicine applications

Event Abstract Back to Event Nanostructured ECM-like biointerfaces for regenerative medicine applications Damien Lefèvre1, Christine Dupont-Gillain1 and Sophie Demoustier-Champagne1 1 Université Catholique de Louvain, Institute of Condensed Matter and Nanosciences (Bio & Soft Matter), Belgium Regenerative medicine drives the development of biointerfaces artificially recreating down to the nanoscale the conditions guiding cell fate in vivo. As the complex interplay of topographical, mechanical, biochemical and physicochemical stimuli driving cell proliferation and differentiation is provided in nature through the extracellular matrix [ECM], current trends in tissue engineering focus on the development of biointerfaces mimicking the native ECM. Here, we report on the production of biomimetic interfaces to support regenerative medicine strategies. With the ECM nanofibrillar structure set as standard, our engineered ECM-like matrices were designed as networks consisting of intersected nanotubes (Fig 1). While ensuring appropriate porosity, such a network offers the opportunity to store a bioactive cargo (e.g., growth factor, anti-inflammatory drug, etc.) within the constituting hollow nanotubes. When choosing the components of these nanotubes, a compromise between biomimetism, biocompatibility and adequate mechanical stability was reached, in a way to switch from soft nanoenvironments closely mimicking the native ECM towards more robust self-supported 3D architectures. Biomacromolecules originating from the native ECM, i.e. collagen [Col] and hyaluronic acid [HA], were therefore combined with a framework of rigid and conductive polymers or ceramic strengthening agents to yield nanotubes with a core-shell structure. The strategy developed for the preparation of these matrices consists in a combination of the hard-templating method with bottom-up synthesis processes[1]. Track-etched polycarbonate membranes [PC] featuring a network of intersected nanopores were filled by a combination of the layer-by-layer [LbL] assembly of Col and HA[2], either with the (electro)polymerization of a rigid conductive polymer (polypyrrole, [PPy])[3] or the adsorption of strengthening agents (e.g., silicon dioxide nanoparticles), to build hybrid nanostructures. Electron microscopy data show the production, after selective dissolution of the supporting template, of mechanically-strengthened ECM-like nanostructures (Fig 2). The chemical composition of these biointerfaces was determined using energy dispersive X-rays and time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry while the mechanical properties of their constituting nanotubes were probed using atomic force microscopy nanoindentation tests. Adhesion and proliferation assays involving the seeding of MC3T3-E1 pre-osteoblasts on the produced biointerfaces will yield indications regarding the potentialities of our engineered biomaterials to efficiently support cell proliferation and differentiation without inducing cytotoxic effects. In conclusion, as an original contribution to the synthesis of biointerfaces able to regulate cell fate for regenerative medicine, we have developed biointerfaces mimicking the native ECM. Applying bottom-up synthesis processes within a templating membrane featuring intersected nanopores offers a highly versatile approach for the creation of multifunctional 3D biointerfaces whose chemical composition as well as mechanical and conductive properties can be tailored at will. Engineered ECM-like biointerfaces offering such a wide range of tailored stimuli are expected to open opportunities to guide the differentiation of cells, including stem cells, towards a desired phenotype. This research has been funded by the Interuniversity Attraction Poles Program initiated by the Belgian Science Policy Office (IAP-PAI P7/05).

Mutations in ABCA7 in a Belgian cohort of Alzheimer's disease patients: a targeted resequencing study

ABCA7 was identified as a risk gene for Alzheimer's disease in genome-wide association studies (GWAS). It was one of the genes most strongly associated with risk of Alzheimer's disease in a Belgian cohort. Using targeted resequencing, we investigated ABCA7 in this cohort with the aim to directly detect rare and common variations in this gene associated with Alzheimer's disease pathogenesis. We did massive parallel resequencing of ABCA7 after HaloPlex target enrichment of the exons, introns, and regulatory regions in 772 unrelated patients with Alzheimer's disease (mean age at onset 74·6 years [SD 8·9]) recruited at two memory clinics in Flanders, Belgium, and 757 geographically matched community-dwelling controls (mean age at inclusion 73·9 years [8·0]). After bioinformatic processing, common variants were analysed with conditional logistic regression and rare variant association analysis was done in Variant Association Tools. To explore an observed founder effect, additional unrelated patients with Alzheimer's disease (n=183, mean age at onset 78·8 years [SD 6·0]) and control individuals (n=265, mean age at inclusion 56·9 years [10·8]) from the same cohort who had not been included in massive parallel resequencing because of insufficient biosamples were screened for the ABCA7 frameshift mutation Glu709fs with Sanger sequencing. The effect of loss-of-function mutations on ABCA7 expression was investigated with quantitative real-time PCR in post-mortem brains of patients (n=3) and control individuals (n=4); nonsense mediated mRNA decay was investigated in lymphoblast cell lines from three predicted loss-of-function mutation carriers from the cohort of 772 patients with Alzheimer's disease. An intronic low-frequency variant rs78117248 (minor allele frequency 3·8% in 58 patients with Alzheimer's disease and in controls 1·8% in 28 controls) showed strongest association with Alzheimer's disease (odds ratio 2·07, 95% CI 1·31-3·27; p=0·0016), and remained significant after conditioning for the GWAS top single nucleotide polymorphisms rs3764650, rs4147929, and rs3752246 (2·00, 1·22-3·26; p=0·006). We identified an increased frequency of predicted loss-of-function mutations in the patients compared with the controls (relative risk 4·03, 95% CI 1·75-9·29; p=0·0002). One frameshift mutation (Glu709fs) showed a founder effect in the study population, and was found to segregate with disease in a family with autosomal dominant inheritance of Alzheimer's disease. Expression of ABCA7 was reduced in the two carriers of loss-of-function mutations found only in patients with Alzheimer's disease (Glu709fs and Trp1214*) compared with four non-carrier controls (relative expression 0·45, 95% CI 0·25-0·84; p=0·002) and in lymphoblast cell lines from three carriers of Glu709fs compared with those from two non-carrier controls. We propose that a low-frequency variant can explain the association between ABCA7 and Alzheimer's disease, and the evidence of loss-of-function mutations in this risk gene suggests that partial loss-of-function of ABCA7 could be a potential pathogenetic mechanism of Alzheimer's disease. Belgian Science Policy Office Interuniversity Attraction Poles program P7/16, Alzheimer Research Foundation, King Baudouin Foundation AB Fund, Methusalem Excellence Program initiative of the Flemish Government, Flanders Impulse Program on Networks for Dementia Research, Research Foundation Flanders, Agency for Innovation by Science and Technology Flanders, University of Antwerp Research Fund, and European Union's Seventh Framework Programme for Research, Technological development and Demonstration (AgedBrainSYSBIO).

Extracellular recordings of neuronal activity by protruding microelectrodes array

Event Abstract Back to Event Extracellular recordings of neuronal activity by protruding microelectrodes array Anastasiya Moskalyuk1, Ramona Samba2, Micha E. Spira3, Isabel Pintelon4, Jean-Pierre Timmermans4 and Michele Giugliano1, 5, 6* 1 University of Antwerp, Dept. Biomedical Sciences, Belgium 2 Natural and Medical Sciences Institute, Germany 3 Institute of Life Science, Hebrew University, Israel 4 University of Antwerp, Dept. Veterinary Sciences, Belgium 5 Neuro-Electronic Research in Flanders, Belgium 6 University of Sheffield, Dept. Computer Science, United Kingdom Multi-electrode arrays (MEAs) are widely used for the investigation of neuronal networks properties and drug screening. The main advantage of this method is a simultaneous registration of electrical activity from a large number of neurons during long periods (days or weeks). However, a major disadvantage of MEA recordings relates to the low signal to noise ratio resulting in failure of detecting subthreshold synaptic events and thus not capturing an essential part of information. In view of the development of novel MEAs with improved recording quality, we investigated the properties and validity of mushroom shape microelectrodes (gold μE). Using dissociated neuronal cultures, the present study revealedthat neuronal cells are able to engulf gold μEs and that the presence of protruding gold μEs do not impact on adhesion and viability of these neurons. In addition, we could show that µEs do not alter passive/active membrane properties of neurons or their network properties. Furthermore, this type of microelectrodes in combination with a conducting polymer coating significantly improves the quality of extracellular recordings. We can conclude that µEs offer further perspectives in enhancing the quality and sensitivity of MEAs and thus might provide an added value in our future understanding of neuronal network behaviour. Acknowledgements J. Couto for discussions; D. Van Dyck for the excellent technical assistance. Financial support from the European Commission (Collaborative Research Project “BRAINLEAP”), from the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO, grant n. G.0888.12N), and from the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO) Keywords: MEA, protruding electrode, action potential, Engulfment, multielectrode recordings Conference: 11th National Congress of the Belgian Society for Neuroscience, Mons, Belgium, 22 May - 22 May, 2015. Presentation Type: Poster presentation Topic: Neuroscience Citation: Moskalyuk A, Samba R, Spira ME, Pintelon I, Timmermans J and Giugliano M (2015). Extracellular recordings of neuronal activity by protruding microelectrodes array. Front. Neurosci. Conference Abstract: 11th National Congress of the Belgian Society for Neuroscience. doi: 10.3389/conf.fnins.2015.89.00072 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 30 Apr 2015; Published Online: 05 May 2015. * Correspondence: Prof. Michele Giugliano, University of Antwerp, Dept. Biomedical Sciences, Antwerp, 2610, Belgium, michele.giugliano@uantwerpen.be Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Anastasiya Moskalyuk Ramona Samba Micha E Spira Isabel Pintelon Jean-Pierre Timmermans Michele Giugliano Google Anastasiya Moskalyuk Ramona Samba Micha E Spira Isabel Pintelon Jean-Pierre Timmermans Michele Giugliano Google Scholar Anastasiya Moskalyuk Ramona Samba Micha E Spira Isabel Pintelon Jean-Pierre Timmermans Michele Giugliano PubMed Anastasiya Moskalyuk Ramona Samba Micha E Spira Isabel Pintelon Jean-Pierre Timmermans Michele Giugliano Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.

Social Enterprises in Lima: Notions and Operating Models

The social enterprise movement in Lima is gathering momentum. An increasing number of people are taking an interest in this field of activity, in events that help spread the word about its significance, and in a range of initiatives aimed at promoting the phenomenon. In Peru, in general, and in Lima, in particular, there has been a growing interest in promoting the social enterprise movement in recent years, with good results. Young people in particular are more aware of social and environmental issues and look upon enterprises as organisations with the legitimacy and the potential to address these problems.The interest in social enterprises has not, however, been accompanied by the creation of a knowledge base that may help us understand better the peculiarities and complexities of this promising sector. Our article proposes to bridge this gap in knowledge. It is is divided into two sections: ( i) definitions; and ( ii) operating models for social enterprises. The first section sets out various definitions and interpretations of the term ‘social enterprise’, while the second part provides an empirical account of six different operating models for social enterprises that are active in Lima. Specifically, this part explains the relationship between social enterprises, the market and the intended beneficiaries. We contend that understanding this three-dimensional relationship is essential for developing a credible knowledge base for social enterprises and their value to the wider economy and society.We use qualitative methodology to support our empirical observations. Our extensive review of the literature enables us to draw down three conceptual and practical propositons which we explore through 39 in-depth interviews were held with government officials, social entrepreneurs, academics and representatives of non-governmental, multilateral aid and private-sector organisations related in some way to social enterprises.The study was carried out as part of the ‘International Comparative Social Enterprise Models’ project, financed by the Belgian Science Policy Office in collaboration with the EMES International Research Network.

KIC 10526294: a slowly rotating B star with rotationally split, quasi-equally spaced gravity modes(Corrigendum)

? Based on observations made with the William Herschel Telescope operated by the Isaac Newton Group on the island of La Palma at the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias. ?? Appendices are available in electronic form at http://www.aanda.org ??? Postdoctoral Fellow of the Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO), Belgium. ???? Postdoctoral Fellow of the Fund for Scientific Research (FWO), Flanders, Belgium. † Postdoctoral Fellow of the Fund for Scientific Research (FWO), Flanders, Belgium.

The Role of Institutions in European Patterns of Work and Retirement

This paper uses the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) to investigate the role of pension and social security institutions in shaping the European patterns of work and retirement. We provide evidence on the extent of “unused capacity” in labor force, on pathways to retirement and on the relationship between actual health status and disability take up. We find that institutional differences between countries explain much of the cross-national differences in work and retirement, while differences in health and demographics play only a minor role. Acknowledgements: The SHARE data collection has been primarily funded by the European Commission through the 5th framework programme (project QLK6-CT-2001-00360 in the thematic programme Quality of Life). Additional funding came from the US National Institute on Aging (U01 AG0974013S2, P01 AG005842, P01 AG08291, P30 AG12815, Y1-AG-4553-01 and OGHA 04-064). Data collection in Austria (through the Austrian Science Fund, FWF), Belgium (through the Belgian Science Policy Office) and Switzerland (through BBW/OFES/UFES) was nationally funded. We are grateful to Susann Rohwedder for kindly providing her programming code for the lifetables. We thank Lorenzo Agnoletto, Christian Goldammer, Giacomo Masier, Giacomo Pinaffo, Stephanie Stuck, and Fabian Terner for excellent research assistance.

Economic Grand Rounds: Financial Burden of Medical Care and Risk of Forgoing Care Among Europeans With Depressive Symptoms

Economic Grand Rounds: Financial Burden of Medical Care and Risk of Forgoing Care Among Europeans With Depressive Symptoms