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Understanding speech in the presence of multiple speakers (i.e. cocktail-party scene) is challenging. In such scenarios, research has shown that visual speech cues can improve speech intelligibility, but the extent to which tactile speech input can also provide a beneficial effect remains unclear. In the current study, we present two distinct experiments which evaluated the effect of vibrotactile stimulation on speech perception in cocktail-party noise. Firstly, we measured 46 participants’ speech recognition thresholds in audio-only and audio-tactile noisy conditions. The vibrotactile stimulation, presented congruently (i.e. synchronously) with the speech stream of interest, was provided to the palms either unimanually or bimanually. Secondly, 30 participants listened to four 6-min audio stories which contained speech presented in silence or embedded in noise, with and without additional unimanual vibrotactile stimulation. The vibrotactile input was either congruent or incongruent (i.e. random) with the attended speech. At the end of each story, participants answered comprehension questions related to each experimental condition. The first experiment showed a significant positive effect of vibrotactile stimulation on speech-in-noise recognition, with no significant effect of the stimulation location. The second experiment illustrated a significant effect of congruent vibrotactile stimulation on the percentage of correct responses to comprehension questions. Moreover, it highlighted the absence of a significant enhancing effect when the vibrotactile input is incongruent with the speech signal, as well as in the absence of background noise. Taken together, our results illustrate the potential role of the tactile modality to supplement speech-in-noise perception, even in complex cocktail-party auditory scenes., info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

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On the long term, buildings could initiate less material flows and have improved environmental performance if they are designed for future disassembly and reuse. However, material flows in the building life cycle are difficult to map, especially those initiated by material replacements and at end-of-life. The calculation formula for the number of replacements in buildings in the Life Cycle Assessment standard EN 15978 neglects the effect such replacements may have on the surrounding interdependent building parts, and hence fails to capture the potential benefits of Design for Disassembly. In light of this shortcoming, we propose a method to model the flows of building parts initiated by the disassembly of a building, both during operational and end-of-life stages. This modeling method considers aspects of structural stability, accessibility, and the use of detachable connections. It offers a bottom-up time-based Material Flow Analysis of an entire building which can be integrated in a Life Cycle Assessment. We apply our method on a pavilion and compare the method results to the those obtained with EN 15978, considering nine design options. The life cycle environmental impact estimated with our method is up to 162% larger than the impacts calculated with EN 15978 for a pavilion with non-detachable connections, which demonstrates the importance of this design parameter. Our method can be of interest to researchers, Life Cycle Assessment and Life Cycle Costing auditors, architecture, engineering and construction professionals, urban miners and any other actors interested in the design of demountable buildings.

The 2014, 2015 and 2016 Brussels and Paris attacks by young European Muslims who had joined IS were followed by abundant legislative activity in the security area; they prompted the federal government and the governments of the federated entities to adopt several “action plans”, and eventually led to an important reorganisation of the Belgian security assemblage. In this context, the objective of AFFECT has been to assess the impact of de-“radicalisation” policies on social cohesion and liberties. Two problems appeared to require particular attention: the rise of “pre-emptive security”, and the adoption of the notion of “radicalisation” that fits perfectly into the latter’s precautionary logic. The field investigated is that of the Belgian State's law enforcement apparatus (police, courts, prisons). Our findings (i) suggest that “radicalisation” is, in advanced liberal societies, the “strategic invention” that allows the passage from social security to “pre-emptive security”, and the reconfiguration of law and the “surveillant assemblages” that this passage requires, and (ii) uncover some impacts of mechanisms induced by this notion, on social cohesion and liberties, the suspectification of the Muslim community, and the marginalisation or radical exclusion of some of its members.

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Deliberative minipublics are often critiqued for being disconnected with mass democracy. This is problematic from the perspective of legitimacy. If ordinary citizens are not aware of the existence of minipublics, how can citizens consent to the process and outcomes of these processes? One possible design innovation is to widen the pool of citizens randomly invited to take part in minipublics. While not all invited individuals will be selected to join minipublics, inviting a large pool of people, at the very least, may trigger their curiosity to closely observe and scrutinise the debates and recommendations of their fellow citizens. Our article examines the viability of this design feature using the case study of the citizen panel ‘Make Your Brussels – Mobility’. We focus on a group of 336 people who accepted the invitation to participate in the citizen panel but were not among the 40 people selected to participate. We have two major findings. First, despite their initial interest in taking part in a minipublic, these citizens did not follow up on their interest in the minipublic. Second, these citizens do not perceive citizen panels as capable of delivering consensual outcomes. We conclude the article by drawing out implications for deliberative practice, especially in enhancing the legitimacy of minipublics.

Biomass is a key player as a renewable resource for the energy transition required to mitigate climate change. Versatility is its strength as it can be used to produce heat, electricity, fuels or chemicals for the non-energy demand (NED). Therefore, the question arises of the optimal use of biomass in energy systems. In the literature, this optimal use is often determined for one specific situation in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and rarely considering the NED. The NED is defined as the demand for energy products used as raw materials. Given the expected simultaneous changes in all industrial sectors, it is important to include the NED in the models of energy systems as they will share common resources. This paper: (1) studies the optimal use of lignocellulosic biomass within an energy system including the NED and (2) analyses the evolution of its role throughout the energy transition. Belgium is taken as case study as it presents a NED corresponding to ~15% of its primary energy mix. The energy system is modelled with EnergyScope TD which optimises whole-energy systems in terms of costs under GHG emission constraints. Local and imported biomass is considered with two potential scenarios. 14 biomass converting technologies are included in the model. It is shown that high temperature heat remains a significant application for biomass in all scenarios and increases when moving towards carbon neutrality. For GHG savings below 50%, biomass is largely used for low temperature heat. However, when aiming at reducing GHG further (>50% reduction), biomass is substantially exploited for the NED. The integration of the NED in the simulations impacts the allocation of biomass in the system, depending on the scenario of potential considered. Electricity from biomass appears for large GHG savings only.

Introduction: Modafinil is an eugeroic drug that has been examined to maintain or recover wakefulness, alertness, and cognitive performance when sleep deprived. In a nonmilitary context, the use of modafinil as a nootropic or smart drug, i.e., to improve cognitive performance without being sleep deprived, increases. Although cognitive performance is receiving more explicit attention in a military context, research into the impact of modafinil as a smart drug in function of operationality is lacking. Therefore, the current review aimed at presenting a current state-of-the-art and research agenda on modafinil as a smart drug. Beside the question whether modafinil has an effect or not on cognitive performance, we examined four research questions based on the knowledge on modafinil in sleep-deprived subjects: (1) Is there a difference between the effect of modafinil as a smart drug when administered in repeated doses versus one single dose?; (2) Is the effect of modafinil as a smart drug dose-dependent?; (3) Are there individual-related and/or task-related impact factors?; and (4) What are the reported mental and/or somatic side effects of modafinil as a smart drug? Method: We conducted a systematic search of the literature in the databases PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus, using the search terms "Modafinil" and "Cognitive enhance*" in combination with specific terms related to the research questions. The inclusion criteria were studies on healthy human subjects with quantifiable cognitive outcome based on cognitive tasks. Results: We found no literature on the impact of a repeated intake of modafinil as a smart drug, although, in users, intake occurs on a regular basis. Moreover, although modafinil was initially said to comprise no risk for abuse, there are now indications that modafinil works on the same neurobiological mechanisms as other addictive stimulants. There is also no thorough research into a potential risk for overconfidence, whereas this risk was identif

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This chapter focuses on the inception phase of a policydriven creative cluster in Brussels called mediapark.brussels. This 10-year urban and property development project around the existing site of the public broadcasting companies VRT and RTBF must result in an attractive urban area for media companies, professionals, communities and entrepreneurs to live and work in. To this end, different regional and local authorities as well as public administrations and organisations are contributing to this project. The chapter outlines the current policy framework in which the mediapark.brussels is being developed. The insights gained through the case study show the issues a government-led cluster initiative can be confronted with, especially in a multi-level governance model. Belgium, with is federal structure made up of (language-based) communities and (territorial) regions, forms an interesting context to study the interplay between various policy levels, considering that the media are a competence of the Communities and not of the Government of the Brussels Capital Region which initiated mediapark.brussels. The resulting tensions that emerge in the development of the project are discussed: a tension between urban and cultural development, between local and international perspectives, and between a wide-spectrum and a specialised media cluster. The findings will be of specific interest to policy researchers of and policy officers in public administrations in complex, multi-level governance contexts.

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The importance of the media industry as an economic asset for cities has been broadly recognized by a growing number of studies and governments from multiple levels. For instance, Krätke (2003) argues that media firms are highly influential in the development of cities. The European Commission states that the media industry plays ‘a key economic, social and cultural role in Europe’, and ‘creates growth and jobs’ (European Commission, 2015). Scott (2000) furthermore stresses that the media industry has been part of many urban regeneration schemes throughout the world. This is also the case for the Brussels-Capital Region. In the Sustainable Regional Development Plan, the regional government identified the creative and cultural industries, including the media industry, as a key sector for economic development. In more detail, the government plans on supporting the development of an audio-visual (AV) media cluster, an agglomeration of the media industry (Komorowski, 2016) and the so-called mediapark.brussels (2013, p.44; 2016, pp.20, 65).1 The argumentation in favour of public support for the media industry in Brussels is strongly influenced by its ability to generate economic benefits for the city. However, little is known about its size and composition. This chapter intends to fill this gap by providing reliable quantitative descriptive insights.

Zum Mitnehmen ° Belgien ist seit 1920 ein Einwanderungsland, das ähnlich wie andere westeuropäischen Länder auf mehrere Einwanderungswellen zurückblickt. Knapp 30 Prozent seiner Bevölkerung ist heute ausländischer Herkunft.Davon stammt die Hälfte aus Staaten der Europäischen Union. ° Die Integrationspolitik in Belgien muss im Lichte der besonderen föderalen Struktur des Landes betrachtet werden. Von einem einheitlichen, belgischen Integrationsmodell kann nicht die Rede sein. ° Während die Einwanderungspolitik in der Zuständigkeit des Zentralstaates liegt, wurde die Integration in den 1980er Jahren Aufgabe der Regionen. In Flandern, Wallonien und Brüssel haben sich seither unterschiedliche Integrationsansätze entwickelt. ° Im flämischen Teil des Landes etablierte sich ein multikulturell ausgerichtetes Modell, das die Bedeutung ethnisch kultureller Vielfalten betonte. Im französischsprachigen Teil des Landes setzte sich in Anlehnung an Frankreich ein egalitäres, auf Assimilation ausgerichtetes Modell, durch. ° Trotz aller Unterschiede ist in den vergangenen Jahren eine Konvergenz der Politikansätze zu beobachten. In allen Regionen wurden mittlerweile verpflichtende Integrationskurse und -programme eingeführt. ° In beiden Teilen des Landes bleibt das schlechtere Abschneiden von Menschen mit Migrationshintergrund im Vergleich zu Einheimischen bei Bildung und Arbeit eine wesentliche Herausforderung für die Politik.