An Approach to Urban Quarter Design Using Building Generative Design and Thermal Performance Optimization

AbstractBuildings thermal performance is influenced by the urban context, such as adjacent buildings shadows, block wind paths, or solar radiation reflection. For this reason, in this paper, an automated procedure is used to generate and optimize buildings’ thermal performance in a closed O-shape urban quarter with ten building blocks to determine the importance of including the surroundings in estimating the buildings’ thermal behavior. The overall shape of the urban quarter is pre-designed, being mainly residential, with several stores in the ground floor and limited to three levels. Each building will have four alternative designs created using a hybrid evolutionary strategy technique that generates building's floor plans according to practitioner's preferences and requirements. Then, a sequential variable optimization procedure coupled with dynamic simulation engine is used to explore the improvement potential of each solution by changing and adding several building elements. The final quarter design is determined by combining the best of all buildings’ solutions from thermal performance criteria.The results demonstrate the influence of urban context in the resulting building's thermal performance. Despite the building's shape is similar in the four solutions, these have significant thermal behavior difference due to their interior organization and position in the urban quarter. A comparison analysis is carried out between all building block designs. The buildings, which have exterior walls with openings facing south, have almost half degree-hours of thermal discomfort due to the combination of large openings and shading overhangs. It is also possible to conclude that generative tools, enhanced with optimization procedures, may help practitioners in designing more energy efficient buildings

Effects of coastal orientation and depth on the distribution of subtidal benthic assemblages

Copyright © 2013 Blackwell Verlag GmbH.A better understanding of biological systems can only be gained if we understand what processes are important and how they operate to determine the distribution of organisms. Coastal orientation and depth can influence environmental conditions, including the degree of water motion and availability of light, which in turn may influence the horizontal and vertical patterns of organism distribution. Here, we used a mixed-model design to examine the effects of coastal orientation and depth on the structure of benthic assemblages by comparing the abundance and distribution of macroalgae and invertebrates in shallow and deep waters on the opposing coasts of Sa˜o Miguel. Generally, coastal orientation had little influence on the distribution of most taxa. In contrast, significant differences were generally associated with depth, although patterns were spatially variable at the scale of locations. This study suggests that depth, and processes operating at the scale of location, but not at the scale of the coast, have an important influence on these assemblages, and that failure to recognise such a scale of variability may hamper our ability to better understand the processes that structure these communities

The combined effect of pressure and temperature on kefir production - a case study of food fermentation in unconventional conditions

Food fermentation under pressure has been studied in recent years as a way to produce foods with novel properties. The purpose of this work was to study kefir production under pressure (7–50 MPa) at different temperatures (17–32 °C), as a case study of unconventional food fermentation. The fermentation time to produce kefir was similar at all temperatures (17, 25, and 32 °C) up to 15 MPa, compared to atmospheric pressure. At 50 MPa, the fermentation rate was slower, but the difference was reduced as temperature increased. During fermentation, lactic and acetic acid concentration increased while citric acid decreased. The positive activation volumes (Va) obtained indicate that pressure decreased the fermentation rate, while the temperature rise led to the attenuation of the pressure effect (lower Va). On the other hand, higher activation energies (Ea) were observed with pressure increase, indicating that fermentation became more sensitive to temperature. The condition that resulted in a faster fermentation, higher titratable acidity, and higher concentration of lactic acid was 15 MPa/32 °C. As the authors are aware, this is the second work in the literature to study the combined effect of pressure and temperature on a fermentative process.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

La membrana vitelina de embriones bovinos, un modelo experimental de interés para estudios proteómicos.Análisis del perfil proteico mediante electroforesis bidimensional

Comunicaciones a congreso

Índices para monitorização de qualidade ecológica de costas rochosas com base em comunidades de macroalgas : simplificação para utilização em áreas geográficas alargadas

Copyright © 2013 APRH.Este estudo centra-se em características de comunidades de macroalgas do intertidal rochoso para avaliação da qualidade ecológica das massas de águas costeiras no âmbito da Diretiva-Quadro da Água (DQA). É proposto um índice alternativo aos desenvolvidos nas Ilhas Britânicas, no norte da Espanha e em Portugal continental, que resulta da comparação da aplicação de todos os índices a um conjunto de dados recolhidos em praias açorianas, discutindo-se a adequação dos parâmetros utilizados em cada índice. Os parâmetros incluídos no índice proposto foram selecionados de forma a permitir a sua aplicação numa área geográfica alargada.ABSTRACT: This study focuses on intertidal rocky shore seaweed community features used for the assessment of ecological quality of coastal water bodies for the Water Framework Directive (WFD). An alternative index to those developed in the British Isles, in northern Spain and in mainland Portugal is proposed. Results from the application of all indices to a dataset collected on Azorean shores are compared and the suitability of the features used in each index discussed. The features included in the proposed index were selected to allow its applicability throughout a large geographic area

A longitudinal analysis

Funding Information: This research was funded by Fundação Álvaro Carvalho (funding manager), Câmara Municipal de Cascais, Fundação Vox Populi, Fundação Manuel Viegas Guerreiro, and Claude and Sofia Foundation. Publisher Copyright: Copyright © 2023 Carvalho, Henriques, Queirós, Rodrigues, Mendonça, Rodrigues, Canhão, de Sousa, Antunes and Guimarães.Background and aim: The kinetics of antibody production in response to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infection is not well-defined yet. This study aimed to evaluate the antibody responses to SARS-CoV-2 and its dynamics during 9-months in a cohort of patients infected during the first phase of the pandemic. As a secondary aim, it was intended to evaluate the factors associated with different concentrations of IgG antibodies. Methods: A prospective cohort study was conducted from June 2020 to January 2021. This study recruited a convenience sample of adult individuals who where recently diagnosed with COVID-19 and were living in mainland Portugal. A total of 1,695 blood samples were collected from 585 recovered COVID-19 patients up to 9 months after SARS-CoV-2 acute infection. A blood sample was collected at baseline and three, 6 and 9 months after SARS-CoV-2 acute infection to assess the concentration of IgG antibody against SARS-CoV-2. Results: The positivity rate of IgG reached 77.7% in the first 3 months after symptom onset. The IgG persists at all subsequent follow-up time-points, which was 87.7 and 89.2% in the 6th and 9th months after symptom onset, respectively. Three distinct kinetics of antibody response were found within the 9 months after infection. Kinetic 1 (K1) was characterized by a constant low IgG antibody concentration kinetic (group size: 65.2%); kinetic 2 (K2), composed by constant moderate IgG kinetic (group size: 27.5%) and kinetic 3 (K3) characterized by higher IgG kinetic (group size: 7.3%). People with ≥56 years old (OR: 3.33; CI 95%: [1.64; 6.67]; p-value: 0.001) and symptomatic COVID-19 (OR: 2.08; CI 95%: [1.08; 4.00]; p-value: 0.031) had higher odds of a “Moderate IgG kinetic.” No significant association were found regarding the “Higher IgG kinetic.” Conclusion: Our results demonstrate a lasting anti-spike (anti-S) IgG antibody response at least 9 months after infection in the majority of patients with COVID-19. Younger participants with asymptomatic disease have lower IgG antibody positivity and possibly more susceptible to reinfection. This information contributes to expanding knowledge of SARS-CoV-2 immune response and has direct implications in the adoption of preventive strategies and public health policies.publishersversionpublishe

Establishment and characterization of human pluripotent stem cells-derived brain organoids to model cerebellar diseases

Supplementary Information Te online version contains supplementary material available at https://doi.org/ 10.1038/s41598-022-16369-y.The establishment of robust human brain organoids to model cerebellar diseases is essential to study new therapeutic strategies for cerebellum-associated disorders. Machado-Joseph disease (MJD) is a cerebellar hereditary neurodegenerative disease, without therapeutic options able to prevent the disease progression. In the present work, control and MJD induced-pluripotent stem cells were used to establish human brain organoids. These organoids were characterized regarding brain development, cell type composition, and MJD-associated neuropathology markers, to evaluate their value for cerebellar diseases modeling. Our data indicate that the organoids recapitulated, to some extent, aspects of brain development, such as astroglia emerging after neurons and the presence of ventricular-like zones surrounded by glia and neurons that are found only in primate brains. Moreover, the brain organoids presented markers of neural progenitors proliferation, neuronal differentiation, inhibitory and excitatory synapses, and firing neurons. The established brain organoids also exhibited markers of cerebellar neurons progenitors and mature cerebellar neurons. Finally, MJD brain organoids showed higher ventricular-like zone numbers, an indication of lower maturation, and an increased number of ataxin-3-positive aggregates, compared with control organoids. Altogether, our data indicate that the established organoids recapitulate important characteristics of human brain development and exhibit cerebellar features, constituting a resourceful tool for testing therapeutic approaches for cerebellar diseases.This work was funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the Centro 2020 Regional Operational Programme under BrainHealth2020 projects (CENTRO-01-0145-FEDER-000008), through the COMPETE 2020—Operational Programme for Competitiveness and Internationalization and Portuguese national funds via FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, under projects — UIDB/04539/2020 and UIDP/04539/2020, POCI-01-0145-FEDER-030737 (NeuroStemForMJD, PTDC/BTM-ORG/30737/2017), CEEC-IND/04242/2017, PhD Scholarships 2020.04751.BD and 2020.07385.BD. It was also funded by the National Ataxia Foundation, the French Muscular Dystrophy Association (AFM-Téléthon) Trampoline Grant #20126, EU Joint Programme—Neurodegenerative Disease Research (JPND) Project JPCO FUND/0005/2015-ModelPolyQ), and the Richard Chin and Lily Lock Machado-Joseph Disease Research Fund.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio