Determination of phytoextraction potential of plant speciesfor toxic elements in soils of abandoned sulphide-mining areas

This study has determined contamination levels in soils and plants from the Sa˜o Domingos mining area, Portugal, by k0-INAA. Total concentrations of As, Sb, Cr, Hg, Cu, Zn and Fe in soils were very high, exceeding the maximum limits in Portuguese legislation. Concentrations of toxic elements like As, Sb and Zn were highest in roots of Erica andevalensis, Juncus acutus, Agrostis castellana and Nicotiana glauca. Additionally, As, Br, Cr, Fe, Sb and Zn in all organs of most plants were above toxicity levels. Those species that accumulated relatively high concentrations of toxic elements in roots (and tops) may be cultivated for phytostabilisation of similar areas

Eugenia membranifolia: a long-forgotten Brazilian Atlantic rainforest Myrtaceae

Eugenia membranifolia Niedenzu, a forgotten name in Brazilian Myrtaceae and presently known only from one isotype, is reported as the correct name for most of the gatherings until now identified as Eugenia bocainensis. We provide a detailed description of E. membranifolia with comments on its distribution, ecology and conservation status, and compare it with E. bocainensis. Key words: Eugenia bocainensis, IUCN Red List, Myrteae, Phyllocaly

Anatomical factors in medication-related osteonecrosis of the jaws

Abstract in proceedings of the Fourth International Congress of CiiEM: Health, Well-Being and Ageing in the 21st Century, held at Egas Moniz’ University Campus in Monte de Caparica, Almada, from 3–5 June 2019.This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The impact of artificial intelligence on commercial management

The essence of this research is to shed light on use and importance of artificial intelligence (AI) in commercial activity. As such, the objective of the present study is to understand the impact of AI tools on the development of business functions and if they can be affirmed as a means of help or as a substitute for these functions. In-depth interviews were conducted with 15 commercial managers from technological SMEs. The results indicate that all the participants use AI systems frequently, that these tools assist in developing of their functions, allowing having more time and better preparing to solve the commercial problems. The findings also indicate that the tools used by commercials are still somewhat limited, and companies should focus on their training and development in AI, as well as the training of their commercials. Furthermore, the results show that firms intend to use the data collection and the analytical tool that enable real-time response and customization according to customer needs.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Timely and effectively profile bacteria in cystic fibrosis lungs

Bacterial lung infections are typical of cystic fibrosis (CF) disease due to accumulation of airway mucus. Despite the use of aggressive antibiotic therapy, the mortality rate of CF patients is still high. Unsuccessful bacterial eradication is often due to several evolutional strategies adopted by bacteria to achieve anaerobic or microaerophilic adaptation and antibiotic resistance, such as biofilm formation and phenotypic switching. By triggering these strategies, bacteria have the potential to better survive to airway stressful conditions, without the fitness costs of irreversible mutations. Indeed, phenotypic switching provides a source of microbial diversity through interchange between phenotypic states, analogue to a mechanism ON/OFF. This interchange of states, often visible in terms of colony morphology, can have serious impact on bacterial virulence, antimicrobial resistance and persistence1. However, the specific correlation between some colony traits and the biological impact is unknown. This study was designed to inspect P. aeruginosa and S. aureus colony phenotypic alterations, particularly morphology changes, by visual inspection, and protein profiles by MALDI MS, and correlate them with some virulence determinants expression and antibiotic susceptibility profiles. The visual identification of colony morphologies was supported by a novel, in-house developed identification system, ColMIS2. MALDI MS profiling grouped colony morphotypes differently from conventional morphological classification and antibiotic susceptibility. However, MALDI MS colony differentiation seems to match with changes in some virulence factors expressed by the different bacterial morphotypes, such as the increase of flagella, swarmer cell differentiation, ability to form biofilm and toxin production. Despite exhibiting distinct colony morphologies, the variants grouped by MALDI shared a common morphological feature, the heterogeneity of colony surface (more than one type of texture). Therefore, these data seems to indicate that MALDI MS clustered colony variants according their virulence that can be inspected by just the heterogeneous surface of the colonies, than the whole morphology. However, this association have to be deeper studied, since other colonies with heterogeneous surfaces were differentially clustered by MALDI MS and, despite decreased virulence, exhibited high resistance to in-use antibiotics. These results highlighted the potential and the need of using a combination of proteomic high-throughput screening of pathogenic bacteria with culturing and physiologic methods to reach a comprehensive understanding of the virulence and antibiotic resistance. Efforts are already underway to develop a new tool based on combinatorial methodologies to help clinical diagnosis and medical decision support, as well the design of new therapeutic strategies. Acknowledgments: The financial support from IBB-CEB and FCT and European Community fund FEDER, through Program COMPETE (FCT PTDC/SAU-SAP/113196/2009/ FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-016012) and Ana Margarida Sousa PhD Grant (SFRH/BD/72551/2010) are gratefully acknowledged

Development of Cyanine 813@Imidazole-Based Doped Supported Devices for Divalent Metal Ions Detection

PM003/2016 IF/00007/2015 CEECIND/00648/2017A NIR cyanine@imidazole derivative Cy1 was synthesized and evaluated as a metal ion sensor in solution. Cy1 was shown to be very sensitive to all metal ions tested, presenting a blue shift in the absorption from 668 nm to 633 nm, followed by a change in colour from pale green to blue with Zn2+, Cd2+, Co2+, Ni2+ and Hg2+ ions. Despite the blue shift in the absorption, a decrease at 633 nm (with a colour change from pale green to colourless), as well as a quenching in the emission intensity at 785 nm were observed for Cu2+ ions. The results show the formation of sandwich complexes of two ligands per metal ion with the highest association constant observed for Cu2+ (Log Kass.abs = 14.76 ± 0.09; Log Kass.emis. = 14.79 ± 0.06). The minimal detectable amounts were found to be 31 nM and 37 nM, with a naked eye detection of 2.9 ppm and 2.1 ppm for Hg2+ and Cu2+ ions, respectively. These results prompted us to explore the applicability of Cy1 by its combination with nanomaterials. Thus, Cy1@ doped MNs and Cy1@ doped PMMA nanoparticles were synthesized. Both nanosystems were shown to be very sensitive to Cu2+ ions in water, allowing a naked-eye detection of at least 1 ppm for Cy1@ doped MNs and 7 ppm for Cy1@ doped PMMA. This colourimetric response is an easy and inexpensive way to assess the presence of metals in aqueous media with no need for further instrumentation.publishersversionpublishe

Validation of a Standard Luminescence Method for the Fast Determination of the Antimicrobial Activity of Nanoparticles in Escherichia coli

Publisher Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.The use of nanoparticles in multiple industries has raised concerned voices about the assessment of their toxicity/antimicrobial activity and the development of standardized handling protocols. Issues emerge during the antimicrobial assaying of multiple cargo, colorimetric, colloidal nanoformulations, as standard protocols often rely on visual evaluations, or optical density (OD) measurements, leading to high variance inhibitory concentrations (MIC). Thus, a fast, luminescence-based assay for the effective assessment of the antimicrobial activity of nanoparticles is herein reported, using the bioluminescence of an in-house E. coli ATCC® 8739™ construct with the pMV306G13 + Lux plasmid (E. coli Lux). The new strain’s sensitivity to ofloxacin as a standard antibiotic was confirmed, and the methodology robustness verified against multiple nanoparticles and colorimetric drugs. The reduction of incubation from 24 to only 8 h, and the sole use of luminescence (LUX490) to accurately determine and distinguish MIC50 and MIC90, are two main advantages of the method. By discarding OD measurements, one can avoid turbidity and color interferences when calculating bacterial growth. This approach is an important tool that contributes to the standardization of methods, reducing samples’ background interference and focusing on luminescence as a direct probe for bacterial metabolic activity, growth and, most importantly, the correct assessment of nanomaterials’ antimicrobial activity.publishersversionpublishe

Distal mummification of all limbs-an odd presentation of multiple myeloma

info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Intramolecular excimer formation and sensing behavior of new fluorimetric probes and their interactions with metal cations and barbituric acids

A new family of compounds able to promote host-guest interactions with specific molecules (e.g., cyanuric and parabanic acids) and to coordinate metal ions, namely Zn(II) and Cu(II), has been synthesized and fully characterized. The new probes derive from the attachment of two methylaminopyrene units to the carbonyl precursor 2,6-bis(2-formylphenoxymethyl)pyridine.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6THH-4HF5KD3-1/1/ef66847d1e019d05e2068bef93cfbd9

Dating archaeological copper using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. Comparison with voltammetry of microparticles dating

[EN] A methodology for dating copper/bronze archaeological objects aged under atmospheric environments using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) is described. The method is based on the measurement of resistance associated to the growth of corrosion layers in EIS recorded upon immersion of the pieces in mineral water and applying a bias potential for the reduction of dissolved oxygen. Theoretical expressions for the time variation of such resistance following a potential rate law are presented. Equivalent expressions are derived and applied for estimating the variation of the tenorite/cuprite ratio from their specific voltammetric signals using voltammetry of microparticles data. Calibration curves were constructed from a set of well-documented coins.Financial support from the MEC Projects CTQ2011-28079-CO3-01 and 02 and CTQ2014-53736-C3-2-P which are supported with ERDF funds is gratefully acknowledged.Domenech Carbo, A.; Capelo, S.; Piquero-Cilla, J.; Domenech Carbo, MT.; Barrio, J.; Fuentes, A.; Al Sekhaneh, W. (2016). Dating archaeological copper using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. Comparison with voltammetry of microparticles dating. Materials and Corrosion. 67(2):120-129. https://doi.org/10.1002/maco.201408048S120129672Friedman, I., & Smith, R. L. (1960). Part I, The Development of the Method. American Antiquity, 25(4), 476-493. doi:10.2307/276634Reich, S., Leitus, G., & Shalev, S. (2003). Measurement of corrosion content of archaeological lead artifacts by their Meissner response in the superconducting state; a new dating method. New Journal of Physics, 5, 99-99. doi:10.1088/1367-2630/5/1/399Scholz, F., Schröder, U., Meyer, S., Brainina, K. 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Analytical Chemistry, 83(14), 5639-5644. doi:10.1021/ac200731qDoménech-Carbó, A., Doménech-Carbó, M. T., Capelo, S., Pasíes, T., & Martínez-Lázaro, I. (2014). Dating Archaeological Copper/Bronze Artifacts by Using the Voltammetry of Microparticles. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 53(35), 9262-9266. doi:10.1002/anie.201404522Benarie, M., & Lipfert, F. L. (1986). A general corrosion function in terms of atmospheric pollutant concentrations and rain pH. Atmospheric Environment (1967), 20(10), 1947-1958. doi:10.1016/0004-6981(86)90336-7Strandberg, H. (1998). Reactions of copper patina compounds—II. influence of sodium chloride in the presence of some air pollutants. Atmospheric Environment, 32(20), 3521-3526. doi:10.1016/s1352-2310(98)00058-2Cano, E., Lafuente, D., & Bastidas, D. M. (2009). Use of EIS for the evaluation of the protective properties of coatings for metallic cultural heritage: a review. 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