The Differentiation and Promotion of Students’ Rights in Portugal

This investigation includes a differential study (Study 1) and a quasi-experimental research (Study 2). In Study 1, the objective was to establish to what extent students’ rights existed and analyse the differentiation between students’ rights with Portuguese and immigrant mothers, throughout school years. The sample consisted of 537 students with Portuguese and immigrant mothers, distributed by different school years (7th, 9th and 11th grades). The Children’s Rights Scale (Hart et al., 1996; Veiga, 2001) was used. In Study 2, the purpose was to analyse the effects on students’ rights of the use by teachers of a communicational intervention program, supervised by school psychologists. The sample involved 7th and 9th grade students, in a total of four classes, two forming the experimental groups (n = 36) and two the control groups (n = 43); as in Study 1, the Children’s Rights Scale was used. The results indicated the effectiveness of the communicational intervention program on students’ rights and are consistent with previous studies. An implication is that psychologists and teachers, working together and taking a human rights perspective, may develop an important role in projects to promote the students’ rights

Comprometimentos cognitivos em pacientes com gliomas de baixo grau e gliomas de alto grau

OBJECTIVE: The relationship between brain tumors and cognitive deficits is well established in the literature. However, studies investigating the cognitive status in low and high-grade gliomas patients are scarce, particularly in patients with average or lower educational level. This study aimed at investigating the cognitive functioning in a sample of patients with low and high-grade gliomas before surgical intervention. METHOD: The low-grade (G1, n=19) and high-grade glioma (G2, n=8) patients underwent a detailed neuropsychological assessment of memory, executive functions, visuo-perceptive and visuo-spatial abilities, intellectual level and language. RESULTS: There was a significant impairment on verbal and visual episodic memory, executive functions including mental flexibility, nominal and categorical verbal fluency and speed of information processing in G2. G1 showed only specific deficits on verbal and visual memory recall, mental flexibility and processing speed. CONCLUSION: These findings demonstrated different levels of impairments in the executive and memory domains in patients with low and high grade gliomas.OBJETIVO: A associação entre tumores cerebrais e déficits cognitivos é bem estabelecida na literatura. No entanto, estudos sobre a cognição de pacientes com gliomas de baixo e alto grau são escassos, especialmente, em sujeitos com baixa escolaridade. Este estudo investigou o funcionamento cognitivo de uma amostra de pacientes com gliomas de baixo e alto grau antes da intervenção cirúrgica. MÉTODO: Os pacientes com glioma de baixo grau (G1, n=19) e alto grau (G2, n=8) foram avaliados quanto à memória, funções executivas, habilidades visuo-perceptivas e visuo-espaciais, nível intelectual e linguagem. RESULTADOS: Houve prejuízo significativo em G2 na memória episódica verbal e visual, funções executivas incluindo flexibilidade mental, fluência verbal nominal e categórica e velocidade de processamento de informações. G1 demonstrou apenas déficits específicos de evocação verbal e visual, flexibilidade mental e velocidade de processamento. CONCLUSÃO: Estes achados demonstraram níveis diferenciados de comprometimento nos domínios executivos e mnésticos de pacientes com gliomas de baixo e alto grau

Degradabilidade in situ de híbridos de milho e de capim-elefante colhidos em quatro estádios de maturidade

Dentre as forragens, a silagem de milho é amplamente utilizada pelos fazendeiros que visam explorar o máximo do potencial genético dos animais. No entanto, outros volumosos tropicais como o capim-elefante (Pennisetum purpureum) são mais produtivos e, portanto, mais baratos do que a silagem de milho. Nosso objetivo foi comparar a degradabilidade in situ do capim-elefante com a degradabilidade de híbridos de milho, colhidos em quatro estágios de maturidade. O experimento seguiu um delineamento de blocos ao acaso com sub-parcelas. Dois híbridos de milho: AG5011 e ZN8392 foram colhidos com 25, 30, 35 e 40% matéria seca (MS) na planta toda e separados na fração colmo + bainha + folhas e espigas. Capim elefante foi colhido 30, 40, 50 e 60 dias após o corte de nivelamento. As amostras secas e trituradas foram incubadas no rúmen por 0, 6, 12, 24, 48 e 72 h para cálculo da cinética da degradação ruminal da MS e da fibra em detergente neutro (FDN). O avanço da maturidade aumentou os teores de FDN e fibra em detergente ácido (FDA) do capim elefante e reduziu a degradabilidade da MS. Entretanto, a maturidade teve pouco efeito sobre os teores de fibra e a degradabilidade da MS da fração planta dos híbridos de milho. O capim elefante apresentou maior degradabilidade da FDN do que híbridos de milho, e não houve efeito da maturidade sobre a degradabilidade da FDN das duas espécies. A degradabilidade da fibra de capim-elefante não é pior do que a de híbridos de milho e, portanto a escolha da forragem deve ser feita com base em análises econômicas ao invés de assumir um menor potencial de produção em dietas a base de capim elefanteAmong tropical forages, corn silage is largely used by farmers trying to explore the maximum genetic potential from the animals. However, other tropical forages, such as elephant-grass (Pennisetum purpureum), are more productive and therefore cheaper to use than corn silage. Our objective was to compare the in situ degradability of elephant-grass with that from corn hybrids, all harvested at four stages of maturity. The experimental design followed a randomized block design with nested subplots. Two corn hybrids: AG5011, ZN8392 were harvested with 25, 30, 35, and 40% dry matter (DM) in the whole plant, and separated in stem + leaf sheath + leaf blade (stover), and cobs. Elephant-grass was harvested with 30, 40, 50 and 60 days after a leveling cut. Dried and ground samples were incubated in nylon bags inside the rumen for 0, 6, 12, 24, 48 and 72 h to estimate the kinetics of ruminal DM and neutral detergent fiber (NDF) degradation. The advance of maturity increased the NDF and acid detergent fiber (ADF) content in elephant-grass, and reduced its DM degradability. However, maturity had little or no effect on fiber content and DM degradability of corn stover. Elephant-grass had a higher NDF degradability than corn stover, and there was no effect of maturity on NDF degradability of either elephant-grass or corn stover. Fiber degradability of elephant-grass was not worse than that of corn stover, and therefore the choice of forage should be made on economical analysis rather than assuming an intrinsic low production potential for elephant-grass based diet

Search for direct production of charginos and neutralinos in events with three leptons and missing transverse momentum in √s = 7 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for the direct production of charginos and neutralinos in final states with three electrons or muons and missing transverse momentum is presented. The analysis is based on 4.7 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data delivered by the Large Hadron Collider and recorded with the ATLAS detector. Observations are consistent with Standard Model expectations in three signal regions that are either depleted or enriched in Z-boson decays. Upper limits at 95% confidence level are set in R-parity conserving phenomenological minimal supersymmetric models and in simplified models, significantly extending previous results

Measurement of D*+/- meson production in jets from pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This paper reports a measurement of D*+/- meson production in jets from proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The measurement is based on a data sample recorded with the ATLAS detector with an integrated luminosity of 0.30 pb^-1 for jets with transverse momentum between 25 and 70 GeV in the pseudorapidity range |eta| < 2.5. D*+/- mesons found in jets are fully reconstructed in the decay chain: D*+ -> D0pi+, D0 -> K-pi+, and its charge conjugate. The production rate is found to be N(D*+/-)/N(jet) = 0.025 +/- 0.001(stat.) +/- 0.004(syst.) for D*+/- mesons that carry a fraction z of the jet momentum in the range 0.3 < z < 1. Monte Carlo predictions fail to describe the data at small values of z, and this is most marked at low jet transverse momentum.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (22 pages total), 5 figures, 1 table, matches published version in Physical Review

Balanço do nitrogênio e fósforo em solo com cultivo orgânico de hortaliças após a incorporação de biomassa de guandu.

Os objetivos deste trabalho foram avaliar os efeitos de faixas de guandu (Cajanus cajan) e da incorporação da biomassa proveniente de sua poda na fertilidade do solo e na produtividade de três hortaliças sob cultivo orgânico. O delineamento usado foi de blocos casualizados completos em esquema de parcelas subsubdivididas com três repetições. As produtividades de beterraba, cenoura e feijão-de-vagem não foram afetadas pelos tratamentos. Nas parcelas onde não houve incorporação da biomassa de guandu, o balanço de nitrogênio no sistema foi negativo, ao passo que com a incorporação, esse balanço foi positivo. Embora tenha ocorrido balanço positivo para o fósforo nas parcelas sem a incorporação de biomassa de guandu, houve um aumento significativo na absorção desse elemento pelas hortaliças quando o material foi incorporado. O sistema de cultivo em aléias de guandu pode representar uma prática vantajosa para os produtores orgânicos, por contribuir na manutenção da fertilidade do solo

Search for supersymmetry in final states with jets, missing transverse momentum and one isolated lepton in sqrt{s} = 7 TeV pp collisions using 1 fb-1 of ATLAS data

We present an update of a search for supersymmetry in final states containing jets, missing transverse momentum, and one isolated electron or muon, using 1.04 fb^-1 of proton-proton collision data at sqrt{s} = 7 TeV recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC in the first half of 2011. The analysis is carried out in four distinct signal regions with either three or four jets and variations on the (missing) transverse momentum cuts, resulting in optimized limits for various supersymmetry models. No excess above the standard model background expectation is observed. Limits are set on the visible cross-section of new physics within the kinematic requirements of the search. The results are interpreted as limits on the parameters of the minimal supergravity framework, limits on cross-sections of simplified models with specific squark and gluino decay modes, and limits on parameters of a model with bilinear R-parity violation.Comment: 18 pages plus author list (30 pages total), 9 figures, 4 tables, final version to appear in Physical Review

Reducing heterotic M-theory to five dimensional supergravity on a manifold with boundary

This paper constructs the reduction of heterotic $M$-theory in eleven dimensions to a supergravity model on a manifold with boundary in five dimensions using a Calabi-Yau three-fold. New results are presented for the boundary terms in the action and for the boundary conditions on the bulk fields. Some general features of dualisation on a manifold with boundary are used to explain the origin of some topological terms in the action. The effect of gaugino condensation on the fermion boundary conditions leads to a `twist' in the chirality of the gravitino which can provide an uplifting mechanism in the vacuum energy to cancel the cosmological constant after moduli stabilisation.Comment: 16 pages, RevTe

Status of the GERDA experiment

The study of neutrinoless double beta (0nbb) decay is the only one presently known approach to the fundamental question if the neutrino is a Majorana particle, i.e. its own anti-particle. The observation of 0nbb decay would prove that lepton number is not conserved, establish that neutrino has a Majorana component and, assuming that light neutrino is the dominating process, provide a method for the determination of its effective mass. GERDA is a new 0nbb decay experiment which is currently taking data at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS) of INFN in Italy. It implements a new shielding concept by operating bare diodes made from Ge with enriched 76Ge in high purity liquid argon supplemented by a water shield. The aim of GERDA is to verify or refute the recent claim of discovery, and, in a second phase, to achieve a two orders of magnitude lower background index than past experiments, to increase the sensitive mass and to collect an exposure of 100 kg yr. The paper will discuss design, physics reach, and status of data taking of GERDA.JRC.D.4-Standards for Nuclear Safety, Security and Safeguard

Measurement of tau polarization in W->taunu decays with the ATLAS detector in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV

In this paper, a measurement of tau polarization in W->taunu decays is presented. It is measured from the energies of the decay products in hadronic tau decays with a single final state charged particle. The data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 24 pb^-1, were collected by the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider in 2010. The measured value of the tau polarization is Ptau = -1.06 +/- 0.04 (stat) + 0.05 (syst) - 0.07 (syst), in agreement with the Standard Model prediction, and is consistent with a physically allowed 95% CL interval [-1,-0.91]. Measurements of tau polarization have not previously been made at hadron colliders.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (25 pages total), 4 figures, 4 tables, revised author list, matches published EPJC versio