9 research outputs found

    Estudo da fauna mamalógica, ornitológica e malacológica recolhida nos contextos medievais de Frielas

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    É aqui apresentado o estudo preliminar dos conjuntos faunísticos compostos por restos osteológicos de mamíferos e aves, bivalves e gastrópodes, provenientes dos contextos medievais escavados, até ao ano de 2003 (inclusive), no complexo arqueológico da villa romana de Frielas. A colecção foi estudada durante o ano de 2004. Uma notícia preliminar foi já disponibilizada na publicação periódica da responsabilidade da câmara de Loures e um segundo momento de divulgação foi o primeiro encontro de arqueologia medieval e moderna realizado em Castelo Novo em Agosto do ano de 20051. O sítio localiza-se na freguesia com o mesmo nome, no concelho de Loures, e tem vindo a ser intervencionado por uma equipa de arqueologia do Museu Municipal de Loures, sob a coordenação científica de Ana Raquel Silva

    Sulphated locust bean gum-coated lipid nanocapsules as potential lung delivery carriers

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    Drugs pertaining to Biopharmaceutics Classification System (BCS) classes II and IV have limitations in their delivery, including in the lung. Therefore, drug delivery carriers have been proposed to improve the therapeutic effectiveness of such drugs. This work proposes lipid nanocapsules (LNC) as a potential platform for lung drug delivery. Locust bean gum (LBG), which is a galactomannan, was used as polymeric shell, protecting the oily core of the nanocapsules and providing their surface with hydrophilic character. Due to the neutral character of LBG, in order to enable nanocapsule formation, a sulphate derivative (LBGS) was prepared, which was confirmed by Fourier-transformed infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. The electrostatic interaction between the negatively charged sulphate groups of LBGS and the positively charged groups of the used cationic lipid (1,2-dioleoyloxy-3- trimethylammoniumpropanchloride, DOTAP), allowed the formation of monodisperse nanocapsules, with sizes around 200 nm and strongly negative zeta potentials, between -70 and -85 mV. Envisaging potential lung drug delivery, the LBGS-coated LNC were co-formulated with mannitol using spray-drying, producing microencapsulated nanocapsules. Feret’s diameter was determined to be 2.6 ± 1.8 µm and 3.1 ± 1.9 µm for Man (control) and Man/LNC microparticles, respectively. Further studies are underway in order to optimise both the nanoplatform and the dry powder formulation

    Role of fibrinogen–erythrocyte and erythrocyte–erythrocyte adhesion on cardiovascular pathologies

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    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

    Vitamin D-related polymorphisms and vitamin D levels as risk biomarkers of COVID-19 disease severity

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    © The Author(s) 2021. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.Vitamin D is a fundamental regulator of host defences by activating genes related to innate and adaptive immunity. Previous research shows a correlation between the levels of vitamin D in patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 and the degree of disease severity. This work investigates the impact of the genetic background related to vitamin D pathways on COVID-19 severity. For the first time, the Portuguese population was characterized regarding the prevalence of high impact variants in genes associated with the vitamin D pathways. This study enrolled 517 patients admitted to two tertiary Portuguese hospitals. The serum concentration of 25 (OH)D, was measured in the hospital at the time of patient admission. Genetic variants, 18 variants, in the genes AMDHD1, CYP2R1, CYP24A1, DHCR7, GC, SEC23A, and VDR were analysed. The results show that polymorphisms in the vitamin D binding protein encoded by the GC gene are related to the infection severity (p = 0.005). There is an association between vitamin D polygenic risk score and the serum concentration of 25 (OH)D (p = 0.04). There is an association between 25 (OH)D levels and the survival and fatal outcomes (p = 1.5e-4). The Portuguese population has a higher prevalence of the DHCR7 RS12785878 variant when compared with its prevalence in the European population (19% versus 10%). This study shows a genetic susceptibility for vitamin D deficiency that might explain higher severity degrees in COVID-19 patients. These results reinforce the relevance of personalized strategies in the context of viral diseases.This project was supported by the “Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia”, program “Research 4 Covid-19 Apoio especial a projetos de implementação rápida para soluções inovadoras de resposta à pandemia de COVID-19”. It was also partially supported by each institution.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

    MAMMALS IN PORTUGAL : A data set of terrestrial, volant, and marine mammal occurrences in P ortugal

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    Mammals are threatened worldwide, with 26% of all species being includedin the IUCN threatened categories. This overall pattern is primarily associatedwith habitat loss or degradation, and human persecution for terrestrial mam-mals, and pollution, open net fishing, climate change, and prey depletion formarine mammals. Mammals play a key role in maintaining ecosystems func-tionality and resilience, and therefore information on their distribution is cru-cial to delineate and support conservation actions. MAMMALS INPORTUGAL is a publicly available data set compiling unpublishedgeoreferenced occurrence records of 92 terrestrial, volant, and marine mam-mals in mainland Portugal and archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira thatincludes 105,026 data entries between 1873 and 2021 (72% of the data occur-ring in 2000 and 2021). The methods used to collect the data were: live obser-vations/captures (43%), sign surveys (35%), camera trapping (16%),bioacoustics surveys (4%) and radiotracking, and inquiries that represent lessthan 1% of the records. The data set includes 13 types of records: (1) burrowsjsoil moundsjtunnel, (2) capture, (3) colony, (4) dead animaljhairjskullsjjaws, (5) genetic confirmation, (6) inquiries, (7) observation of live animal (8),observation in shelters, (9) photo trappingjvideo, (10) predators dietjpelletsjpine cones/nuts, (11) scatjtrackjditch, (12) telemetry and (13) vocalizationjecholocation. The spatial uncertainty of most records ranges between 0 and100 m (76%). Rodentia (n=31,573) has the highest number of records followedby Chiroptera (n=18,857), Carnivora (n=18,594), Lagomorpha (n=17,496),Cetartiodactyla (n=11,568) and Eulipotyphla (n=7008). The data setincludes records of species classified by the IUCN as threatened(e.g.,Oryctolagus cuniculus[n=12,159],Monachus monachus[n=1,512],andLynx pardinus[n=197]). We believe that this data set may stimulate thepublication of other European countries data sets that would certainly contrib-ute to ecology and conservation-related research, and therefore assisting onthe development of more accurate and tailored conservation managementstrategies for each species. There are no copyright restrictions; please cite thisdata paper when the data are used in publications.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

    Mammals in Portugal: a data set of terrestrial, volant, and marine mammal occurrences in Portugal

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    Mammals are threatened worldwide, with ~26% of all species being included in the IUCN threatened categories. This overall pattern is primarily associated with habitat loss or degradation, and human persecution for terrestrial mammals, and pollution, open net fishing, climate change, and prey depletion for marine mammals. Mammals play a key role in maintaining ecosystems functionality and resilience, and therefore information on their distribution is crucial to delineate and support conservation actions. MAMMALS IN PORTUGAL is a publicly available data set compiling unpublished georeferenced occurrence records of 92 terrestrial, volant, and marine mammals in mainland Portugal and archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira that includes 105,026 data entries between 1873 and 2021 (72% of the data occurring in 2000 and 2021). The methods used to collect the data were: live observations/captures (43%), sign surveys (35%), camera trapping (16%), bioacoustics surveys (4%) and radiotracking, and inquiries that represent less than 1% of the records. The data set includes 13 types of records: (1) burrows | soil mounds | tunnel, (2) capture, (3) colony, (4) dead animal | hair | skulls | jaws, (5) genetic confirmation, (6) inquiries, (7) observation of live animal (8), observation in shelters, (9) photo trapping | video, (10) predators diet | pellets | pine cones/nuts, (11) scat | track | ditch, (12) telemetry and (13) vocalization | echolocation. The spatial uncertainty of most records ranges between 0 and 100 m (76%). Rodentia (n =31,573) has the highest number of records followed by Chiroptera (n = 18,857), Carnivora (n = 18,594), Lagomorpha (n = 17,496), Cetartiodactyla (n = 11,568) and Eulipotyphla (n = 7008). The data set includes records of species classified by the IUCN as threatened (e.g., Oryctolagus cuniculus [n = 12,159], Monachus monachus [n = 1,512], and Lynx pardinus [n = 197]). We believe that this data set may stimulate the publication of other European countries data sets that would certainly contribute to ecology and conservation-related research, and therefore assisting on the development of more accurate and tailored conservation management strategies for each species. There are no copyright restrictions; please cite this data paper when the data are used in publications

    The Brazilian–Portuguese version of the Parental Burnout Assessment: Transcultural adaptation and initial validity evidence

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    This study aimed to examine the validity of the Brazilian–Portuguese version of the Parental Burnout Assessment (PBA), the current gold‐standard measure of parental burnout (PB). We surveyed parents in Portugal (N = 407) and Brazil (N = 301). We (a) compared the factor structure of the Brazilian–Portuguese version with the original structure of the PBA, (b) tested the adequacy of a second‐order factor structure, (c) evaluated invariance across gender and countries, (d) examined reliability, and (e) evaluated whether PB levels are related to gender, satisfaction with life, and parental self‐efficacy (PSE). Results provided evidence for the validity of the Brazilian–Portuguese PBA and its four facets. Factor models supported the use of both individual facet scores and a global PB score. The structures tested were invariant across countries and gender, and all factors had good reliability. Relations with PSE, life satisfaction, and gender provided initial evidence for validity, and suggested a possible influence of intensive motherhood models
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