Empreendedorismo e novos modelos de gestão

Os principais desafios impostos às empresas portuguesas em engenharia industrial são uma preocupação! O empreendedorismo pode influenciar a maneira de gestão das mesmas. Esta dissertação pretende analisar o impacto das práticas de gestão, mais concretamente uma orientação empreendedora no desempenho das empresas portuguesas. Para tal foram estudadas empresas portuguesas, no sentido de saber as suas preocupações para com orientações empreendedoras e consequentemente avaliar a sua evolução e eficácia de uma forma empírica. O estudo realiza-se no sector das energias renováveis, sector este com um forte crescimento e evolução. A eficácia de empresas na área das energias renováveis, foi então estudada no sentido de aferir a evolução e o valor criado, com a utilização de práticas e políticas com vista à inserção de um espírito empreendedor Os resultados sugerem a influência da utilização de práticas empreendedoras no sistema interno de empresas bem como boas práticas e orientações para a aplicação de modelos de gestão virados para o empreendedorismo e as suas relações no desempenho das empresas portuguesas

Aplicação de conceitos BIM à instrumentação de estruturas

Tese de mestrado integrado. Engenharia Civil. Faculdade de Engenharia. Universidade do Porto. 201

Depositional setting and stratigraphic patterns of Pre-Salt carbonates in a sector of the Santos Basin, Brazil

Tese de mestrado, Geologia (Estratigafia, Sedimentologia e Paleontologia) Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências, 2019This work aims to better understand the Pre-Salt Barra-Velha Formation lacustrine carbonates and their depositional setting and diagenetic evolution in a specific zone of Santos Basin, Brazil. A multi-scale workflow based on well core analysis and its relation with well log data and stratigraphic seismic interpretation was used to provide a better understanding of facies distribution and depositional cycles, with focus on the Upper Sag unit. The outcomes from the different tasks allowed to develop a conceptual depositional model with application on reservoir characterization, representing a generic regional propose applicable to the Pre-Salt carbonates in the studied area. The results from the six described wells demonstrate high depositional cyclicity, indicating mainly a shallow water environment, being possible to define a generic facies sequence based on base-level position and energy variations. Facies successions identification allowed the recognition of sequence boundaries, which demonstrated that changes in base-level and accommodation space were responsible for different facies deposition. The integration of multiscale data with seismic interpretation demonstrate a progressive basin fill, starting north and gradually reaching structural higher positions. Paleogeomorphology strongly controlled sediment deposition, as different depositional environment conditions were observed in different structural positions, with high base-level position and low energy facies being mainly recognized in structural lows and low base-level position and high energy facies being mostly identified in structural highs. It was also recognized an affinity of diagenetic processes with paleogeomorphology, with fluid circulation having a major impact in structural low positions resulting in porosity reduction processes, while in structural high positions, porosity generation or enhancing processes tend to be more frequent. The understanding of depositional environments retrieved from this study will enhance the geological understanding of Santos Basin depositional setting and may assist on hydrocarbon exploration by providing a more robust reservoir characterization, from a geological point of view

A comprehensive analysis of Med12 controlled (l)ncRNAs and characterization of a novel Sall1 antisense transcript

The function of the Mediator subunit Med12 on gene regulation has been widely studied and its interaction and regulation of protein coding genes broadly documented. However, only recently has its interaction with non-coding genes been verified. Analysis of transcriptome data from Med12 deficient embryonic stem cells (ESCs) revealed hundreds of misregulated protein coding genes, including multiple Wnt targets and genes involved in the developmental processes that were found affected in embryos previously generated with these cells. In addition to the protein coding genes, multiple misregulated non-coding genes were found during the analysis of transcriptome data generated from Med12 mutant cells, including several putative novel transcripts. Among these, an uncharacterized long non-coding (lnc)RNA was found to be differentially expressed cells, tissues and mouse embryos. This gene, designated as LN-BP18, encodes for antisense transcripts of Sall1, a gene also misregulated in the analysed cells. In humans, mutations in this gene are associated with Townes-Brocks syndrome (TBS), which shows several overlapping characteristics with MED12-associated X-linked intellectual disability syndromes. These features led to the deeper characterization of LN-BP18. Detailed gene and transcript analyses of this novel lncRNA led to the identification of two distinct transcription start sites (TSSs), termed TSS1 and TSS2. While TSS1 was active in all analysed tissues, TSS2 was found active only in ESCs. In vitro differentiation of ESCs confirmed this observation, with expression of transcripts originating from TSS1 increasing throughout the differentiation protocol, while the opposite dynamic occurring for TSS2 transcripts. Characterization of the gene structure revealed a complex splicing pattern, with its 7 exons spliced into 9 different isoforms, including spliced variants for three of the exons. Multiple analyses confirmed the lack of coding potential of all identified isoforms. BLAST searches revealed no homologous transcripts in other species, however, a non-conserved predicted lncRNA was described in human, which was also present in a divergent configuration relative to SALL1, suggesting a potential functional similarity to LN-BP18 despite the low sequence similarity. Expression analyses of the different mutant ESCs generated revealed a dynamic expression of LN-BP18. TSS2 transcripts, which were only detected in ESCs and not in embryonic tissues, showed a positive correlation with different pluripotency markers. This correlation, together with the ESC-specific activation of this TSS, suggested a potential role in the pluripotency network for isoforms originating from TSS2. Sall1 and LN-BP18 TSS1 transcripts were downregulated in Med12 depleted ESCs. Additionally, in Sall1-depleted cells, LN-BP18 was downregulated, with a strong effect observed for the TSS1 transcripts compared to TSS2. These observations, together with the co-expression of these two genes in embryonic tissues, suggested LN-BP18, specifically the TSS1, as a target of Sall1 activation. This activation is potentially Med12-dependent, since the effect on LN-BP18 expression was stronger upon Med12 depletion than in Sall1 deplete cells. A heterozygous LN-BP18-β-galactosidase reporter mutant ESC line was generated to detect expression of LN-BP18 in a more sensitive way. Expression of the reporter gene identified in addition to embryonal limb and caudal end expression seen by whole mount in situ hybridization (WISH), a clear expression in the pronephros, somites, neural tube, forebrain/midbrain- and midbrain/hindbrain-boundaries, demonstrating the importance of this reporter line for studying LN-BP18 expression and function during development. Finally, RNA-seq data from Med12 depleted ESC mutant cells was analysed together with public Med12 chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing (ChIP-seq) data from ESCs. This analysis allowed identifying 12 lncRNAs, both annotated as well as new predictions, representing candidate lncRNAs whose expression is mediated by Med12. Compiled information for these genes presented here, offer insight into possible systems to analyse these genes in future studies as well as putative targets. Data from this thesis describe the genetic structure and expression of a previously uncharacterized lncRNA. These data, together with the different mutants generated of this gene establish the ground work for future studies clarifying the functions of LN-BP18 in ESCs, but also during embryonic development

The Management of logistics activities in the furniture sector - cost control with application of time driven activity based costing model

The furniture sector in Portugal is predominantly composed of Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (SME'S). Its internationalisation process has been continuous and growing. However, to be viable, SMEs need to compete with international and large companies which benefit from economies of scale. Thus, SME's must create a competitive advantage in quality, differentiated furniture design, and customised services. In this context, the management of value chain activities gains extreme importance. This research work focuses on the logistics activities in the furniture sector. It aims to analyse the management practices of Portuguese SMEs regarding customer service in logistics and propose a framework for to cost calculation of customer service activities in logistics. Using an approach based on the Delphi methodology, we consulted a panel of experts in the furniture sector to develop a questionnaire to identify logistics activities in the furniture business. Then the questionnaire was applied to SMEs operating in the furniture sector. Despite the small number of participants, the results indicate that firms are aware of the importance of cost management of logistics for their competitiveness, they have the necessary data to calculate their costs, and Time Drive Activity Based Costing can be a suitable solution for costs calculation, once it can perform an accurate cost division per each stage of the transport workflow and determine the total cost of the operation with high precision, based on the type of transportation and selected incoterm negotiated with clients

Deteção de atividades ilícitas de software Bots através do DNS

DNS is a critical component of the Internet where almost all Internet applications and organizations rely on. Its shutdown can deprive them from being part of the Internet, and hence, DNS is usually the only protocol to be allowed when Internet access is firewalled. The constant exposure of this protocol to external entities force corporations to always be observant of external rogue software that may misuse the DNS to establish covert channels and perform multiple illicit activities, such as command and control and data exfiltration. Most current solutions for bot malware and botnet detection are based on Deep Packet Inspection techniques, such as analyzing DNS query payloads, which may reveal private and sensitive information. In addiction, the majority of existing solutions do not consider the usage of licit and encrypted DNS traffic, where Deep Packet Inspection techniques are impossible to be used. This dissertation proposes mechanisms to detect malware bots and botnet behaviors on DNS traffic that are robust to encrypted DNS traffic and that ensure the privacy of the involved entities by analyzing instead the behavioral patterns of DNS communications using descriptive statistics over collected network metrics such as packet rates, packet lengths, and silence and activity periods. After characterizing DNS traffic behaviors, a study of the processed data is conducted, followed by the training of Novelty Detection algorithms with the processed data. Models are trained with licit data gathered from multiple licit activities, such as reading the news, studying, and using social networks, in multiple operating systems, browsers, and configurations. Then, the models were tested with similar data, but containing bot malware traffic. Our tests show that our best performing models achieve detection rates in the order of 99%, and 92% for malware bots using low throughput rates. This work ends with some ideas for a more realistic generation of bot malware traffic, as the current DNS Tunneling tools are limited when mimicking licit DNS usages, and for a better detection of malware bots that use low throughput rates.O DNS é um componente crítico da Internet, já que quase todas as aplicações e organizações que a usam dependem dele para funcionar. A sua privação pode deixá-las de fazerem parte da Internet, e por causa disso, o DNS é normalmente o único protocolo permitido quando o acesso à Internet está restrito. A exposição constante deste protocolo a entidades externas obrigam corporações a estarem sempre atentas a software externo ilícito que pode fazer uso indevido do DNS para estabelecer canais secretos e realizar várias atividades ilícitas, como comando e controlo e exfiltração de dados. A maioria das soluções atuais para detecção de malware bots e de botnets são baseadas em técnicas inspeção profunda de pacotes, como analizar payloads de pedidos de DNS, que podem revelar informação privada e sensitiva. Além disso, a maioria das soluções existentes não consideram o uso lícito e cifrado de tráfego DNS, onde técnicas como inspeção profunda de pacotes são impossíveis de serem usadas. Esta dissertação propõe mecanismos para detectar comportamentos de malware bots e botnets que usam o DNS, que são robustos ao tráfego DNS cifrado e que garantem a privacidade das entidades envolvidas ao analizar, em vez disso, os padrões comportamentais das comunicações DNS usando estatística descritiva em métricas recolhidas na rede, como taxas de pacotes, o tamanho dos pacotes, e os tempos de atividade e silêncio. Após a caracterização dos comportamentos do tráfego DNS, um estudo sobre os dados processados é realizado, sendo depois usados para treinar os modelos de Detecção de Novidades. Os modelos são treinados com dados lícitos recolhidos de multiplas atividades lícitas, como ler as notícias, estudar, e usar redes sociais, em multiplos sistemas operativos e com multiplas configurações. De seguida, os modelos são testados com dados lícitos semelhantes, mas contendo também tráfego de malware bots. Os nossos testes mostram que com modelos de Detecção de Novidades é possível obter taxas de detecção na ordem dos 99%, e de 98% para malware bots que geram pouco tráfego. Este trabalho finaliza com algumas ideas para uma geração de tráfego ilícito mais realista, já que as ferramentas atuais de DNS tunneling são limitadas quando usadas para imitar usos de DNS lícito, e para uma melhor deteção de situações onde malware bots geram pouco tráfego.Mestrado em Engenharia de Computadores e Telemátic

Computational Information Engines to improve Knowledge Transfer Skills in Industry 4.0

Many countries around the world, in particular the developing ones, are facing multiple chal- lenges related to skills of the workforce required in Industry 4.0 new paradigm. Specifically, there is a gap between current learning programmes in High Education Institutions (HEI) and skills required by companies. In this context, special centres called Learning Centres (Centres of Excellence) were created, aiming to facilitate and support that knowledge transfer between university and industry environments. The goal of this work is to design and to develop computational information engines which applied in those centres, it could improve the knowledge transfer between academy and industry and vice-versa. The resulting system has two main objectives. One is focused on High Education Institution curricula management and improvement to be in-line with the industry’s competences demands. And the other one is focused in analysing the workers knowledge com- petence’s gaps in relation to the current technological advancements in the industry 4.0 domain.Vários países em desenvolvimento ou recentemente industrializados, enfrentam atualmente múltiplos desafios em relação à sua mão-de-obra no contexto da Indústria 4.0, especificamente a existência de um desajuste nos programas curriculares das unidades de ensino face ao que é exigido pela indústria. Neste contexto, têm sido criados vários Centros de Ensino (Centros de Excelência), com o objetivo de facilitar e apoiar a transferência de conhecimento entre as uni- versidades e indústria. Procura-se desenhar e desenvolver software que, aplicado a esses centros, possa melhorar a transferência de conhecimento entre universidades e indústria. O sistema a ser desenvolvido tem dois requisitos principais. O primeiro visa desenvolver um motor computacional que in- dique como ajustar os planos curriculares das universidades, de modo a estarem em linha com as competências exigidas pela indústria. O outro motor computacional tem como finalidade fazer a análise das competências dos trabalhadores e as lacunas face ao que é exigido tendo em conta o avanço tecnológico inerente ao novo paradigma da Indústria 4.0