Progress in mass and clonal selection of grapevine varieties in Portugal

Since 1978 we have developed methods for mass and clonal selection of grapevine well adapted to the conditions of Portuguese viticulture. The most remarkable innovation of this methodology is the establishment of large experimental populations of clones in which good estimates of yield heritability and genetic gain can be obtained. The aim of the present paper is to clarify some methodological aspects such as (1) the ideal composition and structure of the experimental populations of clones and (2) the application of this methodology to a large number of Portuguese varieties, in order to maximize the rate of yield improvement. At present we can point out the following results: According to experimental data and computer simulation; we may conclude that the optimal number of clones to be included in each population is about 200-300, each one represented by 4 vines in 5 replications. By this way we can usually obtain heritability estimates between 30 and 80% and genetic gain values higher than 15%.Until now, we have succeeded in applying this methodology to 30 of the most important Portuguese varieties, which represent more than 80% of all varieties normally propagated in the country

Equality of opportunity and educational achievement in Portugal

Portugal has one of the highest levels of income inequality in Europe, and low wages and unemployment are concentrated among low skill individuals. Education is an important determinant of inequality. However, there are large differences in the educational attainment of different individuals in the population, and the sources of these differences emerge early in the life-cycle when families play a central role in individual development. We estimate that most of the variance of school achievement at age 15 is explained by family characteristics. Observed school inputs explain very little of adolescent performance. Children from highly educated parents benefit of rich cultural environments in the home and become highly educated adults. Education policy needs to be innovative: (1) it needs to explicitly recognize the fundamental long run role of families on child development; (2) it needs to acknowledge the failure of traditional input based policies

Inhomogeneous cosmologies, the Copernican principle and the cosmic microwave background: More on the EGS theorem

We discuss inhomogeneous cosmological models which satisfy the Copernican principle. We construct some inhomogeneous cosmological models starting from the ansatz that the all the observers in the models view an isotropic cosmic microwave background. We discuss multi-fluid models, and illustrate how more general inhomogeneous models may be derived, both in General Relativity and in scalar-tensor theories of gravity. Thus we illustrate that the cosmological principle, the assumption that the Universe we live in is spatially homogeneous, does not necessarily follow from the Copernican principle and the high isotropy of the cosmic microwave background.Comment: 17 pages; to appear in GR

Observational constraints on late-time Lambda(t) cosmology

The cosmological constant, i.e., the energy density stored in the true vacuum state of all existing fields in the Universe, is the simplest and the most natural possibility to describe the current cosmic acceleration. However, despite its observational successes, such a possibility exacerbates the well known cosmological constant problem, requiring a natural explanation for its small, but nonzero, value. In this paper we study cosmological consequences of a scenario driven by a varying cosmological term, in which the vacuum energy density decays linearly with the Hubble parameter. We test the viability of this scenario and study a possible way to distinguish it from the current standard cosmological model by using recent observations of type Ia supernova (Supernova Legacy Survey Collaboration), measurements of the baryonic acoustic oscillation from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the position of the first peak of the cosmic microwave background angular spectrum from the three-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe.Comment: Some important revisions. To appear in Physical Review

Evolution of density perturbations in decaying vacuum cosmology: The case of non-zero perturbations in the cosmological term

We extend the results of a previous paper where a model of interacting dark energy, with a cosmological term decaying linearly with the Hubble parameter, is tested against the observed mass power spectrum. In spite of the agreement with observations of type Ia supernovas, baryonic acoustic oscillations and the cosmic microwave background, we had shown previously that no good concordance is achieved if we include the mass power spectrum. However, our analysis was based on the ad hoc assumption that the interacting cosmological term is strictly homogeneous. Now we perform a more complete analysis, by perturbing such a term. Although our conclusions are still based on a particular, scale invariant choice of the primordial spectrum of dark energy perturbations, we show that a cosmological term decaying linearly with the Hubble parameter is indeed disfavored as compared to the standard model.Comment: Version accepted for publication in Physical Review

Interação genótipos x ambiente e estimativas de adaptabilidade e estabilidade de produção em clones de café Conilon.

Os objetivos deste trabalho foram estudar a ?performance?, a interação genótipos x ambientes e efetuar a análise de adaptabilidade e estabilidade de produção de 40 genótipos de café Conilon do Programa de Melhoramento Genético do INCAPER, em dois locais do estado do Espírito Santo em sete colheitas. Para estimação da adaptabilidade e estabilidade foi utilizada a metodologia de Cruz et al. (1989). Verificou-se que as condições edafoclimáticas de Sooretama e Marilândia são favoráveis para obtenção de ganho em produtividade, com o uso dos genótipos do Programa de Melhoramento Café Conilon do Incaper e, que os resultados são importantes para a seleção de clones para adaptação geral, para adaptações em ambientes favoráveis, ambientes desfavoráveis do Estado, para formações de variedades melhoradas e de populações base