As letras capitulares na ilustração dos livros infantis em Portugal, nos séculos XIX e XX

O presente trabalho tem por objecto o desenho de letras capitulares (ou capitais) nos textos destinados às crianças desde finais do século XIX até meados da década de 1970 e insere-se no âmbito da investigação em curso sobre a ilustração infanto-juvenil em Portugal. Longe de ser um estudo conclusivo sobre a matéria, o que propomos é um olhar descomprometido sobre certas particularidades (visuais e gráficas) assumidas por estes caracteres no contexto das obras infantis, algumas das quais são peças fundamentais da literatura infanto-juvenil em língua portuguesa. Os exemplos seleccionados (cerca de cinquenta) resultaram da escolha feita com base num leque muito alargado de publicações, entre jornais, revistas e livros, tendo em conta diversos géneros e formatos - do conto tradicional ao romance de aventuras, da revista em fascículo ao álbum ilustrado. Em termos metodológicos, optámos por uma exposição não cronológica dos exemplos, mas sim focalizada em aspectos formais e estéticos dos elementos em estudo. Optámos pela apresentação integral da página onde aqueles elementos foram impressos. Num primeiro momento, verificamos que a utilização das letras capitulares (pelo menos, no caso das obras destinadas à infância) não decorre de uma intencionalidade artística precisa, ou de uma atitude concertada relativamente à sua integração no todo composicional da obra, mas que, muitas vezes, essa opção podia ser fruto do livre arbítrio ou do preconceito de gosto do compositor que, na ocasião, tinha a obra ao seu encargo. Na realidade, as letras capitais, eram vistas como caracteres tipográficos e não como imagens, transmutados em desenhos, é certo, mas nunca deixando de fazer parte do alfabeto escrito; talvez por isso, a manipulação desses caracteres em contexto de paginação e composição não fizesse parte das competências do desenhador, mas sim do compositor ou do impressor. Nada que não se compreenda se pensarmos que, durante séculos, a acção do ilustrador esgota-se quase sempre à entrada das oficinas, após terem sido entregues os originais. Mesmo durante o século XVIII, considerado por Ernesto Soares “incontestavelmente o que maior brilho apresenta na ilustração do livro” (Soares, 1961: 20), era habitual os desenhos passarem para as mãos dos incisores, gravadores e tipógrafos, que dentro dos ateliers oficinais os transformavam em gravuras ou litografias para depois serem incluídas nas obras. Certas unidades tipográficas importantes, como por exemplo a Casa Literária do Arco do Cego, um projecto editorial iniciado em 1799, chegavam a ter um corpo de gravadores e iluminadores considerável. O estatuto artístico destes profissionais era de tal modo incontestado, que as gravuras impressas a partir dos desenhos originais (ou mesmo pinturas) incluíam, geralmente, não só o nome do artista, como também o do gravador. Tal como o manuscrito do escritor ficava a cargo dos tipógrafos mais experientes, assim os desenhos terminavam nas mãos daqueles profissionais, cujo engenho (mas nem sempre a arte) procurava não desvirtuar o original

Engineering education towards sustainability

The traditional systems have been studied in an isolated mode, seek to respond to a specific need and deal with a restricted set of variables. The targets established for energy efficient systems and energy sustainability imply that new systems are more comprehensive and combine the various individual systems. This new topology requires a new kind of engineering professionals provided with new skills. New engineering professionals need to have not only a set of deep capabilities in a specific area, but also more comprehensive proficiencies that allow them to understand how to integrate their particular system into a wider functional system. This paper addresses some challenges and issues posed to Higher Education institutions and to engineering professionals of the future.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A multicultural approach to teach sustainability

Globalization is a tendency that covers all society perspectives in general, and the high education in particular. The main traditional objective of these institutions was to prepare domestic students with a set of skills. The research competition and universities rankings, as well as the need to reach other publics pushed them towards internationalization. The exchange of students across the UE is a well-known reality which success is largely due to cultural similarities. However, a set of issues raises in importance when students from different cultures are involved. We proposed an International Summer Course with a layout specifically designed to identify those questions. In our experience the class included Korean and Portuguese students in the same proportions to develop some work under the framework of sustainability, a specific theme chosen in order to foster consensus. Aiming at a higher level of internationalization and having in mind that students could gain from an intensive and multicultural experience ISEP organized its first Engineering for Sustainable Development (E4SD) Summer Course, in July 2014. This work reports some results from this experience, which included a Problem Based Learning (PBL) approach, and points new directions. In fact, PBL seemed to be a way of promoting integration and the inclusion of multiple cultures allowed the analysis of different perspectives which otherwise would not have been considered. On the other hand, all the students had an international experience, in a non native language, which has driven them out of their confort zon

TERT promoter mutations in pancreatic endocrine tumours are rare and mainly found in tumours from patients with hereditary syndromes

One of the hallmarks of cancer is its unlimited replicative potential that needs a compensatory mechanism for the consequential telomere erosion. Telomerase promoter (TERTp) mutations were recently reported as a novel mechanism for telomerase re-activation/expression in order to maintain telomere length. Pancreatic endocrine tumors (PETs) were so far recognized to rely mainly on the alternative lengthening of telomeres (ALT) mechanism. It was our objective to study if TERTp mutations were present in pancreatic endocrine tumors (PET) and could represent an alternative mechanism to ALT. TERTp mutations were detected in 7% of the cases studied and were mainly associated to patients harbouring hereditary syndromes. In vitro, using PET-derived cell lines and by luciferase reporter assay, these mutations confer a 2 to 4-fold increase in telomerase transcription activity. These novel alterations are able to recruit ETS transcription factor members, in particular GABP-α and ETV1, to the newly generated binding sites. We report for the first time TERTp mutations in PETs and PET-derived cell lines. Additionally, our data indicate that these mutations serve as an alternative mechanism and in an exclusive manner to ALT, in particular in patients with hereditary syndromes.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia; Norte 2020 – Programa Operacional Regional do Norte project: (“Advancing cancer research: from basic knowledgment to application” - grant: NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000029); Associate Laboratory of the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education: (I3S)

Common genetic variation in KATNAL1 non-coding regions is involved in the susceptibility to severe phenotypes of male infertility

Free PMC article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9546047/Background: Previous studies in animal models evidenced that genetic mutations of KATNAL1, resulting in dysfunction of its encoded protein, lead to male infertility through disruption of microtubule remodelling and premature germ cell exfoliation. Subsequent studies in humans also suggested a possible role of KATNAL1 single nucleotide polymorphisms in the development of male infertility as a consequence of severe spermatogenic failure. Objectives: The main objective of the present study is to evaluate the effect of the common genetic variation of KATNAL1 in a large and phenotypically well-characterised cohort of infertile men because of severe spermatogenic failure. Materials and methods: A total of 715 infertile men because of severe spermato genic failure, including 210 severe oligospermia and 505 non-obstructive azoospermia patients, as well as 1058 unaffected controls were genotyped for three KATNAL1 single-nucleotide polymorphism taggers (rs2077011, rs7338931 and rs2149971). Case–control association analyses by logistic regression assuming different models and in silico functional characterisation of risk variants were conducted. Results: Genetic associations were observed between the three analysed taggers and different severe spermatogenic failure groups. However, in all cases, the haplotype model (rs2077011*C | rs7338931*T | rs2149971*A) better explained the observed associations than the three risk alleles independently. This haplotype was associated with non-obstructive azoospermia (adjusted p = 4.96E-02, odds ratio = 2.97), Sertoli cell only syndrome (adjusted p = 2.83E-02, odds ratio = 5.16) and testicular sperm extraction unsuccessful outcomes (adjusted p = 8.99E-04, odds ratio = 6.13). The in silico analyses indicated that the effect on severe spermatogenic failure predisposition could be because of an alteration of the KATNAL1 splicing pattern. Conclusions: Specific allelic combinations of KATNAL1 genetic polymorphisms may confer a risk of developing severe male infertility phenotypes by favouring the overrepresentation of a short non-functional transcript isoform in the testis.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the Spanish National Plan for Scientific and Technical Research and Innovation (refs. SAF2016-78722-R and PID2020-120157RB-I00), the ‘Instituto de Salud Carlos III’ (Fondo de Investigaciones Sanitarias)/Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional ‘Una manera de hacer Europa’ (FIS/FEDER) (ref. DTS18/00101 to Sara Larriba), the Generalitat de Catalunya (ref. 2017SGR191), the ‘Ramón y Cajal’ program (ref. RYC-2014-16458) and the ‘Juan de la Cierva Incorporación’ program (ref. IJC2018-038026-I), as well as the Andalusian Government through the R&D&i Projects Grants for Universities and Public Research Entities (ref. PY20_00212), which include FEDER funds. Andrea Guzmán-Jiménez was a recipient of a grant from the Spanish Ministry of Education and Professional Training (‘Becas de Colaboración en Departamentos Universitarios para el curso académico 2020/2021’). Patricia I. Marques is supported by the FCT post-doctoral fellowship (SFRH/BPD/120777/2016), financed from the Portuguese State Budget of the Ministry for Science, Tech nology and High Education and from the European Social Fund, available through the ‘Programa Operacional do Capital Humano’. João Gonçalves was partially funded by FCT/MCTES through national funds attributed to the Centre for Toxicogenomics and Human Health— ToxOmics (UID/BIM/00009/2016 and UIDB/00009/2020). Sara Larriba is sponsored by the Researchers Consolidation Program (ISCIII SNS/Dpt. Salut Generalitat de Catalunya) (CES09/020).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Common genetic variation in KATNAL1 non‐coding regions is involved in the susceptibility to severe phenotypes of male infertility

© 2022 The Authors. Andrology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American Society of Andrology and European Academy of Andrology. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.Background: Previous studies in animal models evidenced that genetic mutations of KATNAL1, resulting in dysfunction of its encoded protein, lead to male infertility through disruption of microtubule remodelling and premature germ cell exfoliation. Subsequent studies in humans also suggested a possible role of KATNAL1 single-nucleotide polymorphisms in the development of male infertility as a consequence of severe spermatogenic failure. Objectives: The main objective of the present study is to evaluate the effect of the common genetic variation of KATNAL1 in a large and phenotypically well-characterised cohort of infertile men because of severe spermatogenic failure. Materials and methods: A total of 715 infertile men because of severe spermatogenic failure, including 210 severe oligospermia and 505 non-obstructive azoospermia patients, as well as 1058 unaffected controls were genotyped for three KATNAL1 single-nucleotide polymorphism taggers (rs2077011, rs7338931 and rs2149971). Case-control association analyses by logistic regression assuming different models and in silico functional characterisation of risk variants were conducted. Results: Genetic associations were observed between the three analysed taggers and different severe spermatogenic failure groups. However, in all cases, the haplotype model (rs2077011*C | rs7338931*T | rs2149971*A) better explained the observed associations than the three risk alleles independently. This haplotype was associated with non-obstructive azoospermia (adjusted p = 4.96E-02, odds ratio = 2.97), Sertoli-cell only syndrome (adjusted p = 2.83E-02, odds ratio = 5.16) and testicular sperm extraction unsuccessful outcomes (adjusted p = 8.99E-04, odds ratio = 6.13). The in silico analyses indicated that the effect on severe spermatogenic failure predisposition could be because of an alteration of the KATNAL1 splicing pattern. Conclusions: Specific allelic combinations of KATNAL1 genetic polymorphisms may confer a risk of developing severe male infertility phenotypes by favouring the overrepresentation of a short non-functional transcript isoform in the testis.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the Spanish National Plan for Scientific and Technical Research and Innovation (refs. SAF2016-78722-R and PID2020-120157RB-I00), the ‘Instituto de Salud Carlos III’ (Fondo de Investigaciones Sanitarias)/Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional ‘Una manera de hacer Europa’ (FIS/FEDER) (ref. DTS18/00101 to Sara Larriba), the Generalitat de Catalunya (ref. 2017SGR191), the ‘Ramón y Cajal’ program (ref. RYC-2014-16458) and the ‘Juan de la Cierva Incorporación’ program (ref. IJC2018-038026-I), as well as the Andalusian Government through the R&D&i Projects Grants for Universities and Public Research Entities (ref. PY20_00212), which include FEDER funds. Andrea Guzmán-Jiménez was a recipient of a grant from the Spanish Ministry of Education and Professional Training (‘Becas de Colaboración en Departamentos Universitarios para el curso académico 2020/2021’). Patricia I. Marques is supported by the FCT post-doctoral fellowship (SFRH/BPD/120777/2016), financed from the Portuguese State Budget of the Ministry for Science, Technology and High Education and from the European Social Fund, available through the ‘Programa Operacional do Capital Humano’. João Gonçalves was partially funded by FCT/MCTES through national funds attributed to the Centre for Toxicogenomics and Human Health—ToxOmics (UID/BIM/00009/2016 and UIDB/00009/2020). Sara Larriba is sponsored by the Researchers Consolidation Program (ISCIII SNS/Dpt. Salut Generalitat de Catalunya) (CES09/020).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

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

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

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