As Oportunidades de Financiamento na Economia Social - Estudo de Caso às Entidades do Distrito da Guarda

A Economia Social pertence ao terceiro setor e tem vindo a ganhar relevo, principalmente, nas sociedades desenvolvidas, como é o caso da Europa, contudo, é ainda complexa a sua definição. A Economia Social visa colmatar algumas lacunas da própria sociedade civil, às quais o Estado não consegue eliminar e o Mercado não se interessa por colmatar, permitindo assim responder às necessidades a nível social e cultural, criação de emprego para os residentes e contribuição para a economia nacional e local. O presente projeto propôs-se investigar o conhecimento das oportunidades de financiamento na Economia Social, por parte das entidades do distrito da Guarda. Para alcançar este objetivo foi aplicado um questionário a algumas entidades da Economia Social do distrito da Guarda para melhor perceber quais as suas fontes de financiamento e qual o conhecimento que têm das mesmas. Com as respostas obtidas da amostra estudada, nota-se que a maioria das entidades são Associações de Solidariedade Social e grande parte destas opera na área da Terceira Idade. Contudo, existem algumas que atuam em simultâneo nas áreas Terceira Idade e Infância e Juventude. Provou-se que o conhecimento sobre as oportunidades de financiamento da Economia Social por parte das entidades, precisa de ser aperfeiçoado. Verificou-se que 65% das entidades referem ter uma razoável sustentabilidade na sua Organização, mas poucas entidades investem em novas oportunidades de Financiamento. A sustentabilidade insere-se nos métodos tradicionais, como receitas próprias adquiridas provenientes dos utentes e protocolos com a Segurança Social. Poucas entidades contam com protocolos dos Municípios Locais

Electro-enzymatic ATP regeneration coupled to biocatalytic phosphorylation reactions

Funding Information: A.L.D, M.P. and M.V. thank grants RTI2018-095090-B-I00 and PID2021-1241160B-I00 funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Union, and 2021AEP014 funded by CSIC. G.G.M. thanks grant BES-2016-078815 funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Union. I.L.-M. and M.V. acknowledge financial support through grant S2018/BAA-4403 SINOXPHOS-CM (EU-FEDER). I.A.C.P. and A.M.C. thank support from the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia through fellowship SFRH/BD/146475/2019 and MOSTMICRO-ITQB R&D Unit (UIDB/04612/2020, UIDP/04612/2020) and LS4FUTURE Associated Laboratory (LA/P/0087/2020). Publisher Copyright: © 2023 The Author(s)Adenosine-5-triphosphate (ATP) is the main energy vector in biological systems, thus its regeneration is an important issue for the application of many enzymes of interest in biocatalysis and synthetic biology. We have developed an electroenzymatic ATP regeneration system consisting in a gold electrode modified with a floating phospholipid bilayer that allows coupling the catalytic activity of two membrane-bound enzymes: NiFeSe hydrogenase from Desulfovibrio vulgaris and F1Fo-ATP synthase from Escherichia coli. Thus, H2 is used as a fuel for producing ATP. This electro-enzymatic assembly is studied as ATP regeneration system of phosphorylation reactions catalysed by kinases, such as hexokinase and NAD+-kinase for respectively producing glucose-6-phosphate and NADP+.publishersversionpublishe

Reference gene validation for quantitative RT-PCR during biotic and abiotic stresses in Vitis vinifera

Grapevine is one of the most cultivated fruit crop worldwide with Vitis vinifera being the species with the highest economical importance. Being highly susceptible to fungal pathogens and increasingly affected by environmental factors, it has become an important agricultural research area, where gene expression analysis plays a fundamental role. Quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) is currently amongst the most powerful techniques to perform gene expression studies. Nevertheless, accurate gene expression quantification strongly relies on appropriate reference gene selection for sample normalization. Concerning V. vinifera, limited information still exists as for which genes are the most suitable to be used as reference under particular experimental conditions. In this work, seven candidate genes were investigated for their stability in grapevine samples referring to four distinct stresses (Erysiphe necator, wounding and UV-C irradiation in leaves and Phaeomoniella chlamydospora colonization in wood). The expression stability was evaluated using geNorm, NormFinder and BestKeeper. In all cases, full agreement was not observed for the three methods. To provide comprehensive rankings integrating the three different programs, for each treatment, a consensus ranking was created using a non-weighted unsupervised rank aggregation method. According to the last, the three most suitable reference genes to be used in grapevine leaves, regardless of the stress, are UBC, VAG and PEP. For the P. chlamydospora treatment, EF1, CYP and UBC were the best scoring genes. Acquaintance of the most suitable reference genes to be used in grapevine samples can contribute for accurate gene expression quantification in forthcoming studiesinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Directed functional brain connectivity based on EEG source imaging : methodology and application to temporal lobe epilepsy

The importance of functional brain connectivity to study physiological and pathological brain activity has been widely recognized. Here, we aimed to 1) review a methodological pipeline to investigate directed functional connectivity between brain regions using source signals derived from high-density EEG; 2) elaborate on some methodological challenges; and 3) apply this pipeline to temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) patients and healthy controls to investigate directed functional connectivity differences in the theta and beta frequency bands during EEG epochs without visible pathological activity

Dynamic directed interictal connectivity in left and right temporal lobe epilepsy.

OBJECTIVE There is increasing evidence that epileptic activity involves widespread brain networks rather than single sources and that these networks contribute to interictal brain dysfunction. We investigated the fast-varying behavior of epileptic networks during interictal spikes in right and left temporal lobe epilepsy (RTLE and LTLE) at a whole-brain scale using directed connectivity. METHODS In 16 patients, 8 with LTLE and 8 with RTLE, we estimated the electrical source activity in 82 cortical regions of interest (ROIs) using high-density electroencephalography (EEG), individual head models, and a distributed linear inverse solution. A multivariate, time-varying, and frequency-resolved Granger-causal modeling (weighted Partial Directed Coherence) was applied to the source signal of all ROIs. A nonparametric statistical test assessed differences between spike and baseline epochs. Connectivity results between RTLE and LTLE were compared between RTLE and LTLE and with neuropsychological impairments. RESULTS Ipsilateral anterior temporal structures were identified as key drivers for both groups, concordant with the epileptogenic zone estimated invasively. We observed an increase in outflow from the key driver already before the spike. There were also important temporal and extratemporal ipsilateral drivers in both conditions, and contralateral only in RTLE. A different network pattern between LTLE and RTLE was found: in RTLE there was a much more prominent ipsilateral to contralateral pattern than in LTLE. Half of the RTLE patients but none of the LTLE patients had neuropsychological deficits consistent with contralateral temporal lobe dysfunction, suggesting a relationship between connectivity changes and cognitive deficits. SIGNIFICANCE The different patterns of time-varying connectivity in LTLE and RTLE suggest that they are not symmetrical entities, in line with our neuropsychological results. The highest outflow region was concordant with invasive validation of the epileptogenic zone. This enhanced characterization of dynamic connectivity patterns could better explain cognitive deficits and help the management of epilepsy surgery candidates

Electro-enzymatic ATP regeneration coupled to biocatalytic phosphorylation reactions

Adenosine-5-triphosphate (ATP) is the main energy vector in biological systems, thus its regeneration is an important issue for the application of many enzymes of interest in biocatalysis and synthetic biology. We have developed an electroenzymatic ATP regeneration system consisting in a gold electrode modified with a floating phospholipid bilayer that allows coupling the catalytic activity of two membrane-bound enzymes: NiFeSe hydrogenase from Desulfovibrio vulgaris and F1Fo-ATP synthase from Escherichia coli. Thus, H2 is used as a fuel for producing ATP. This electro-enzymatic assembly is studied as ATP regeneration system of phosphorylation reactions catalysed by kinases, such as hexokinase and NAD+-kinase for respectively producing glucose-6-phosphate and NADP+. © 2023 The Author(s)A.L.D, M.P. and M.V. thank grants RTI2018-095090-B-I00 and PID2021-1241160B-I00 funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/ 501100011033 and by the European Union, and 2021AEP014 funded by CSIC. G.G.M. thanks grant BES-2016-078815 funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033 and by the European Union. I.L.-M. and M.V. acknowledge financial support through grant S2018/BAA-4403 SINOXPHOS-CM (EU-FEDER). I.A.C.P. and A.M.C. thank support from the Fundaç˜ao para a Ciˆencia e Tecnologia through fellowship SFRH/BD/ 146475/2019 and MOSTMICRO-ITQB R&D Unit (UIDB/04612/2020, UIDP/04612/2020) and LS4FUTURE Associated Laboratory (LA/P/ 0087/2020).Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi. org/10.1016/j.bioelechem.2023.108432Peer reviewe