Seasonality and interspecific competition shape individual niche variation in co‐occurring tetra fish in Neotropical streams

The drivers of intraspecific niche variation and its effects on species interactions are still unclear, especially in species-rich Neotropical environments. Here, we investigated how ecological opportunity and interspecific competition affect the degree of individual trophic specialization and the population niche breadth in tetra fish. We studied the four ecologically similar species (Psalidodon aff. gymnodontus, P. aff. paranae, P. bifasciatus, and Bryconamericus ikaa) in subtropical headwater streams (three sites with two co-occurring species and three sites with only one species). We sampled fish in two contrasting seasons (winter/dry and summer/wet) and quantified their trophic niches using gut content analysis. Psalidodon bifasciatus was the only species distributed over all the sampled streams. We observed seasonal differences in population trophic niche breadth of P. bifasciatus just when this species co-occurred with P. aff. gymnodontus. These findings confirm the complex nature of the effects of interspecific competition, depending, for instance, on the identity of the competitor. The degree of individual specialization of P. bifasciatus was higher in the winter, and it was not influenced by the presence of another species. Conversely, the other two Psalidodon species studied presented greater individual specialization in the summer, when fish consumed a higher proportion of allochthonous items (terrestrial insects and seeds), and there were no effects only for B. ikaa. Herein, our results suggest that seasonality in food-resource availability is a major driver of niche variation and it has the potential to play an important role in how these similar tetra species interact and coexist.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Intraspecific behavioral variation mediates insect prey survival via direct and indirect effects

© 2020 by the authors. Conspecific individuals often exhibit behavioral differences that influence susceptibility to predation. Yet, how such trait differences scale to affect prey population regulation and community structure remains unclear. We used an 8 day field mesocosm experiment to explore the effects of intraspecific prey behavioral trait variation on survival in an herbivorous insect community. We further manipulated spider predator composition to test for top-down context-dependence of behavioral effects. Insect prey behavioral trait variance influenced survival through both direct (i.e., variation among conspecifics) and indirect (i.e., variation among heterospecifics) mechanisms. The behavioral variance of two prey species, Philaenus and Orchelimum, directly reduced their survival, though for Philaenus, this direct negative effect only occurred in the presence of a single spider predator species. In contrast, the survival of Scudderia was enhanced by the behavioral trait variance of the surrounding insect community, an indirect positive effect. Taken together, these results emphasize the importance of accounting for intraspecific variation in community ecology, demonstrating novel pathways by which individual-level behavioral differences scale to alter population and community level patterns

ESCRITA E EMBRIAGUEZ EM FERNANDO PESSOA: UM ESTUDO PSICANALÍTICO

O presente trabalho objetiva investigar a relação entre escrita e embriaguez emFernando Pessoa a partir do referencial teórico da psicanálise, para isso adotou-se ométodo da psicanálise aplicada. Constatou-se por meio da análise dos escritos que o álcool e a escrita em Pessoa se entrelaçam no sentido de ambas serem utilizadascomo medidas paliativas frente ao mal-estar, e por terem o efeito de "narcose",modificando-se apenas no grau de moderação. Outra relação observada entre álcoolescrita se deu no sentido de ambas estarem atreladas ao corpo. Desta forma, concluise que uma escrita-alcoolizada em Pessoa é possível no sentido que nem toda ação tóxica desencadeia efeitos nocivos, e que a associação álcool-escrita podeproporciona uma relação entre a fantasia e a realidade gerando um apaziguamentodo sujeito frente ao mal-estar

Increasing the Sustainability of Manufacturing Processes in Plastic Injection: Recovering Out-Of-Service Robots to Eliminate Manual Assembly Operations

In the 20th century, there was a burst concerning the development of the automobile industry, which has become an essential asset for society. With its evolution, this industry created a foundation that based its competitiveness on satisfying people’s needs with the highest possible quality and always respecting the delivery deadlines. With the growth in demand, the improvement of certain processes was needed to achieve the desired production goals, accomplished through automation and robotics, as production and assembly lines increasingly used fully automated processes. In plastic injection lines, production is constant and carried out quickly, so it is desirable to perform component assembly steps that immediately support the output of the injection mould parts. This work consists of adapting an obsolete robotic cell to be implemented in one of the production lines to insert components into the injected parts, replacing labour work. Through a mechanical project and an automation design, the equipment was concluded and is currently in production, fulfilling the necessary requirements and improving the process’ cycle time. This proves that it is possible to recover old equipment, which is able to improve current tasks and common needs in modern industry, increasing the economic sustainability of the processes and saving resourcesinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Single step fabrication of antimicrobial fibre mats from a bioengineered protein-based polymer

Producción CientíficaGenetically engineered protein polymers functionalized with bioactive domains have potential as multifunctional versatile materials for biomedical use. The present work describes the fabrication and characterisation of antimicrobial fibre mats comprising the antimicrobial elastin-like recombinamer (ELR) CM4-A200. The CM4-A200 protein polymer derives from the genetic fusion of the ABP-CM4 antimicrobial peptide from Bombyx mori with 200 repetitions of the pentamer VPAVG. This is the first report on non-crosslinked fibre mats fabricated with an antimicrobial ELR stable in solution. Thermal gravimetric analysis of CM4-A200 fibre mats shows one single degradation step at temperatures above 300 °C, with fibres displaying a higher thermal degradation activation. The electrospun CM4-A200 fibres display high antimicrobial activity against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria with no detectable cytotoxic effects against normal human skin fibroblasts and keratinocytes, revealing the great potential of these polymers for the fabrication of biomedical materials.2018-09-10Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad (Projects MAT2013-41723-R, MAT2013- 42473-R and MAT2012-38043)Junta de Castilla y León (programa de apoyo a proyectos de investigación – Ref. VA244U13, VA313U14

Smart Walker Solutions for Physical Rehabilitation

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Development of antimicrobial protein-based polymers for biomedical applications

Inspired in naturally occurring fibrous proteins and composed of amino acid building blocks commonly found in structural proteins, protein-based polymers (PBPs) are a group of materials with unique chemical, physical and biological properties. Coventional recombinant DNA technology allows the biological synthesis of recombinant protein-based polymers (rPBPs) with precise control over its size and composition and the incorporation of functional bioactive domains such as antimicrobial peptides (AMPs). Owing to the unique balance between their mechanical properties, biocompatibility, biodegradability and thermostability, elastin-like recombinamers (ELRs) and silk-elastin like proteins (SELPs) are two of the most remarkable families of rPBP for biotechnological applications. Here, we describe the functionalization of a SELP and an ELR with different antimicrobial peptides that showed promising results against several Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacterial strains. This will provide the basis for the development of advanced biomaterials processed into different types of structures (e.g. hydrogels, films, fibers, particles) suitable for biomedical applications

Protein-engineered polymers functionalized with antimicrobial peptides for the development of active surfaces

Antibacterial resistance is a major worldwide threat due to the increasing number of infections caused by antibiotic-resistant bacteria with medical devices being a major source of these infections. This suggests the need for new antimicrobial biomaterial designs able to withstand the increasing pressure of antimicrobial resistance. Recombinant protein polymers (rPPs) are an emerging class of nature-inspired biopolymers with unique chemical, physical and biological properties. These polymers can be functionalized with antimicrobial molecules utilizing recombinant DNA technology and then produced in microbial cell factories. In this work, we report the functionalization of rPBPs based on elastin and silk-elastin with different antimicrobial peptides (AMPs). These polymers were produced in Escherichia coli, successfully purified by employing non-chromatographic processes, and used for the production of free-standing films. The antimicrobial activity of the materials was evaluated against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria, and results showed that the polymers demonstrated antimicrobial activity, pointing out the potential of these biopolymers for the development of new advanced antimicrobial materials.This work was supported by the “Contrato-Programa” UIDB/04050/2020, project FunBioPlas (ERA-IB-2-6/0004/2014) and project FUN2CYT (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-030568) funded by Portugal national funds through the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT I.P.). A.M.P. acknowledges the Doctoral Programme in Applied and Environmental Microbiology (DP_AEM) and FCT I.P. for the PD/BD/113811/2015 grant. R.M. acknowledges FCT I.P. for funding in the scope of the Scientific Employment Stimulus instrument (CEECIND/00526/2018)

A new approach on communications architectures for intelligent transportation systems

A Vehicular Adhoc Network (VANET) is a generic communications conceptualization that can be applied to Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) and its main goal is to allow exchange of information between moving vehicles, fixed infrastructures, pedestrians with personal devices, and all other electronic devices able to connect to a VANET environment. Information exchange between different stakeholders brings a relevant potential to the development of applications to help users in different areas such as traffic safety and efficiency, infotainment and personal comfort. However, due to the expected heterogeneity (different processing power and storage capabilities, communications technologies and mobility patterns) and large scale on the number of devices involved, application interoperability in VANET contexts can be a challenging problem. Non-agnostic standard communications architectures for ITS systems have some deploying limitations and lack important specific implementation details. This paper presents an agnostic VANET architecture (it permits the use of several communication technologies in an open and modular framework), which is an adaption of present standards approach, to be deployed on ITS systems as a mean to overcome their main limitations. (C) 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.This work has been sponsored by the Portugal Incentive System for Research and Technological Development. Project in co-promotion no 002797/2015 (INNOVCAR 2015-2018), and also by COMPETE: POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007043 and FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the Project Scope: UID/CEC/00319/2013

Rhizobium strains competitiveness on bean nodulation in Cerrado soils

The objective of this work was to identify the most competitive and effective Rhizobium strains in order to increase common bean yield by nitrogen fixation as alternative or complementation to the nitrogen fertilization. Competitiveness tests were lead in axenic conditions, in Cerrado soil pots and in three field experiments, with native Rhizobium strains that were previously identified, according to their effectiveness and genetic variability. The identification of strains in nodules was performed using serological tests (axenic conditions) - agglutination and enzyme linked immunosorbent (Elisa) assays - and random amplified polymorfic DNA (RAPD) (Cerrado soil). Plant yield was determined using the dry weight (greenhouse conditions), total N and grain yield (field experiments). Among the analyzed Rhizobium strains, native strain SLA 2.2 and commercial strain CIAT 899 were the dominant nodules in plants of the most productive plots, presenting yield productivity similar or higher to those obtained in treatments where 20 kg ha-1 of N were applied.O objetivo deste trabalho foi identificar as estirpes de Rhizobium mais efetivas e competitivas, a fim de maximizar a produtividade do feijoeiro por meio da fixação de nitrogênio, como alternativa à adubação nitrogenada. Foram conduzidos testes de competitividade em condições axênicas, em vasos com solo do Cerrado e em três experimentos de campo, com estirpes de Rhizobium nativas, previamente selecionadas quanto à efetividade e à variabilidade genética. A identificação das estirpes nos nódulos foi efetuada por meio das técnicas de aglutinação e ensaio imunoabsorvente de ligação de enzimas (Elisa), em condições de casa de vegetação, e pela técnica de DNA polimórfico amplificado ao acaso (RAPD), em solo de Cerrado. A produtividade das plantas foi determinada pela produção de matéria seca, teor de N e produção de grãos (condições de campo). A estirpe nativa SLA 2.2 e a estirpe comercial CIAT 899 foram dominantes nos nódulos das plantas das parcelas mais produtivas, com índices de produtividade iguais ou superiores aos obtidos nos tratamentos em que foram aplicados 20 kg ha-1 de N