Empirical approaches for near-term climate predictions

Climate variations on seasonal to decadal time scales can have enormous social, economical and environmental impacts. As such, the ability to make skilful and reliable climate predictions at these time scales offers many benefits for climate preparedness, adaptation and resilience. In the recent years, major progress has been made in the development of such predictions with the advent of simulations with global climate models that are initialized from the current climate state. However, many challenges remain including an understanding of the underlying physical mechanisms for skilful predictions and whether such predictions could be improved. The purpose of this thesis is to establish new benchmarks for seasonal to decadal predictions in diverse components of the climate system and to provide some pieces of evidence that help to understand what are the drivers for these predictable patterns. Specifically, we use a suite of empirical models to perform predictions of oceanic and atmospheric variables together with initialized climate predictions to: 1. Understand the contribution of remote and local factors to the predictability of North and Tropical Pacific Oceans Sea Surface Temperature and Land Surface Temperature over Western North America; 2. Provide a higher baseline level skill for the state-of-art global prediction systems, from seasonal to decadal time scales; 3. Explore possible sources of errors in the global climate model simulations using statistical predictive models.First, we isolate contributions to the forecast skill from different spatial and time scales in the Pacific Ocean using a Liner Inverse Modelling (LIM) approach, showing the importance of temporal scale interactions in improving the predictions on decadal time scales. Specifically, we show that the Extratropical North Pacific is a source of predictability for the tropics on seasonal to interannual time scales, while the tropics enhance the forecast skill for the decadal component. We then show that the skill for an empirically-built LIM is comparable to and sometimes better than that from two state-of-art global prediction systems, from seasonal to decadal timescales and for several regions around the globe. These results indicate that the evolution of the system in those areas may not be not fully driven by unpredictable dynamics and that there may be some room for improvement in the dynamical models predictions, given that a low-dimensional linear model is able to generate better skill than the fully-coupled nonlinear model. Bearing that in mind, we use the LIM linear feedback matrix to explore possible sources of errors in the dynamical model simulations and we find that some of the simulated atmospheric and oceanic local and remote feedbacks differ in several key regions from that obtained with observations. These results may indicate sources of error in the dynamical models and therefore in its prediction skill that merit focused attention.We then investigate the role of remote and local predictors in seasonal predictors of minimum and maximum air temperatures over the Western North America, using a Canonical Correlation Analysis approach. We show that remote predictors, in the form of Pacific climate modes, provide the best predictive skill for temperature over land, particularly during wintertime. Lastly, considering that persistence is the widely-used measure when evaluating the predictive skill for dynamical models, we suggest the use of CCA as a much higher benchmark for seasonal predictions of land surface air temperatures

Prática de ensino supervisionada em educação pré-escolar e ensino do 1º ciclo do ensino básico - A hora do conto: relato de práticas

O presente relatório da Prática de Ensino Supervisionada surge no âmbito do Mestrado em Educação Pré-Escolar e Ensino do 1º Ciclo do Ensino Básico da Universidade de Évora e é o resultado de uma investigação sustentada pela ação educativa desenvolvida ao longo da Prática de Ensino Supervisionada, no Pré-Escolar e no 1º Ciclo do Ensino Básico. Esta investigação tem como principais objetivos compreender de que forma se processa a hora do conto nos dois contextos onde realizei a minha prática, nomeadamente compreender qual a sua importância na promoção da leitura. Para isso, pretendi responder às seguintes questões: Que práticas devo realizar para promover a leitura, para formar leitores competentes, autónomos, e para desenvolver a capacidade linguística das crianças? E como dinamizar a hora do conto no ambiente educativo? Neste sentido, procedeu-se à construção do quadro teórico que sustenta a investigação do tema “A hora do conto: Relato de práticas”, onde procuro compreender a importância e a dinamização da hora do conto, nomeadamente na promoção da leitura. Para além da fundamentação teórica, a metodologia adotada foi a investigação-ação, onde propus uma prática de dinamização e promoção da leitura. Importa também realçar a importância dos instrumentos de investigação utilizados durante a PES, que contribuíram para a recolha de dados, nomeadamente a entrevista semiestruturada realizada à educadora e professora cooperante, possibilitando assim o alcance dos objetivos acima enunciados. Assim, a investigação permitiu contribuir de forma significativa para a ampliação dos estudos acerca da importância da Hora do Conto como um importante veículo para a formação de leitores, uma vez que o gosto pelas histórias começa na voz dos pais, passa pelos contadores, educadores, professores, os quais assumem uma grande responsabilidade de introduzir a criança no mundo da literatura; ABSTRACT: This report of the Supervised Teaching Practice comes under the Master’s Degree in Pre-school Teaching and Primary Education of the University of Évora and is the result research supported by the education developed throughout Supervised Teaching Practice in Preschool and in Primary Education. The main objectives of this inquiry are to understand how story time is processed in two contexts where I did my practice, in particular to understand what is the importance in promoting reading. For this reason, I wanted to answer the following questions: What practices should I take to promote reading, to form competent readers, autonomous, and to develop the linguistic ability of children? And how to encourage story time within the educational environment? In this sense, a theoretical framework was designed which supports the inquiry of the theme "The Story Time: Reporting practices", where I try to understand the importance and the encouragement of story time, particularly in the promotion of reading. In addition to the theoretical foundation, the methodology adopted was research-action, where I proposed a practice of stimulation and promotion of reading. It is also important to emphasize the importance of the research tools used during the PES, which contributed to the collection of data, in particular structured interviews held with the teacher and teacher’s assistant, thus enabling to achieve the objectives set out above. This way the investigation significantly contributed to the expansion of the studies about the importance of story time as as an important vehicle for the formation of readers, since the taste for stories begins in the parental voice, passes by storytellers, educators , teachers who take on a great responsibility to introduce the child in the world of literature

Autonomous guided vehicles applied to industrial engineering and management studies

This article presents a framework to an Industrial Engineering and Management Science course from School of Management and Industrial Studies using Autonomous Ground Vehicles (AGV) to supply materials to a production line as an experimental setup for the students to acquire knowledge in the production robotics area. The students must be capable to understand and put into good use several concepts that will be of utmost importance in their professional life such as critical decisions regarding the study, development and implementation of a production line. The main focus is a production line using AGVs, where the students are required to address several topics such as: sensors actuators, controllers and an high level management and optimization software. The presented framework brings to the robotics teaching community methodologies that allow students from different backgrounds, that normally don’t experiment with the robotics concepts in practice due to the big gap between theory and practice, to go straight to ”making” robotics. Our aim was to suppress the minimum start point level thus allowing any student to fully experience robotics with little background knowledge

To what extent does the implementation of a category management program influence retail pharmacies' current model?

As a result of structural changes that affected the retail pharmacy market and completely altered its competitive landscape, pharmacies are now actively seeking to strategically counterpoint these events. ANF, as the national association for pharmacies in Portugal, is an organization that, among other services, provides managerial support to associated pharmacies. By associating themselves with ANF, these pharmacies become part of the Farmácias Portuguesas brand. This study focuses on ANF’s latest project, the creation of a Category Management Program, which is expected to become available to all pharmacies associated to ANF (thus part of the Farmácias Portuguesas’ Channel). By studying the program’s reach and impact on these independent business units, conclusions are reached regarding its results in the current business model followed, and how this may translate into counterpointing competitors’ actions

Caracterização física de preparações líquidas não estéreis: aparência

The present dissertation consists in the development of a visual and instrumental method for the evaluation of the color of a non-sterile liquid formulation. The color of the formulation was analyzed at different time intervals, after being subjected to different conditions of temperature and relative humidity in its pre-stability period. The evaluation occurred by comparing the formulation with different color scales reproduced based on the European Pharmacopoeia 9.7. Due to the fact that the visual assessment could be subjective, an instrumental color evaluation was performed from three- and two-dimensional color spaces, namely the CIELAB color space. Since the two-dimensional representation used to the instrumental specification of color does not consider all the attributes associated with color (does not include brightness), the CIELAB Difference (ΔE∗) between the color of the standard solutions of the scales and the formulation analyzed under different conditions was determined. The CIELAB Difference between two colors considers all the parameters that influence the color sensation and allows determining which of the standard solution has the most similar color to the formulation under analysis. Finally, using the standard solution with the most intense color of one of the scales reproduced, a rectangular color tolerance box was established to limit the acceptable tolerance for the coordinates of the formulation under analysis: all the formulations with the color coordinates outside the tolerance limits should be potentially rejected and investigated. However, the tolerance defined with the most intense color of one of the scales is merely representative: the main objective is, over time, to obtain a history of the coordinates of the color of the formulation and establish as tolerance limit the coordinates of the color associated with a formulation that is at the limit of the specifications associated with itA presente dissertação tem como objetivo o desenvolvimento e implementação de um método de avaliação da cor de uma preparação líquida não estéril analisada em diferentes intervalos de tempo, após estar sujeita a diferentes condições de temperatura e humidade relativa no seu período de pré-estabilidade. A avaliação ocorreu através da comparação entre a formulação e diferentes escalas da cor reproduzidas com base na Farmacopeia Europeia 9.7. Devido ao facto de a avaliação visual poder ser subjetiva, procedeu-se a uma avaliação instrumental da cor a partir de espaços de cor tridimensionais e bidimensionais, nomeadamente o espaço de cor CIELAB. Dado que a representação bidimensional utilizada para a especificação instrumental da cor não considera todos os atributos associados à mesma (não inclui a luminosidade), determinou-se a Diferença CIELAB (Δ"∗) entre a cor das amostras de referência das escalas e a cor da formulação em análise. A Diferença CIELAB considera todos os parâmetros que influenciam a sensação da cor e permite determinar qual das amostras de referência tem a cor mais semelhante à formulação em análise. Por fim, recorrendo à amostra de referência com a cor mais intensa de uma das escalas, estabeleceu-se uma caixa retangular de tolerância para a cor da formulação em avaliação: todas as formulações com coordenadas fora do limite da caixa devem ser rejeitadas e investigadas. No entanto, a tolerância definida com as coordenadas da cor mais intensa de uma das escalas é meramente representativa: o objetivo é, através de histórico de coordenadas da cor da formulação ao longo do tempo, estabelecer o limite de tolerância com as coordenadas associadas a uma formulação que se encontre no limite das especificações associadas à mesmaMestrado em Engenharia Químic

Deteção dos limites navegáveis da estrada por análise da densidade de nuvens de pontos acumulados

As part of the Atlas project, this dissertation aims to identify the navigable limits of the road by analyzing the density of accumulated point clouds, obtained through laser readings from a SICK LD-MRS sensor. This sensor, installed in front of the AtlasCar2, has the purpose of identifying obstacles at road level and from it the creation of occupation grids that delimit the navigable space of the vehicle is proposed. First, the point cloud density is converted into an occupancy density grid, normalized in each frame in relation to the maximum density. Edge detection algorithms and gradient filters are subsequently applied to the density grid, in order to detect patterns that match sudden changes in density, both positive and negative. To these grids are applied thresholds in order to remove irrelevant information. Finally, a methodology for quantitative evaluation of algorithms was also developed, using KML files to define road boundaries and, relying on the accuracy of the GPS data obtained, comparing the actual navigable space with the one obtained by the methodology for detection of road boundaries and thus evaluating the performance of the work developed. In this work, the results of the different algorithms are presented, as well as several tests taking into account the influence of grid resolution, car speed, among others. In general, the work developed meets the initially proposed objectives, being able to detect both positive and negative obstacles and being minimally robust to speed and road conditions.No âmbito do projeto Atlas, esta dissertação prevê a identificação dos limites navegáveis da estrada através da análise da densidade da acumulaçao de nuvens de pontos, obtidas através de leituras laser provenientes de um sensor SICK LD-MRS. Este sensor, instalado na frente do AtlasCar2, tem como propósito a identificação de obstáculos ao nível da estrada e a partir dos seus dados prevê-se a criação de grelhas de ocupação que delimitem o espaço navegável do veículo. Em primeiro lugar, a densidade da nuvem de pontos é transformada numa grelha de densidade normalizada em cada frame em relação à densidade máxima, à qual posteriormente são aplicados algoritmos de deteção de arestas e filtros de gradiente com o objetivo de detetar padrões que correspondam a mudanças súbitas de densidade, tanto positivas como negativas. A estas grelhas são aplicados limiares de forma a eliminar informação irrelevante. Por fim, foi desenvolvida também uma metodologia de avaliação quantitativa dos algoritmos, usando ficheiros KML para deliniar limites da estrada e, contanto com a precisão dos dados de GPS obtidos, comparar o espaço navegável real com o obtido pela metodologia de deteção de limites de estrada e assim avaliar o desempenho dos algoritmos desenvolvidos. Neste trabalho são apresentados resultados dos diferentes algoritmos, bem como diversos testes tendo em conta a influência da resolução de grelha, velocidade do carro, entre outros. O trabalho desenvovido cumpre os objetivos propostos inicialmente, sendo capaz de detetar ambos obstáculos positivos e negativos e sendo minimamente robusto a velocidade e condições de estrada.Mestrado em Engenharia Mecânic

Características da fluorescência e fotoinibição em arvoretas de acariquara em dias nublados e ensolarados

High irradiance may reduce the productivity of tropical plants by exacerbating photoinhibition of photosynthesis, particularly in the case of shade-adapted plants. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of cloud cover on the fluorescence characteristics and photoinhibition on saplings of manwood (Minquartia guianensis Aubl.). Three-year-old saplings were exposed to full irradiance either on clear days (10, 45 and 90 min) or under overcast conditions (120, 180, and 420 min). Changes in the population of functional photosystem II (PSII), the initial (Fo) and maximum fluorescences (Fm), and the Fv/Fm ratio (maximum potential quantum yield of PSII) were monitored after plant exposure to full irradiance and during recovery (within 48 h) at low light intensity. Although photoinhibition of PSII (Fv/Fm) was determined by the number of photons reaching the leaf surface (photon fluence), cloudiness tended to reduce the photoinhibitory effect of irradiance. Fo increased with fluence on cloudy days and was unaffected by irradiance on clear days, except for a sharp rise during the first 10 min of exposure to full sunlight. For a given photon fluence, Fm was lower on clear days. Recovery from photoinhibition was similar in both light environments. Although photon fluence is the preponderant factor determining the extent of photoinhibition, cloudiness might alleviate the photoinhibitory effect of irradiance.Alta irradiância pode reduzir a produtividade de plantas tropicais por intensificar a fotoinibição da fotossíntese, particularmente em plantas adaptadas à sombra. O objetivo deste trabalho foi determinar o efeito da nebulosidade nas características da fluorescência e na fotoinibição em arvoretas de acariquara (Minquartia guianensis Aubl.). Plantas jovens de três anos de idade foram expostas à irradiância em dias ensolarados (10, 45 e 90 min) ou nublados (120, 180 e 420 min). Foram monitoradas mudanças na população de fotossistemas II (FSII) funcionais, na fluorescência inicial (Fo) e máxima (Fm) e na relação Fv/Fm (rendimento quântico potencial do FSII), antes da exposição das plantas à irradiância e durante a recuperação (até 48 h) sob baixa intensidade luminosa. Apesar de a fotoinibição (Fv/Fm) ser determinada pelo número de fótons incidentes na superfície da folha (fluência), houve tendência de a nebulosidade reduzir o efeito da irradiância na fotoinibição. Fo aumentou com a fluência em dias nublados, mas não em dias ensolarados, exceto pelo aumento nos primeiros 10 min de exposição à luz solar plena. Para uma dada fluência, Fm foi menor nos dias ensolarados. A recuperação da fotoinibição foi similar em ambos os ambientes de luz. Apesar de a fluência de fótons ser o fator preponderante na determinação do grau de fotoinibição, a nebulosidade ameniza o efeito fotoinibitório da irradiância

Sensitivity and specificity of a low-cost screening protocol for identifying children at risk for language disorders

OBJECTIVES: To compare the diagnostic accuracy of a low-cost screening test for identifying children at risk for language disorders with that of a specific language assessment. METHODS: The study was conducted during a polio vaccination campaign in basic health units in western Sa˜o Paulo, Brazil. The parents/guardians of 1000 children aged between 0 and 5 years were asked to answer questions of a specific screening test. The instrument consisted of a uniform set of questions about the main milestones in language development (from 0 to 5 years of age) with scaled scores to assess responses. There were no exclusion criteria. After the screening test, the children were referred to a specific language assessment by ABFW, following a determined flow of referrals. The results obtained in the screening were compared to those obtained in the specific language assessment; then, the sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, and positive and negative predictive values were determined for the screening test. Children who failed the screening test also underwent an audiological evaluation. The statistical significance was set at 5%. RESULTS: The majority of the participants were aged between 4 and 5 years (21.82%) and were male (51.6%). The sensitivity and specificity values were 82.5% and 98.93%, respectively. The area under the curve was 0.907 (0.887–0.925), and the screening test showed 96% accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: The screening test showed high diagnostic efficiency in determining the risk of language disorders in children aged between 0 and 5 years