Exploring a volatomic-based strategy for a fingerprinting approach of Vaccinium padifolium L. berries at different ripening stages

The effect of ripening on the evolution of the volatomic pattern from endemic Vaccinium padifolium L. (Uveira) berries was investigated using headspace-solid phase microextraction (HS-SPME) followed by gas chromato graphy/quadrupole-mass spectrometry (GC–qMS) and multivariate statistical analysis (MVA). The most sig nificant HS-SPME parameters, namely fibre polymer, ionic strength and extraction time, were optimized in order to improve extraction efficiency. Under optimal experimental conditions (DVB/CAR/PDMS fibre coating, 40 °C, 30 min extraction time and 5 g of sample amount), a total of 72 volatiles of different functionalities were isolated and identified. Terpenes followed by higher alcohols and esters were the predominant classes in the ripening stages – green, break and ripe. Although significant differences in the volatomic profiles at the three stages were obtained, cis-β-ocimene (2.0–40.0%), trans-2-hexenol (2.4–19.4%), cis-3-hexenol (2.5.16.4%), β-myrcene (1.9–13.8%), 1-hexanol (1.7–13.6%), 2-hexenal (0.7–8.0%), 2-heptanone (0.7–7.7%), and linalool (1.9–6.1%) were the main volatile compounds identified. Higher alcohols, carboxylic acids and ketones gradually increased during ripening, whereas monoterpenes significantly decreased. These trends were dominated by the higher alcohols (1-hexanol, cis-3-hexenol, trans-2-hexenol) and monoterpenes (β-myrcene, cis-β-ocimene and trans-β ocimene). Partial least squares regression (PLSR) revealed that ethyl caprylate (1.000), trans-geraniol (0.995), ethyl isovalerate (−0.994) and benzyl carbinol (0.993) are the key variables that most contributed to the successful differentiation of Uveira berries according to ripening stage. To the best of our knowledge, no study has carried out on the volatomic composition of berries from endemic Uveira.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Tangerines cultivated on Madeira Island: a high throughput natural source of bioactive compounds

Tangerines (Citrus reticulata) are popular fruits worldwide, being rich in many bioactive metabolites. The setubalense variety cultivated on Madeira Island has an intense aroma easily distinguishable from other tangerines, being traditionally used to enrich several foods and beverages. Nonetheless, setubalense volatile composition has never been characterized, and we aimed to unveil the bioactive potential of peels and juices of setubalense tangerines and compare them with the murcott variety grown in Portugal mainland. Using headspace solid-phase microextraction coupled to gas chromatography mass spectrometry (HS-SPME/GC-MS), we identified a total of 128 volatile organic metabolites (VOMs) in the juice and peels, with d-limonene, γ-terpinene, β-myrcene, α- and β-pinene, o-cymene, and terpinolene, the most dominant in both cultivars. In contrast, setubalense juices are richer in terpenes, many of them associated with health protection. Discriminant analysis revealed a pool of VOMs, including β-caryophyllene and E-ocimene, with bioactive properties able to differentiate among tangerines according to variety and sample type (peel vs. juice). This is the first report on the volatile composition of setubalense tangerines grown on Madeira Island revealing that its pungent aroma is constituted by secondary metabolites with specific aroma notes and health properties. This is strong evidence of the higher nutraceutical value of such fruit for the human diet.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Evaluation of the Health-Promoting Properties of Selected Fruits

In this study, the health-promoting benefits of different fruits grown in Madeira Island, namely lemon (Citrus limon var. eureka), tangerine (Citrus reticulata var. setubalense), pitanga (Eugenia uniflora var. red), tomato (Solanum lycopersicum var. gordal) and uva-da-serra, an endemic blueberry (Vaccinium padifolium Sm.), were investigated. The phenolic composition (total phenolics and total flavonoids content) and antioxidant capacity (assessed through ABTS and DPPH assays) were measured revealing a high phenolic potential for all fruits, except tomato, while uva-da-serra is particularly rich in flavonoids. In relation to the antioxidant capacity, the highest values were obtained for pitanga and uva-da-serra extracts. The bioactive potential was also assessed through the ability of the extracts to inhibit digestive enzymes linked to diabetes (α-amylase, α- and β glucosidases) and hypertension (angiotensin-converting enzyme, ACE). The results obtained point to a very high bioactive potential with the selected samples exhibiting very important ACE anti enzymatic capacities. A statistical analysis of the obtained data reveals a very strong correlation between ABTS and TPC, and a strong contribution of the fruit polyphenols for enzyme inhibition, and thus, presenting high antihypertensive and antidiabetic capacities. Overall, the results obtained clearly show a high bioactive potential of the selected fruits that should be further studied, in terms of specific phenolic composition. Moreover, these results strongly support the valorisation of pitanga seeds usually discarded as a waste, and uva-da-serra, an endemic and wild bush, as potential bioresources of bioactive compounds with impact in human diet.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The potential of microextraction techniques for the analysis of bioactive compounds in food

For a long time, the importance of sample preparation and extraction in the analytical performance of the most diverse methodologies have been neglected. Cumbersome techniques, involving high sample and solvent volumes have been gradually miniaturized from solid-phase and liquid-liquid extractions formats and microextractions approaches are becoming the standard in different fields of research. In this context, this review is devoted to the analysis of bioactive compounds in foods using different microextraction approaches reported in the literature since 2015. But microextraction also represents an opportunity to mitigate the environmental impact of organic solvents usage, as well as lab equipment. For this reason, in the recent literature, phenolics and alkaloids extraction from fruits, medicinal herbs, juices, and coffee using different miniaturized formats of solid-phase extraction and liquid-liquid microextraction are the most popular applications. However, more ambitious analytical limits are continuously being reported and emergent sorbents based on carbon nanotubes and magnetic nanoparticles will certainly contribute to this trend. Additionally, ionic liquids and deep eutectic solvents constitute already the most recent forefront of innovation, substituting organic solvents and further improving the current microextraction approaches.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Enhancing Decision-making Systems with Relevant Patient Information by Leveraging Clinical Notes

[Abstract] Hospitalised patients suffering from secondary illnesses that require daily medication typically need personalised treatment. Although clinical guidelines were designed considering those circumstances, existing decision-support features fail in assimilating detailed relevant patient information, which opens up opportunities for systems capable of performing a real-time evaluation of such data against existing knowledge and providing recommendations during clinical treatments. In this paper, we present a proposal for a new feature to integrate with electronic health record (EHR) systems that enriches the health treatment process by automatically extracting information from patient medical notes and aggregating it in clinical protocols. Our goal is to leverage the historical component of the patient trajectory to improve clinical decision support systems performance.EU/EFPIA Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint Undertaking; 806968NETDIAMOND project; POCI-01-0145-FEDER-016385Foundation for Science and Technology; PD/BD/142878/2018Foundation for Science and Technology; SFRH/BD/147837/201

A Recommender System to Help Refining Clinical Research Studies

[Abstract] The process of refining the research question in a medical study depends greatly on the current background of the investigated subject. The information found in prior works can directly impact several stages of the study, namely the cohort definition stage. Besides previous published methods, researchers could also leverage on other materials, such as the output of cohort selection tools, to enrich and to accelerate their own work. However, this kind of information is not always captured by search engines. In this paper, we present a methodology, based on a combination of content-based retrieval and text annotation techniques, to identify relevant scientific publications related to a research question and to the selected data sources.This work has received support from the EU/EFPIA Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint Undertaking under grant agreement No 806968. JFS and JRA are funded by the FCT - Foundation for Science and Technology (national funds) under the grants PD/BD/142878/2018 and SFRH/BD/147837/2019 respectively.Portugal. Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia; PD/BD/142878/2018Portugal. Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia; SFRH/BD/147837/201

Influence of service temperature on shear creep behaviour of a rigid low-density closed-cell PIR foam

An experimental campaign was carried out to assess shear creep behaviour of a rigid low-density closed-cell polyisocyanurate (PIR) foam. Two service temperature values were considered, 20 ºC and 30 ºC, and the applied stresses ranged between 20% and 60% of the corresponding shear strength. The results showed that a stress amplitude of 30% was enough to cause nonlinear creep response. Furthermore, creep deformations were slightly smaller in the tests at 30 ºC, a fact that matched the viscoelastic response of the PIR foam obtained from DMA testing. Finally, creep prediction curves were calibrated through an analytical approach based on the Findley’s power law.This work is part of the research project “EasyFloor – Development of composite sandwich panels for rehabilitation of floor buildings”, involving the company ALTO – Perfis Pultrudidos, Lda., CERis/Instituto Superior Técnico and ISISE/University of Minho, supported by FEDER funds through the Operational Program for Operational Program for Competitiveness and Internationalization (POCI) and the Portuguese National Innovation Agency (ANI) - project no. 3480 (POCI-01-0247-FEDER-003480). The second author acknowledge the grant SFRH/BSAB/150266/2019 provided by FCT, financed by European Social Fund and by national funds through the FCT/MCTES. Acknowledgments are extended to LEST – Laboratório de Estruturas for their material support. The contribution of the Department of Mechanical Engineering of the University of Minho is also gratefully acknowledged in the person of Engineer Pedro Ribeiro. Lastly, the authors would like to thank SIKA Company for suppling the adhesive

Urinary Volatomic Expression Pattern: Paving the Way for Identification of Potential Candidate Biosignatures for Lung Cancer

The urinary volatomic profiling of Indian cohorts composed of 28 lung cancer (LC) pa tients and 27 healthy subjects (control group, CTRL) was established using headspace solid phase microextraction technique combined with gas chromatography mass spectrometry methodology as a powerful approach to identify urinary volatile organic metabolites (uVOMs) to discriminate among LC patients from CTRL. Overall, 147 VOMs of several chemistries were identified in the intervention groups—including naphthalene derivatives, phenols, and organosulphurs—augmented in the LC group. In contrast, benzene and terpenic derivatives were found to be more prevalent in the CTRL group. The volatomic data obtained were processed using advanced statistical analysis, namely partial least square discriminative analysis (PLS-DA), support vector machine (SVM), random forest (RF), and multilayer perceptron (MLP) methods. This resulted in the identification of nine uVOMs with a higher potential to discriminate LC patients from CTRL subjects. These were furan, o-cymene, furfural, linalool oxide, viridiflorene, 2-bromo-phenol, tricyclazole, 4-methyl-phenol, and 1-(4-hydroxy-3,5-di-tert-butylphenyl)-2-methyl-3-morpholinopropan-1-one. The metabolic pathway analysis of the data obtained identified several altered biochemical pathways in LC mainly affecting glycolysis/gluconeogenesis, pyruvate metabolism, and fatty acid biosynthesis. Moreover, acetate and octanoic, decanoic, and dodecanoic fatty acids were identified as the key metabolites responsible for such deregulation. Furthermore, studies involving larger cohorts of LC patients would allow us to consolidate the data obtained and challenge the potential of the uVOMs as candidate biomarkers for LC.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A hybrid cementitious based-G/CFRP sandwich panel: concept, design and initial outcomes

Nowadays, the advantages of using fibre-reinforced polymers (FRP) in Civil Engineering structures are very well-known. In comparison to other materials, the FRPs show high strength-to-weight and stiffness-to-weight ratios, as well as high corrosion resistance [1]. Moreover, they can be easily moulded into complex shapes during the manufacturing process. Due to the slenderness of the cross section components and systems [2], and their significant initial cost [3], the FRPs are typically used along with other materials in composite structural elements. In the recent years, the FRPs have been increasingly used in composite sandwich panels designed for the building and housing industry [4]. However, in terms of flooring solutions, the sandwich panels still reveal some limitations for the most typical values of spans and loads in buildings [5]. In order to overcome the aforementioned drawbacks, the EasyFloor project was launched to develop enhanced composite sandwich panels for rehabilitation of floors in buildings. One of the important innovations included in the project relies on the use of both glass and carbon fibre roving (G/CFRP). This hybrid solution aims at improving significantly both the strength and stiffness. Furthermore, the top face of the panel is made of steel fibre reinforced self-compacting micro concrete (SFRSCMC), instead of the usual FRP compressive face, aiming to overcome face wrinkling issues. Additionally, this solution can provide higher ductility, fire endurance and impact resistance [6]. Furthermore, polycianurate (PIR) closed-cell foam is used as core material of the panel. Proper adhesion between G/CFRP and SFRSCMC is developed in order to obtain the full bending capacity of the composite solution. Finally, the FRP component is produced by pultrusion, taking all the advantages of this manufacturing process. The final proposal for the hybrid sandwich panel was obtained through the use of genetic algorithms in the design, which consisted in optimizing the geometric and the mechanical properties of the panel, taking into account the following features: (i) structural and energy efficiency; (ii) durability, versatility of use, ease of handling, quick assembly and production; (iii) low maintenance needs and aesthetics. The present work describes the design solution that resulted from the optimization procedure and subsequently presents initial experimental results regarding the mechanical characterization of the different materials, as well as the FRP/SFRSCMC interface. The experimental program comprised: (i) tensile and flexural tests on both the bottom and external ribs of the C/GFRP laminate skins; (ii) tensile, compressive and direct shear tests on both foam core materials (PIR); (iii) compressive and flexural tests on the SFRSCMC top face, and; (iv) pull-off tests for the characterization of the connection between the SFRSCMC and FRP using different types of adhesives.This work is part of the research project “EasyFloor – Development of composite sandwich panels for rehabilitation of floor buildings”, involving the company ALTO – Perfis Pultrudidos, Lda., CERis/Instituto Superior Técnico and ISISE/University of Minho, supported by FEDER funds through the Operational Program for Operational Program for Competitiveness and Internationalization (POCI) and the Portuguese National Innovation Agency (ANI) - project no. 3480 (POCI-01-0247-FEDER-003480). The authors would like to thanks the following companies for suppling the adhesives: KERAKOLL, MAPEI and SIKADUR.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Multifunctional Lanthanide-Based Metal−Organic Frameworks Derived from 3‑Amino-4-hydroxybenzoate: Single-Molecule Magnet Behavior, Luminescent Properties for Thermometry, and CO2 Adsorptive Capacity

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The authors thank SGIker of UPV/EHU and European funding (ERDF and ESF) for technical and human support as well as wish to acknowledge the terrific help of all reviewers of the present manuscript whose comments helped to improve the quality of the work.Supporting Information The Supporting Information is available free of charge at https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.2c00544.Funding E.E. is grateful to the Government of the Basque Country for the predoctoral fellowship and R.F.M. to the Junior Research Position CEECIND/ 00553/2017. The research contract of FF (REF-168-89-ARH/2018) is funded by national funds (OE), through FCT, in the scope of the framework contract foreseen in nos. 4, 5, and 6 of article 23 of the Decree-Law 57/2016, of 29 August, changed by Law 57/2017, of 19 July. This work was developed within the scope of the projects given by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MCIU/AEI/ FEDER, UE) (PGC2018-102052-A-C22, PGC2018-102052-BC21, and PID2019-108028GB-C21), Gobierno Vasco/Eusko Jaurlaritza (IT1310-19 and IT1291-19), Junta de Andalucía (FQM-394), University of the Basque Country (GIU 20/028), and CICECO-Aveiro Institute of Materials (UIDB/50011/ 2020 and UIDP/50011/2020).Herein, we describe and study a new family of isostructural multifunctional metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) with the formula {[Ln5L6(OH)3(DMF)3]·5H2O}n (where (H2L) is 3-amino-4-hydroxybenzoic acid ligand) for magnetism and photoluminescence. Interestingly, three of the materials (Dy-, Er-, and Yb-based MOFs) present single-molecule magnet (SMM) behavior derived from the magnetic anisotropy of the lanthanide ions as a consequence of the adequate electronic distribution of the coordination environment. Additionally, photoluminescence properties of the ligand in combination with Eu and Tb counterparts were studied, including the heterometallic Eu–Tb mixed MOF that shows potential as ratiometric luminescent thermometers. Finally, the porous nature of the framework allowed showing the CO2 sorption capacity.Government of the Basque CountryJunior Research Position CEECIND/ 00553/2017National funds (OE)Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MCIU/AEI/ FEDER, UE) (PGC2018-102052-A-C22, PGC2018-102052-BC21, and PID2019-108028GB-C21)Gobierno Vasco/Eusko Jaurlaritza (IT1310-19 and IT1291-19)Junta de Andalucía (FQM-394)University of the Basque Country (GIU 20/028)CICECO-Aveiro Institute of Materials (UIDB/50011/ 2020 and UIDP/50011/2020