Potencialidades da abordagem inquiry-based science education no ensino da função excretora : um estudo com alunos do 9º ano de escolaridade

Relatório da Prática de Ensino Supervisionada, Mestrado em Ensino de Biologia e Geologia, Universidade de Lisboa, Instituto de Educação, 2021Um pressuposto da educação do século XXI é o desenvolvimento de aptidões e competências essenciais, que visam a formação de um cidadão munido de múltiplas literacias, capaz de analisar e questionar criticamente a realidade e tomar decisões fundamentadas no seu dia-a-dia. Com esta perspetiva, o presente estudo realizado no âmbito da Iniciação à Prática Profissional, teve como objetivo avaliar as potencialidades da abordagem Inquiry-based science education no ensino contextualizado da função excretora. De modo a dar resposta às questões da componente investigativa, foram avaliadas o tipo de competências desenvolvidas, as dificuldades evidenciadas e as apreciações dos alunos, quando se utiliza esta estratégia na sala de aula. Os instrumentos de recolha selecionados para a concretização desta investigação foram a observação, questionário e a análise de documentos. Nesta proposta, a abordagem IBSE foi implementada através de questões e atividades estruturadas e orientadas pelo professor, e delineadas com um grau de complexidade crescente. A análise dos dados sugere potencialidades da estratégia no desenvolvimento de competências ao nível do conhecimento substantivo, processual, raciocínio e atitudes. Destacam-se a seleção e análise da informação a partir de fontes e recursos diversificados. Para além disto, foram evidenciadas a aquisição de competências em áreas importantes como o bem-estar e saúde. As dificuldades mais relatadas pelos alunos relacionam-se à organização e síntese da informação. A seguir, aparecem dificuldades relativas à interpretação de dados e o cumprimento dos prazos. De modo geral, os alunos fazem um balanço positivo acerca das atividades desenvolvidas e dos recursos utilizados, sublinhando em especial, as vantagens da abordagem contextualizada no ensino da função excretora.Education in the 21st century requires the development of skills and competencies to foster the formation of critical citizens. Multiliterate students develop the skills needed to think critically about the world, therefore being able to make informed decisions in their everyday lives. In this perspective, the present study developed as part of the Introduction to Professional Practice, aimed to evaluate the potentialities of the Inquiry-based science education approach, and the contextualized teaching strategy to the study of the excretory function. In order to respond to the investigative questions regarding the implementation of this approach, the type of skills developed, the difficulties faced throughout the study, as well the students' appraisals were evaluated. The data collecting instruments used in the investigation were observation, questionnaires, and written documents produced by the students In this proposal, the IBSE approach was implemented using structured inquiry and activities developed and guided by the teacher. The activities were built with increasing levels of complexity. The data analyses suggest potentialities of the strategy in the development of competencies in terms of substantive, procedural and analytical reasoning knowledge, and attitudes. The data suggest the development of abilities related to the selection and analysis of information from different resources. In addition, the students showed the acquisition of competencies in areas such as well-being and health. The most reported difficulties by the students were related to the organization and synthesis of the information, followed by difficulties in data interpretation and meeting deadlines. In general, students provided positive impressions concerning the activities developed and the resources used in the study, highlighting the advantages of the contextualized approach to the study of the excretory function

Priming of a DNA metabarcoding approach for species identification and inventory in marine macrobenthic communities

In marine and estuarine benthic communities, the inventory and estimation of species richness are often hampered by the need for broad taxonomic expertise across several phyla. The use of DNA metabarcoding has emerged as a powerful tool for the fast assessment of species composition in a diversity of ecological communities. Here, we tested the amplification success of five primer sets targeting different COI-5P regions by 454 pyrosequencing to maximize the recovery of two simulated macrobenthic communities containing 21 species (SimCom1 and SimCom 2). Species identification was first performed against a compiled reference library of macrobenthic species. Reads with similarity results to reference sequences between 70% and 97% were then submitted to GenBank and BOLD to attempt the identification of concealed species in the bulk sample. The combination of at least three primer sets was able to recover more species than any primer set alone, achieving 85% of represented species in SimCom1 and 76% in SimCom2. Our approach was successful to detect low-frequency specimens, as well as concealed species, in the bulk sample, indicating the potential for the application of this approach on marine bioassessment and inventory, including the detection of "hidden" biodiversity that would hardly be possible based on morphology only.This work was supported by FEDER through POFCCOMPETE by national funds from 'Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia (FCT)' in the scope of the grant FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-015429 and also by the strategic programme UID/BIA/04050/2013 (POCI-01-0145-FEDER007569). This work was also funded by national funds through the FCT I.P. and by the ERDF through the COMPETE2020 - Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalizacao (POCI). J.L. was supported by a PhD fellowship (SFRH/BD/69750/2010) from FCT and C.H. by a CAPES Post-doctoral fellowship, under Science Without Borders Program (Ministry of Education, Brazil)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Compiling a DNA barcode reference library for benthic molluscs of the Southern European Atlantic coast

info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The Amazon River system as an ecological barrier driving genetic differentiation of the pink dolphin (Inia geoffrensis)

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High-throughput trapping of secretory pathway genes in mouse embryonic stem cells

High-throughput gene trapping is a random approach for inducing insertional mutations across the mouse genome. This approach uses gene trap vectors that simultaneously inactivate and report the expression of the trapped gene at the insertion site, and provide a DNA tag for the rapid identification of the disrupted gene. Gene trapping has been used by both public and private institutions to produce libraries of embryonic stem (ES) cells harboring mutations in single genes. Presently, ∼66% of the protein coding genes in the mouse genome have been disrupted by gene trap insertions. Among these, however, genes encoding signal peptides or transmembrane domains (secretory genes) are underrepresented because they are not susceptible to conventional trapping methods. Here, we describe a high-throughput gene trapping strategy that effectively targets secretory genes. We used this strategy to assemble a library of ES cells harboring mutations in 716 unique secretory genes, of which 61% were not trapped by conventional trapping, indicating that the two strategies are complementary. The trapped ES cell lines, which can be ordered from the International Gene Trap Consortium (), are freely available to the scientific community

Regulation of Saccharomyces cerevisiae maltose fermentation by cold temperature and CSF1 Regulação da fermentação de maltose em Saccharomyces cerevisiae por baixas temperaturas e CSF1

We studied the influence of cold temperature (10ºC) on the fermentation of maltose by a S. cerevisiae wild-type strain, and a csf1delta mutant impaired in glucose and leucine uptake at low temperatures. Cold temperature affected the fermentation kinetics by decreasing the growth rate and the final cell yield, with almost no ethanol been produced from maltose by the wild-type cells at 10ºC. The csf1delta strain did not grew on maltose when cultured at 10ºC, indicating that the CSF1 gene is also required for maltose consumption at low temperatures. However, this mutant also showed increased inhibition of glucose and maltose fermentation under salt stress, indicating that CSF1 is probably involved in the regulation of other physiological processes, including ion homeostasis.<br>Foi estudado o efeito da baixa temperatura (10ºC) na fermentação de maltose por uma cepa de S. cerevisiae selvagem, e uma cepa csf1delta mutante incapaz de transportar glicose e leucina a baixas temperaturas. A baixa temperatura afeta a cinética da fermentação por diminuir a velocidade de crescimento e rendimento celular final, com quase nenhum etanol produzido a partir de maltose pelas células selvagems a 10ºC. A cepa csf1delta foi incapaz de crescer em maltose a 10ºC, indicando que o gene CSF1 é também necessário para a utilização de maltose a baixas temperaturas. Entretanto, o mutante também mostrou inibição acentuada da fermentação de glicose e maltose por estresse salino, indicando que CSF1 também estaria envolvido na regulação de outros processos fisiológicos, incluindo a homeostase iónica

Learning lessons and moving forward

Funding Information: This work was supported by the Directorate-General Environment of the European Commission (Grant Number 110661/2018/794607/SUB/ENV.C2 ). Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia ( FCT , Portugal), through the strategic projects , and the project LA/P/0069/2020 granted to the Associate Laboratory ARNET - Aquatic Research Network. We are very grateful to all partners of the RAGES (Risk Based Approaches to Good Environmental Status; https://www.msfd.eu/rages/rages.html) consortium for discussions during the development of this work, particularly to Jean-Marc Brignon and Valentin Chapon for their contributions to discussions around the application of the ELECTRE II approach. We are also indebted to the RAGES partners as well as to invited experts that contributed to the NIS lists and to the HS exercise. Finally, we would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their remarks, which improved the quality of this work. Publisher Copyright: © 2023 The AuthorsRisk-based Approaches (RBA) are increasingly playing an explicit and important role in a number of environmental regulations across Europe and globally. In this paper, we summarise a generic RBA developed for the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) and its application to two descriptors of Good Environmental Status (GES) for marine waters, Non-Indigenous Species and Underwater Energy and Noise (Descriptors 2 and 11). We provide an overview of the findings and outcomes emerging from the application, which focus on identifying common advantages as well as common challenges encountered in the application of the RBA. Recommendations are then made, aimed at identifying potential solutions to the common problems, particularly in relation to data and expert-judgement approaches. Further recommendations address the development of governance structures to facilitate the uptake of risk-based approaches at the level of the MSFD common implementation strategy. Finally, some general and specific recommendations are made to effectively embed RBA and enhance regional cooperation for future implementation of the MSFD.publishersversionpublishe

MicrosatellitesSotaliaFINAL

Microsatellite data file used in analyses. data for both species is included in this file. 10 loci for Sotalia guianensis, 8 loci for Sotalia fluviatili

Data from: Population structure of riverine and coastal dolphins Sotalia fluviatilis and Sotalia guianensis: PATTERNS of nuclear and mitochondrial diversity AND implications for conservation

Coastal and freshwater cetaceans are particularly vulnerable due to their proximity to human activity, localized distributions and small home ranges. These species include Sotalia guianensis, found in the Atlantic and Caribbean coastal areas of central and South America, and Sotalia fluviatilis, distributed in the Amazon River and tributaries. We investigated the population structure and genetic diversity of these two species by analyses of mtDNA control region and 8-10 microsatellite loci. MtDNA analyses revealed strong regional structuring for S. guianensis (i.e. Colombian Caribbean vs. Brazilian Coast, FST= 0.807, ΦST = 0.878, P <0.001) especially north and south of the Amazon River mouth. For S. fluviatilis, population structuring was detected between the western and eastern Amazon (i.e. Colombian Amazon vs. Brazilian Amazon, FST= 0.085, ΦST = 0.277, P <0.001). Haplotype and nucleotide diversity were higher for S. fluviatilis. Population differentiation was supported by analysis of the microsatellite loci (S. guianensis, northern South America vs. southern South America FST= 0.275, Jost´s D = 0.476, P<0.001; S. fluviatilis, western and eastern Amazon FST= 0.197, Jost´s D = 0.364, P<0.001). Most estimated migration rates in both species overlapped with zero, suggesting no measurable migration between most of the sampling locations. However, for S. guianensis, there was measurable migration in neighboring sampling locations. These results indicate that the small home ranges of these species may act to restrict gene flow between populations separated by relatively short distances, increasing the risk of extirpation of some localized populations in the future if existing threats are not minimized

Molecular Analysis of Maltotriose Active Transport and Fermentation by Saccharomyces cerevisiae Reveals a Determinant Role for the AGT1 Permease▿

Incomplete and/or sluggish maltotriose fermentation causes both quality and economic problems in the ale-brewing industry. Although it has been proposed previously that the sugar uptake must be responsible for these undesirable phenotypes, there have been conflicting reports on whether all the known α-glucoside transporters in Saccharomyces cerevisiae (MALx1, AGT1, and MPH2 and MPH3 transporters) allow efficient maltotriose utilization by yeast cells. We characterized the kinetics of yeast cell growth, sugar consumption, and ethanol production during maltose or maltotriose utilization by several S. cerevisiae yeast strains (both MAL constitutive and MAL inducible) and by their isogenic counterparts with specific deletions of the AGT1 gene. Our results clearly showed that yeast strains carrying functional permeases encoded by the MAL21, MAL31, and/or MAL41 gene in their plasma membranes were unable to utilize maltotriose. While both high- and low-affinity transport activities were responsible for maltose uptake from the medium, in the case of maltotriose, the only low-affinity (Km, 36 ± 2 mM) transport activity was mediated by the AGT1 permease. In conclusion, the AGT1 transporter is required for efficient maltotriose fermentation by S. cerevisiae yeasts, highlighting the importance of this permease for breeding and/or selection programs aimed at improving sluggish maltotriose fermentations