89 research outputs found
An exploratory study on the role of emotions in service satisfaction and loyalty behaviours
Master'sMASTER OF ENGINEERIN
High Resistant Starch Rice: Variation in Starch Related SNPs, and Functional, and Sensory Properties
Human diets containing greater resistant starch (RS) are associated with superior glycemic control. Although high amylose rice has higher RS (29 g/kg to 44 g/kg) than lower amylose content varieties, sensory and processing properties associated with RS have not been evaluated. This study used variants of Waxy and starch synthase II a (SSIIa) genes to divide high amylose (256 g/kg to 284 g/kg) varieties into three haplotypes to examine their effects on RS, RVA parameters, and 14 cooked rice texture properties. RVA characteristics were influenced by both genes with peak and hotpaste viscosity differentiating the three haplotypes. Setback from hotpaste viscosity was the only RVA parameter correlated with RS content across three haplotypes (r = −0.76 to −0.93). Cooked rice texture attributes were impacted more by Waxy than by SSIIa with initial starch coating, roughness, and intact particles differentiating the three haplotypes. Pairwise correlation (r = 0.46) and PCA analyses suggested that roughness was the only texture attribute associated with RS content; while protein content influenced roughness (r = 0.49) and stickiness between grains (r = 0.45). In conclusion, variation exists among genetic haplotypes with high RS for sensory traits that will appeal to diverse consumers across the globe with limited concern for negatively affecting grain processing quality
Linking Neolithic lakeshore settlements through raw material of siliceous artefacts
This paper presents the results of the provenience analysis of siliceous artefacts from Neolithic lakeshore settlements studied in the scope of the SNSF-project MET (“Mobilities, entanglements and transformations in Neolithic societies on the Swiss Plateau (3900-3500 BCE) supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (Project No 100011 156205). The aim of this paper is to compare the cultural entanglements as defined by the pottery studies with the regions of origins of the knappable siliceous sedimentary rocks (KSSR) raw materials. The analysed siliceous artefacts were found in cultural layers of wetland settlements in the Northern Alpine Foreland, most of which are dated dendrochronologically with extreme precision. The sources of the raw materials were determined by the identification of the sedimentary microfacies of the siliceous artefacts, which allows the accurate location of the exploited outcrops without destroying the artefacts. This enabled detailed insights into complex entanglements, ties and mobility patterns in the raw material procurement between settlement communities on the Swiss Plateau, southern Germany and eastern France. Furthermore, these results were compared visually with stylistic entanglements in the pottery of the 4th millennium BCE. As a first attempt in this direction, this paper shows the potential of studies on mobility patterns when different find categories are studied in combination regarding their raw materials but also their typology
Early maturation and substance use across adolescence and young adulthood : A longitudinal study of Finnish twins
Early maturation, indexed by pubertal development (PD), has been associated with earlier initiation and greater frequency of adolescent substance use, but this relationship may be biased by confounding factors and effects that change across development. Using a population-based Finnish twin sample (N = 3,632 individuals), we conducted twin modeling and multilevel structural equation modeling of the relationship between PD and substance use at ages 12-22. Shared environmental factors contributed to early PD and heavier substance use for females. Biological father absence was associated with early PD for boys but not girls, and did not account for the relationship between PD and substance use. The association between early PD and heavier substance use was partially due to between-family confounds, although early PD appeared to qualitatively alter long-term trajectories for some substances (nicotine), but not others (alcohol). Mediation by peer and parental factors did not explain this relationship within families. However, higher peer substance use and lower parental monitoring were themselves associated with heavier substance use, strengthening the existing evidence for these factors as targets for prevention/intervention efforts. Early maturation was not supported as a robust determinant of alcohol use trajectories in adolescence and young adulthood, but may require longer term follow-up. Subtle effects of early PD on nicotine and illicit drug use trajectories throughout adolescence and adulthood merit further investigation.Peer reviewe
RiskBenefit4EU project – a strategy for risk-benefit assessment of foods in Portugal
O balanço entre os riscos e benefícios para a saúde resultante do consumo
de alimentos é um importante contributo para apoiar a definição de
políticas de saúde e a promoção da literacia dos consumidores. No âmbito
do projeto RiskBenefit4EU, financiado pela European Food Safety Authority
e coordenado pelo Departamento de Alimentação e Nutrição do Instituto
Nacional de Saúde Doutor Ricardo Jorge, o presente trabalho pretende
descrever a estratégia implementada para a capacitação das equipas portuguesas
em avaliação de risco-benefício de alimentos (RBA). Concretizada
pelos parceiros do Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique e da
Technical University of Denmark, a capacitação consiste em três atividades
principais: 1) Formação teórica, focando os conceitos-chave para a
avaliação de RBA; 2) Formação prática, aplicando os conceitos adquiridos
e as metodologias transmitidas a um estudo de caso; e 3) Missões científicas,
de curta duração, para formação avançada em domínios específicos
da avaliação de RBA. No que diz respeito à formação prática, e com o objetivo
de consolidar os conhecimentos adquiridos em avaliação de RBA,
está previsto o desenvolvimento de um estudo de caso português sobre
alimentos à base de cereais habitualmente consumidos por crianças. A
estratégia de capacitação seguida neste projeto servirá de modelo para
outras equipas e países, contribuindo para a disseminação de uma cultura
de avaliação de RBA nas vertentes toxicológica, microbiológica e nutricional
a nível internacional.The balance of risks and health benefits from food consumption constitutes
a crucial topic to consumer literacy and health policy-makers. Through the
RiskBenefit4EU project, funded by the European Food Safety Authority,
and coordinated by the Food and Nutrition Department of Portuguese
National Institute of Health Dr. Ricardo Jorge, the present work intends to
identify the applied strategy to capacitate the Portuguese teams for the development
and implementation of risk-benefit assessment (RBA) in food.
The training of the Portuguese team is being accomplished by the French
National Institute for Agricultural Research and the Technical University
of Denmark members, through three main capacity building activities: 1)
Theoretical training, focusing on the key concepts for RBA; 2) Practical
training, applying the concepts acquired and the methodologies transmitted
to a concrete case study; and 3) Short-term scientific missions for advanced
training in specific areas of RBA. In order to complete the training
of the Portuguese teams and consolidate the knowledge acquired in RBA,
a Portuguese case study on cereal-based foods usually consumed by children
is planned. The training strategy followed in this project will contribute
as a model of capacity building for disseminating a culture of risk-benefit
assessment in the toxicological, microbiological and nutritional aspects at
the international level.Trabalho desenvolvido no âmbito do projeto “RiskBenefit4EU – Partnering
to strengthen the risk-benefit assessment within EU using
a holistic approach” financiado pela EFSA Partnering Grants (Grant
Agreement Number A/EFSA/AFSCO/2017/01 – GA02).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Risk-Benefit Assessment of Cereal-Based Foods Consumed by Portuguese Children Aged 6 to 36 Months-A Case Study under the RiskBenefit4EU Project
This article belongs to the Section Pediatric Nutrition.Cereal-based foods, including breakfast (BC) and infant cereals (IC), are among the first
solid foods introduced to infants. BC and IC are sources of macro and micronutrients that have bene ficial effects on health, but can also be sources of harmful chemical and microbiological contaminants
and nutrients that may lead to adverse health effects at high consumption levels. This study was
performed under the RiskBenefit4EU project with the aim of assessing the health impact associated
with consumption of BC and IC by Portuguese children under 35 months. Adverse effects associated
with the presence of aflatoxins, Bacillus cereus, sodium and free sugars were assessed against the
benefits of fiber intake. We applied a risk–benefit assessment approach, and quantified the health
impact of changes in consumption of BC and IC from current to various alternative consumption
scenarios. Health impact was assessed in terms of disability-adjusted life years. Results showed that
moving from the current consumption scenario to considered alternative scenarios results in a gain
of healthy life years. Portuguese children can benefit from exchanging intake of IC to BC, if the BC
consumed has an adequate nutritional profile in terms of fiber, sodium and free sugars, with levels of
aflatoxins reduced as much as possible.This research was funded by European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) (Grant Agreement
Number–GA/EFSA/AFSCO/2017/01–GA02) (The authors declare that this manuscript reflects only
the authors’ view and EFSA is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information
it contains.). R.A., P.A. and C.M. also thanks FCT/MCTES for the financial support to CESAM
(UIDP/50017/2020 + UIDB/50017/2020), through national funds. R.A. was supported by FCT
Individual CEEC 2018 Assistant Researcher Grant CEECIND/01570/2018.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Schistosoma mansoni : use of a fluorescent indicator to detect nitric oxide and related species in living parasites
Author Posting. © The Authors, 2005. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of Elsevier B.V. for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Experimental Parasitology 113 (2006): 130-133, doi:10.1016/j.exppara.2005.12.013.Nitric oxide (NO) is synthesized enzymatically by nitric oxide synthase (NOS). Several
groups have previously presented evidence for NOS activity and immunoreactivity in several
parasitic platyhelminths, including schistosomes. Here, we use 4,5-diaminofluorescein-2
diacetate (DAF-2 DA), a fluorescent indicator of NO, to detect NO in living schistosomes. In
adult worms, DAF-2 fluorescence is found selectively in epithelial-like cells. Fluorescence
increases when worms are incubated in L-arginine, the precursor of NO synthesis, and decreases
dramatically in the presence of the NOS inhibitor NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME),
indicating that predicted NO release may be NOS-dependent, and that enzymatic NO signaling
pathways may play an important role in schistosome physiology.This work was
supported by NIH grant NS 39103 and NSF grants 0304569 (LLM), and NIH grant AI 40522
and the Neal Cornell Research Fund at the Marine Biological Laboratory (RMG)
In a Silent Way: Communication between AI and improvising musicians beyond sound
Collaboration is built on trust, and establishing trust with a creative Artificial Intelligence is difficult when the decision process or internal state driving its behaviour isn't exposed. When human musicians improvise together, a number of extra-musical cues are used to augment musical communication and expose mental or emotional states which affect musical decisions and the effectiveness of the collaboration. We developed a collaborative improvising AI drummer that communicates its confidence through an emoticon-based visualisation. The AI was trained on musical performance data, as well as real-time skin conductance, of musicians improvising with professional drummers, exposing both musical and extra-musical cues to inform its generative process. Uni- and bi-directional extra-musical communication with real and false values were tested by experienced improvising musicians. Each condition was evaluated using the FSS-2 questionnaire, as a proxy for musical engagement. The results show a positive correlation between extra-musical communication of machine internal state and human musical engagement
Adolescent to young adult longitudinal development of subcortical volumes in two European sites with four waves
Adolescent subcortical structural brain development might underlie psychopathological symptoms, which often emerge in adolescence. At the same time, sex differences exist in psychopathology, which might be mirrored in underlying sex differences in structural development. However, previous studies showed inconsistencies in subcortical trajectories and potential sex differences. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the subcortical structural trajectories and their sex differences across adolescence using for the first time a single cohort design, the same quality control procedure, software, and a general additive mixed modeling approach. We investigated two large European sites from ages 14 to 24 with 503 participants and 1408 total scans from France and Germany as part of the IMAGEN project including four waves of data acquisition. We found significantly larger volumes in males versus females in both sites and across all seven subcortical regions. Sex differences in age-related trajectories were observed across all regions in both sites. Our findings provide further evidence of sex differences in longitudinal adolescent brain development of subcortical regions and thus might eventually support the relationship of underlying brain development and different adolescent psychopathology in boys and girls.</p
Consumption of cereal-based foods by Portuguese children: a risk-benefit assessment
De uma forma geral, o consumo de alimentos pode apresentar potenciais
riscos e benefícios para os consumidores. Os alimentos à base de
cereais, incluindo os cereais de pequeno-almoço e os cereais infantis,
representam componentes importantes da dieta humana e estão entre os
primeiros alimentos sólidos que são introduzidos na dieta. Estes alimentos
constituem uma fonte importante de vários nutrientes, incluindo o
sódio, fibras e açúcares livres, que podem estar associados a efeitos benéficos
e adversos para a saúde. Simultaneamente, os alimentos à base
de cereais podem também ser veículo de contaminantes químicos (por
exemplo, micotoxinas) e microbiológicos (por exemplo, Bacillus cereus).
As aflatoxinas, um grupo de micotoxinas que apresenta maior potencial
tóxico, são frequentemente detetadas em cereais. No âmbito do projeto
RiskBenefit4EU, o presente estudo teve como objetivo avaliar os riscos
e os benefícios associados ao consumo de alimentos à base de cereais
pelas crianças portuguesas. Os riscos (teores de aflatoxinas e B. cereus,
sódio e açúcares livres) e os benefícios (teor de fibra) associados ao
consumo de cereais de pequeno-almoço (CPA) foram comparados com
aqueles associados ao consumo de cereais infantis (CI). Os resultados
obtidos revelaram que a mudança do consumo atual para os cenários
alternativos considerados (em especial para o consumo de cereais de
pequeno-almoço com características semelhantes ao “Melhor CPA”)
poderia resultar num ganho de anos de vida saudável.Foodstuffs, as cereal-based products, may present both potential risks
and benefits to consumers. Cereal-based foods including breakfast and
infant cereals represent important components of human diets and are
among the first solid foods that young children usually eat. Cereal-based
products constitute a source of several nutrients, including sodium, fibre
and free sugars, which could be associated to beneficial and hazardous
effects. Simultaneously, cereal-based foods could also present chemical (e.g. mycotoxins) and microbiological (e.g. Bacillus cereus) contaminants.
Aflatoxins, a frequent mycotoxin found in cereals, are undoubtedly the
most toxic. Developed under RiskBenefit4EU project, the present study
aimed to assess risks and benefits associated with the consumption
of cereal-based products by the Portuguese young children. The risks
posed by the consumption of breakfast cereals (BC) versus infant cereals
(IC), due to aflatoxins, B. cereus, sodium and free sugars, were evaluated
against the benefits of the intake of fibre. Obtained results showed that
moving from the current consumption to the considered alternative scenarios
(especially if considered the consumption of breakfast cereals similar
to “Best BC”) could result in a gain of healthy-life years.Este trabalho foi desenvolvido no âmbito do projeto RiskBenefit4EU
– Partnering to strengthen the risk-benefit assessment within EU
using a holistic approach financiado pelas EFSA Partnering Grants
(Grant Agreement Number – GA/EFSA/AFSCO/2017/01 – GA02) 1.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
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