Employer Branding: a realidade do tecido empresarial português

O mundo está a desconstruir-se e a reinventar-se. Nas organizações, os departamentos de Recursos Humanos e o Marketing têm-se unido com o propósito de implementar estratégias de Employer Branding. Estas são orientadas para aspetos como a reputação, ambiente de trabalho, a motivação dos trabalhadores, ou mesmo a desejabilidade do mercado empregador. Logo, é importante entender o que se está a fazer nas empresas com maior representatividade em Portugal, as PMEs. Este trabalho tem como objetivo entender de que forma o Employer Branding tem vindo a ser adotado nessas empresas; compreender as diferenças entre as PMEs e as grandes empresas; saber o grau de satisfação dos trabalhadores; conhecer o grau de identificação dos trabalhadores com a marca empregadora; e perceber o seu efeito na prática. Este estudo foi desenvolvido através de uma metodologia de investigação quantitativa, descritiva, experimental e transversal. O método de recolha de dados proposto é o questionário, por ser mais analítico e permitir uma melhor forma de apresentar os dados e indicadores, e detetar tendências/comportamentos. Este método de recolha de dados permitiu apurar que, nesta amostra, não se verificaram diferenças significativas entre os grupos de empresas. O Employer Branding já está a ser adotado e os trabalhadores estão satisfeitos com a sua função; sentem-se reconhecidos; conseguem ter equilíbrio entre vida pessoal e profissional; reconhecem a missão, visão e valores; admitem existir um bom ambiente de trabalho pois as equipas são assertivas, contudo a entreajuda e cooperação não estão inteiramente asseguradas; têm benefícios diversificados, mesmo que a remuneração não seja sentida como coerente com a sua função. De forma geral, os trabalhadores estão satisfeitos, reconhecem práticas mais coerentes para com os atuais desafios da sociedade. As organizações demonstram estar mais presentes, mais conscientes, com sinais de evolução e mais dedicadas em criar marcas empregadoras atrativas e fortes no mercado

Broad host range of SARS-CoV-2 predicted by comparative and structural analysis of ACE2 in vertebrates

The novel coronavirus severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the cause of COVID-19. The main receptor of SARS-CoV-2, angiotensin I converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), is now undergoing extensive scrutiny to understand the routes of transmission and sensitivity in different species. Here, we utilized a unique dataset of ACE2 sequences from 410 vertebrate species, including 252 mammals, to study the conservation of ACE2 and its potential to be used as a receptor by SARS-CoV-2. We designed a five-category binding score based on the conservation properties of 25 amino acids important for the binding between ACE2 and the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein. Only mammals fell into the medium to very high categories and only catarrhine primates into the very high category, suggesting that they are at high risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection. We employed a protein structural analysis to qualitatively assess whether amino acid changes at variable residues would be likely to disrupt ACE2/SARS-CoV-2 spike protein binding and found the number of predicted unfavorable changes significantly correlated with the binding score. Extending this analysis to human population data, we found only rare (frequency \u3c 0.001) variants in 10/25 binding sites. In addition, we found significant signals of selection and accelerated evolution in the ACE2 coding sequence across all mammals, and specific to the bat lineage. Our results, if confirmed by additional experimental data, may lead to the identification of intermediate host species for SARS-CoV-2, guide the selection of animal models of COVID-19, and assist the conservation of animals both in native habitats and in human care

Caracterização da atividade antioxidante de sumos verdes comerciais e os seus equivalentes manufaturados, ao longo do tempo

Dissertação para obtenção do grau de Mestre no Instituto Superior de Ciências da Saúde Egas MonizEnquadramento: As preocupações com a saúde e a procura de novos produtos têm crescido por parte de um consumidor mais exigente e informado. No entanto, a informação quantitativa nos rótulos das embalagens, respeitante à capacidade antioxidante, é frequentemente insuficiente. Objectivos: Caracterizar e comparar o efeito do tempo na capacidade antioxidante de um sumo verde comercial e o seu equivalente manufaturado. Métodos: 7 amostras independentes de um sumo comercial (C) e 7 amostras independentes do sumo verde equivalente manufaturado (M) foram sujeitas a uma extração hidro-metanólica (1:2). As amostras foram sujeitas a análise para determinar o teor de Fenóis Totais (FT) e a atividade antioxidante através do teste FRAP (Ferric Reducing Antioxidant Potential) e do teste de DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picryl-hydrazyl-hydrate). Os testes foram realizados em triplicado, em 3 momentos: após abertura/confecção (t0), após 24h (t1) e após 72h (t2). Foi aplicado ANOVA de medições repetidas e avaliada a interação entre os fatores independentes e os fatores de medições repetidas. Resultados: Para os valores de FT e DPPH foi obtida uma interação significativa entre o fator independente do sumo e o de repetição no tempo (p <0.001), logo as comparações devem ser feitas com cuidado. Mesmo assim a potência observada (superior a 80%) sugere que os efeitos observados não se devem ao acaso. Assim o tratamento estatístico sugere, para FT que os valores de sumo comercial são significativamente superiores e para o DPPH, os são valores significativamente superiores no sumo comercial apenas para (t1). Sugere ainda que tanto para FT como para DPPH existe um comportamento significativamente diferente entre os dois sumos ao longo do tempo. Em relação ao FRAP, a ausência de interação entre os fatores legitima a comparação entre os sumos e entre os momentos, de forma independente. Neste caso foram observadas diferenças entre os sumos, com valores de FRAP superiores para o sumo comercial (p<0.001). Conclusão: Os parâmetros analisados para os sumos comerciais e manuais revelaram diferenças para os 3 momentos estudados e sugerem vantagens nas propriedades antioxidantes do sumo verde comercial

Capacitação de cuidadores de crianças em processo de reabilitação

Enquadramento: A família está intrinsecamente envolvida no processo saúde/doença dos seus membros e representa uma importante fonte de suporte à pessoa doente. Neste sentido, é necessário garantir a integração e o acompanhamento da mesma nos cuidados de enfermagem de reabilitação. Os pais, enquanto cuidadores informais, são membros na parceria de cuidados, sendo vistos pela equipa de enfermagem como agentes integrantes dos cuidados. Deste modo o papel parental, não sendo considerado um foco específico da enfermagem de reabilitação, insere-se diretamente na relação de parceria de cuidados, desenvolvida constantemente pelo Enfermeiro Especialista em Enfermagem de Reabilitação. Objetivo: Descrever o processo de desenvolvimento e aquisição de Competências Comuns do Enfermeiro Especialista, Específicas em Enfermagem de Reabilitação e de Mestre em Enfermagem, as atividades desenvolvidas no contexto de Estágio Final e evidenciar os ganhos em saúde sensíveis a um programa de reabilitação sobre a capacitação de cuidadores de crianças em processo de reabilitação. Metodologia: De modo a analisar a aquisição de competências recorreu-se à metodologia reflexiva. No desenvolvimento do projeto foi utilizada a metodologia de estudo de casos múltiplos, de forma a realizar uma análise e reflexão dos dados obtidos com a implementação do mesmo. A amostra foi selecionada acidentalmente. De modo a conduzir o processo reflexivo, assim como o projeto desenvolvido, foram exploradas a teoria do défice do autocuidado de Orem, a teoria das transições de Meleis e o modelo de parceria de cuidados de Anne Casey. Resultados: A elaboração do presente relatório possibilitou a aquisição de competências de mestre na área da enfermagem. Também as competências especificas na área da enfermagem e da enfermagem de reabilitação foram largamente alcançadas devido ao desenvolvimento de todo o processo de aprendizagem e dos ensinos clínicos realizados. A implementação do projeto de intervenção demonstrou resultados positivos na área da capacitação dos cuidadores de crianças em processo de reabilitação. Ao avaliar o nível de independência das crianças, assim como a sobrecarga e a qualidade de vida dos cuidadores verificou-se indícios de quanto menor o nível de dependência da criança, menor também a sobrecarga sentida pelos cuidadores e maior a qualidade de vida percecionada também por estes. Conclusão: O desenvolvimento e a aquisição de competências de Enfermagem de Reabilitação e de Mestre em Enfermagem foram alcançados, contribuindo para o aumento da funcionalidade das crianças e capacitação dos cuidadores, aquando de intervenções especializadas em Enfermagem de Reabilitação; - TRAINING OF CAREERS OF CHILDREN IN THE PROCESS OF REHABILITATION ABSTRACT: Framework: The family is intrinsically involved in the health/disease process of its members and represents an important source of support for the sick person. So, it is necessary to ensure its integration and monitoring in rehabilitation nursing care. Parents, as informal caregivers, are members of the care partnership, being seen by the nursing team as integral agents of care. Thus, the parental role, not being considered a specific focus of rehabilitation nursing, is directly inserted in care partnership relations, constantly developed by the Nurse Specialist in Rehabilitation Nursing. Objective: To describe the process of development and acquisition of Common Skills for Specialist Nurses, Specific in Rehabilitation Nursing and Master's in Nursing, the activities developed in the context of the Final Practice and to highlight the health gains sensitive to a rehabilitation program on the training of children’s undergoing rehabilitation caregivers. Methodology: To analyze the acquisition of competences, the reflective methodology was used. In the development of the project, the methodology of multiple case studies was used, to carry out an analysis and reflection of the data obtained with it. The sample was selected accidentally. To conduct the reflective process, as well as the developed project, Orem's self-care deficit theory, Meleis' theory of transitions and Anne Casey's care partnership model were explored. Results: The development of this report enabled the acquisition of skills in nursing mastery. Also, the specific skills in general nursing and rehabilitation nursing were largely achieved due to the development of the entire learning process and the clinical teaching carried out. The implementation of the intervention project showed positive results in training caregivers of children in rehabilitation process. When assessing the children's level of independence, as well as caregivers' overload and quality of life, it was found some evidence that the lower the child's level of dependence, the lower the overload felt by caregivers and so the higher the quality of life perceived by them. Conclusion: The development and acquisition of Rehabilitation Nursing and Master's in Nursing skills were achieved, contributing to the increase of children's functionality and training of caregivers, during specialized interventions in Rehabilitation Nursing

Reconstruction of avian ancestral karyotypes reveals differences in the evolutionary history of macro- and microchromosomes

Background Reconstruction of ancestral karyotypes is critical for our understanding of genome evolution, allowing for the identification of the gross changes that shaped extant genomes. The identification of such changes and their time of occurrence can shed light on the biology of each species, clade and their evolutionary history. However, this is impeded by both the fragmented nature of the majority of genome assemblies and the limitations of the available software to work with them. These limitations are particularly apparent in birds, with only 10 chromosome-level assemblies reported thus far. Algorithmic approaches applied to fragmented genome assemblies can nonetheless help define patterns of chromosomal change in defined taxonomic groups. Results Here, we make use of the DESCHRAMBLER algorithm to perform the first large-scale study of ancestral chromosome structure and evolution in birds. This algorithm allows us to reconstruct the overall genome structure of 14 key nodes of avian evolution from the Avian ancestor to the ancestor of the Estrildidae, Thraupidae and Fringillidae families. Conclusions Analysis of these reconstructions provides important insights into the variability of rearrangement rates during avian evolution and allows the detection of patterns related to the chromosome distribution of evolutionary breakpoint regions. Moreover, the inclusion of microchromosomes in our reconstructions allows us to provide novel insights into the evolution of these avian chromosomes, specifically

Analytical assessment and nutritional adequacy of school lunches in Sintra’s public primary schools

© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).School meals present several cost benefits overtime at the short, medium, and long term for individuals and society. This cross-sectional study aims to analyse the nutritional composition and evaluate the adequacy of school lunches. One hundred and fifty-eight samples were collected and analysed from 10 primary schools in Sintra's municipality, served during one week. On average, energy (27.7% daily energetic requirements) and carbohydrate (48.1%) contents did not reach the reference values, and the content of protein (19.5%) exceeded the reference value (p < 0.05). The mean total fat (28.8%) and saturated fatty acids (5.4%) content complied with the recommendations. The mean salt (1.7 g) and dietary fibre (8.3 g) content exceeded the reference value but did not differ significantly from the recommendations. Addressing school canteens is crucial, not only in a nutritional approach, but also as an opportunity to achieve healthier, sustainable, and accessible food systems, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals 2030. We highlighted the importance of evaluating evidence-based practices and disseminated practice-based evidence regarding the adequacy of school lunches.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

syntenyPlotteR: a user-friendly R package to visualize genome synteny, ideal for both experienced and novice bioinformaticians

Motivation: The rapid increase in the number of chromosome-scale genome assemblies has renewed interest in chromosome evolution studies. The visualization of syntenic relationships between genomes is a crucial initial step in the study of chromosome rearrangements and evolution. There are few tools available that serve this purpose, and they can be difficult to learn. Moreover, these tools are limited in the number of species comparisons that can be visualized and the size of chromosome rearrangements identified. Thus, the development of novel visualization tools is in strong need. Results: Here, we present syntenyPlotteR, an R package developed to visualize homologous synteny blocks in a pairwise or multispecies manner. This package contains three functions that allow users to generate publication-quality representations of syntenic relationships easily and quickly between genomes of interest. Availability and implementation: SyntenyPlotteR can be installed from CRAN with the documentation found in https://farre-lab.github.io/syntenyPlotteR/

Reconstruction of the diapsid ancestral genome permits chromosome evolution tracing in avian and non-avian dinosaurs

The file attached is the Published/publisher’s pdf version of the article.Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.NHM Repositor

Novel insights into chromosome evolution in birds, archosaurs, and reptiles

Homologous synteny blocks (HSBs) and evolutionary breakpoint regions (EBRs) in mammalian chromosomes are enriched for distinct DNA features, contributing to distinct phenotypes. To reveal HSB and EBR roles in avian evolution, we performed a sequence-based comparison of 21 avian and 5 outgroup species using recently sequenced genomes across the avian family tree and a newly-developed algorithm. We identified EBRs and HSBs in ancestral bird, archosaurian (bird, crocodile, and dinosaur), and reptile chromosomes. Genes involved in the regulation of gene expression and biosynthetic processes were preferably located in HSBs, including for example, avian-specific HSBs enriched for genes involved in limb development. Within birds, some lineage-specific EBRs rearranged genes were related to distinct phenotypes, such as forebrain development in parrots. Our findings provide novel evolutionary insights into genome evolution in birds, particularly on how chromosome rearrangements likely contributed to the formation of novel phenotypes

Chromosome-level assembly reveals extensive rearrangement in sakar falcon and budgerigar, but not ostrich, genomes

Background: The number of de novo genome sequence assemblies is increasing exponentially; however, relatively few contain one scaffold/contig per chromosome. Such assemblies are essential for studies of genotype-to-phenotype association, gross genomic evolution, and speciation. Inter-species differences can arise from chromosomal changes fixed during evolution, and we previously hypothesized that a higher fraction of elements under negative selection contributed to avian-specific phenotypes and avian genome organization stability. The objective of this study is to generate chromosome-level assemblies of three avian species (saker falcon, budgerigar, and ostrich) previously reported as karyotypically rearranged compared to most birds. We also test the hypothesis that the density of conserved non-coding elements is associated with the positions of evolutionary breakpoint regions. Results: We used reference-assisted chromosome assembly, PCR, and lab-based molecular approaches, to generate chromosome-level assemblies of the three species. We mapped inter- and intrachromosomal changes from the avian ancestor, finding no interchromosomal rearrangements in the ostrich genome, despite it being previously described as chromosomally rearranged. We found that the average density of conserved non-coding elements in evolutionary breakpoint regions is significantly reduced. Fission evolutionary breakpoint regions have the lowest conserved non-coding element density, and intrachromomosomal evolutionary breakpoint regions have the highest. Conclusions: The tools used here can generate inexpensive, efficient chromosome-level assemblies, with > 80% assigned to chromosomes, which is comparable to genomes assembled using high-density physical or genetic mapping. Moreover, conserved non-coding elements are important factors in defining where rearrangements, especially interchromosomal, are fixed during evolution without deleterious effects