Seismic vulnerability of churches in Faial and Pico islands, Azores

Earthquakes represent one of the main cause of serious damage and loss of historic and architectural heritage. Interventions to preserve these building should start with a careful knowledge and assessment of their seismic vulnerability, in order to support any needed retrofitting and strengthening measures. This paper proposes a procedure to register and diagnose of the level of damage on churches after the occurrence of an earthquake, and also to assess the seismic vulnerability of this type of construction. This procedure was applied to sixteen churches in the Azores islands which were hit by the July 9th 1998 earthquake. Belfries of church towers are elements with a particular seismic vulnerability. For this reason, and based on the Italian methodology proposed by the Linee Guida (2006), it is applied to belfries of two churches from Pico (Azores), a simplified mechanical model for assessment of seismic vulnerability of this type of structures

Are Stroke Occurrence and Outcome Related to Weather Parameters? Results from a Population-Based Study in Northern Portugal

Background: Changes in meteorological parameters have been associated with cardiovascular mortality and stroke. The high incidence of stroke in Portugal may be modelled by short- or long-term weather changes whose effect may be different across stroke types and severity. Methods: Data include all patients with a first-ever-in-a-lifetime stroke registered in a population of 86,023 residents in the city of Porto from October 1998 to September 2000. Specific stroke types were considered and ischaemic stroke (IS) subtype was defined according to the Oxfordshire Community Stroke Projet classification and the Trial of Org 10172 in Acute Stroke Treatment (TOAST) criteria. Information on daily temperature, humidity and air pressure was obtained from the National Meteorological Office. The Poisson distribution was used to model the daily number of events as a function of each weather parameter measured over different hazard periods, and the binomial model to contrast effects across subgroups. Differential effects of meteorological parameters and hazard periods upon stroke occurrence and outcome were analysed in a stepwise model. Results: Among the 462 patients registered, 19.6% had a primary intracerebral haemorrhage (PICH) and 75.3% an IS. Among patients with IS, 21.6% were total anterior circulation infarcts (TACIs), 19.8% partial anterior circulation infarcts (PACIs), 19.5% posterior circulation infarcts (POCIs) and 39.1% were lacunar infarcts (LACIs). The aetiology of IS was large artery atherosclerosis in 6.9%, cardioembolism in 23.3% and small artery occlusion in 35.6%. The incidence of PICH increased by 11.8% (95% CI: 3.8–20.4%) for each degree drop in the diurnal temperature range in the preceding day. The incidence of IS increased by 3.9% (95% CI: 1.6–6.3%) and cardioembolic IS by 5.0% (95% CI: 0.2–10.1%) for a 1 ° C drop in minimum temperature in the same hazard period. The incidence of TACIs followed the IS pattern while for PACIs and POCIs there were stronger effects of longer hazard periods and no association was found for LACIs. The relative risk of a fatal versus a non-fatal stroke increased by 15.5% (95% CI: 6.1–25.4%) for a 1 ° C drop in maximum temperature over the previous day. Conclusions: Outdoor temperature and related meteorological parameters are associated with stroke occurrence and severity. The different hazard periods for temperature effects and the absence of association with LACIs may explain the heterogeneous effects of weather on stroke occurrence found in community- based and hospital admission studies. Emergency services should be aware that specific weather conditions are more likely to prompt calls for more severe strokes

Field behavior of an Ising model with aperiodic interactions

We derive exact renormalization-group recursion relations for an Ising model, in the presence of external fields, with ferromagnetic nearest-neighbor interactions on Migdal-Kadanoff hierarchical lattices. We consider layered distributions of aperiodic exchange interactions, according to a class of two-letter substitutional sequences. For irrelevant geometric fluctuations, the recursion relations in parameter space display a nontrivial uniform fixed point of hyperbolic character that governs the universal critical behavior. For relevant fluctuations, in agreement with previous work, this fixed point becomes fully unstable, and there appears a two-cycle attractor associated with a new critical universality class.Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure (included). Accepted for publication in Int. J. Mod. Phys.

An Ultra-Stable Referenced Interrogation System in the Deep Ultraviolet for a Mercury Optical Lattice Clock

We have developed an ultra-stable source in the deep ultraviolet, suitable to fulfill the interrogation requirements of a future fully-operational lattice clock based on neutral mercury. At the core of the system is a Fabry-P\'erot cavity which is highly impervious to temperature and vibrational perturbations. The mirror substrate is made of fused silica in order to exploit the comparatively low thermal noise limits associated with this material. By stabilizing the frequency of a 1062.6 nm Yb-doped fiber laser to the cavity, and including an additional link to LNE-SYRTE's fountain primary frequency standards via an optical frequency comb, we produce a signal which is both stable at the 1E-15 level in fractional terms and referenced to primary frequency standards. The signal is subsequently amplified and frequency-doubled twice to produce several milliwatts of interrogation signal at 265.6 nm in the deep ultraviolet.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure

MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACH AND QUALITY OF LIFE IN PATIENTS WITH SPINA BIFIDA

Introdução: A Espinha Bífida é o defeito mais comum do tubo neural. A abordagem multidisciplinar é a mais adequada para prestar cuidados a estes doentes. Objetivo: Caracterizar a população de crianças seguida na consulta multidisciplinar de Espinha Bífida de um Hospital Terciário. Avaliar a perceção da qualidade de vida das crianças, adolescentes e pais/cuidadores. Correlacionar a qualidade de vida com algumas variáveis estudadas. Métodos: Estudo retrospetivo que incluiu as crianças em seguimento na consulta multidisciplinar de Espinha Bífida. As variáveis analisadas foram: tipo de defeito do tubo neural, regime vesico-esfincteriano e nível funcional. A avaliação da qualidade de vida foi feita através da aplicação do questionário Child Health Questionnaire – Parental Form (CHQ – PF50). O tratamento estatístico foi realizado no programa SPSS, versão 17. Resultados: Foram incluídas no estudo 69 crianças. Os doentes apresentavam uma idade média de 13 anos, sendo 52,2% do sexo masculino. Oitenta e seis por cento tinham diagnóstico de mielomeningocelo, 56,5% efetuavam marcha de forma autónoma e 30,4% eram incontinentes necessitando do uso de fralda. O questionário de qualidade de vida foi respondido pelos pais de 31 doentes. Todos os scores apresentaram valores superiores a 50, sendo que os que revelaram valores menores foram o relativo à função física nas crianças e o referente ao impacto emocional nos pais. Foi encontrada uma correlação estatisticamente significativa entre a capacidade funcional e o componente da escala de qualidade de vida relativo ao funcionamento físico (r = 0,456; p =0,01). Conclusão: As várias manifestações clínicas e complicações associadas a esta condição podem interferir de forma significativa nos vários componentes da qualidade de vida dos doentes e seu núcleo familiar. Este trabalho sublinha a importância da avaliação e intervenção das necessidades das crianças com incapacidade de forma a promover o seu bem-estar físico, psicológico e social.Introduction: Spina Bifida is the most common neural tube defect. Multidisciplinary approach has long been advocated as the optimal way to provide care for these patients. Aim: To characterize the population of children followed in Spina Bifida clinic. To measure health-related quality of the life of children, adolescents and care givers. To correlate quality of life with some studied variables. Methods: Retrospective study that included children followed in Spina Bifida clinic. The variables analyzed were: regarding the type of neural tube defect, bladder-sphincter system and functional level. The quality of life was assessed through the application of the questionnaire Child Health Questionnaire - Parental Form (CHQ – PF50). The statistical analysis was made with SPSS, version 17. Results: The study included 69 children. Patients had a mean age of 13 years, 52.2% male, 86% had a diagnosis of myelomeningocele, 56.5% had independent gait and 30.4% were incontinent and used a diaper. The quality of life questionnaire was completed by 31 parents. All scores were greater than 50, the lowest value in patients was physical function and in parents was emotional impact. We found a statistically significant correlation between functional capacity and physical functioning score on quality of life scale (r = 0.456, p = 0.01). Conclusion: Clinical manifestations and complications of this condition can interfere significantly in the various components of patients’ and families’ quality of life. This study emphasizes the importance of assessment and measurement of needs in children with disabilities in order to promote their physical, psychological and social well-being

Learn to Eat and Get a Move On

Healthy dieting and the practice of physical activities are deemed fundamental for the adequate growth, development and maintenance of health in young people. This project takes into account these priority areas and is directed towards the educational community, giving a voice to the students through projects such as "Ambassadors of Health" and "E- P@articipate". With "Learn to Eat and Get a Move On" a transversal involvement between community partners, projects and disciplinary areas were achieved, namely through the projects "Mediterranean Diet", "Geodesic Greenhouse" and physical education, with activities being developed in the areas of diet, health and environment. In the greenhouse, aromatic seeds were planted to highlight their importance in a diet, as well as a way to reduce or replace salt