O desafio da previsão do comportamento fora-do-plano de edifícios existentes de alvenaria

O comportamento sísmico de estruturas existentes em alvenaria é muito condicionado pelo seu comportamento fora-do-plano, originando os chamados mecanismos locais, existindo diversas metodologias que tentam prever o comportamento deste tipo de estruturas e/ou modos de colapso. Este trabalho pretende resumir os principais resultados obtidos num evento subordinado ao tema “Methods and challenges on the out-of-plane assessment of existing masonry buildings”, inserido na 9th IMC (2014) em Guimarães, com o objectivo de prever o comportamento de duas estruturas em alvenaria utilizando métodos de análise correntemente utilizados na análise sísmica de estruturas existentes. Relativamente às estruturas estudadas, uma destas era materializada em alvenaria tradicional de pedra de dois panos, sendo a outra construída em alvenaria de tijolo. Estas estruturas foram ensaiadas à escala real na mesa sísmica do LNEC. No final do presente artigo apresentam-se os principais resultados obtidos com as simulações realizadas e sua comparação com o comportamento real das estruturas.The seismic behaviour of existing masonry buildings is governed by the out-of-plane behaviour in the form of the so-called local mechanisms. Despite recent advances within the area, there are several different methodologies to predict the behaviour of these local mechanisms. The article herein submitted aims to present the main results obtained on a workshop entitled “Methods and challenges on the out-of-plane assessment of existing masonry buildings”, within the 9th IMC (2014) held at Guimarães, with the objective of predict the behaviour of masonry structures making use of any available method for the seismic analysis. Regarding the studied structures, one was built on traditional doubleleaf stone masonry while the other was built on brick masonry, and they were tested at LNEC shaking table. The main conclusions are presented at the end of the article, namely the obtained results with the prediction and the observed experimental behavior

Life cycle assessment of a vanadium flow battery

The 6th International Conference on Energy and Environment Research, July 22–25, 2019, University of Aveiro, PortugalBattery storage technologies have been showing great potential to address the vulnerability of renewable electricity generation systems. Among the various options, vanadium redox flow batteries are one of the most promising in the energy storage market. In this work, a life cycle assessment of a 5 kW vanadium redox flow battery is performed on a cradle-to-gate approach with focus on the vanadium electrolytes, since they determine the battery’s storage capacity and can be readjusted and reused indefinitely. The functional unit is 1 kWh stored by the battery. The initial results show that the environmental hotspots reside mainly in the structural and material components of the battery, evidencing the need for alternative or recycled materials, preferably produced locally. Since the quantity of electrolytes determine the amount of storable electricity, an analysis was conducted on the variation of the impacts with the increase of storage capacity. An alternative scenario with reused electrolytes was also performed. Results show that with the increase of storage capacity, the contribution of the electrolytes to the impacts decrease significantly by stored kWh. In the reused electrolytes scenario, impacts were reduced mainly for the Acidification and Mineral, fossil and renewable resource depletion categories.This work was financial supported by projects “SunStorage – Harvesting and storage of solar energy”, with reference POCI-01-0145-FEDER-016387, funded by European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), through COMPETE 2020 – Operational Programme for Competitiveness and Internationalization (OPCI), and to FCT — Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, Portugal I.P., project IF/01093/2014/CP1249/CT0003, research grants IF/01093/2014 and SFRH/BPD/112003/2015. Support from POCI-01-0145-FEDER-006939 (Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy — LEPABE, UID/EQU/00511/2019) funded by FEDER, Spain through COMPETE2020-POCI and by national funds through FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC), Portugal.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Life cycle assessment of a renewable energy generation system with a vanadium redox flow battery in a NZEB household

6th International Conference on Energy and Environment ResearchBuildings are responsible for a significant part of the global energy consumption. Besides the need to improve their energy efficiency, new buildings also need to generate their own energy, preferably from renewable sources, to become more sustainable. As renewable energy generation is strongly dependent on the climatic conditions, energy storage must be considered when designing such a system. In this study, a cradle-to-grave life cycle assessment (LCA) study of a renewable energy generation system with a prototype Vanadium flow battery integrated in a Near Zero Energy Building (NZEB) is performed. A combined grid-connected PV and a solar thermal system generates the energy, and it was dimensioned to supply the annual energy needs of a household in Porto, Portugal considering the local climatic conditions. As an end of life scenario, it is assumed that the battery is dismantled and most of the materials are recycled. A functional unit of 1 kWh of supplied energy to the system was considered, and study results show that environmental impacts are reduced when the energy is produced onsite and the battery components are recycled or reused. A sensitivity analysis was conducted changing the household’s geographic location.Authors thank the financial support of projects “SunStorage - Harvesting and storage of solar energy”, with reference POCI-01-0145-FEDER-016387, funded by European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), through COMPETE 2020 - Operational Programme for Competitiveness and Internationalization (OPCI), and to FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia I.P., for funding project IF/01093/2014/CP1249/CT0003, research grants IF/01093/2014 and SFRH/BPD/112003/2015, and financial support of POCI-01-0145-FEDER-006939 (Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy - LEPABE, UID/EQU/00511/2019) funded by FEDER through COMPETE2020-POCI and by national funds through FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC). Authors would also like to thank Dr. Ricardo André Ribeiro Monteiro for the valuable information regarding the vanadium battery prototype obtained within the Sunstorage project.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Compared to mycophenolate mofetil, rapamycin induces significant changes on growth factors and growth factor receptors in the early days post‐kidney transplantation

We found 1 article: Transplantation. 2002 Mar 27;73(6):915-20. Compared to mycophenolate mofetil, rapamycin induces significant changes on growth factors and growth factor receptors in the early days post-kidney transplantation. Oliveira JG, Xavier P, Sampaio SM, Henriques C, Tavares I, Mendes AA, Pestana M. Renal Department, Hospital S. João, Porto, Portugal. Abstract BACKGROUND: The new immunosuppressive drug Rapamycin (Rapa) is endowed with a mechanism of action that is distinct from that of calcineurin inhibitors. It has been claimed that Rapa does not significantly modulate either the cytokine expression or the transcription of several growth factors in mitogen-activated T cells. Previously, we reported that fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) sample cultures synthesize a large array of cytokines, and some of them may be powerful predictors of acute rejection in renal transplants. We hypothesized that Rapa may induce significant changes on cytokine production by FNAB sample cultures and on serum cytokine receptors when compared to other immunosuppressive drugs. METHODS: Kidney transplants treated with CsA-Rapa-Pred (Rapa group) were compared with transplants treated with CsA-mycophenolate mofetil-Pred (MMF group). They were studied on day 7 posttransplantation, and they remained rejection free for at least the first 6 months. FNAB samples were cultured and the supernatants were collected at 48 hr of incubation and analyzed by ELISA for interleukin 1 receptor antagonist (IL-1ra), IL-2, IL-6, IL-10, IL-18, monocyte chemotactic protein 1 (MCP-1), soluble tumor necrosis factor I, and transforming growth factor (TGF)-beta(1). The soluble receptors for IL-1, IL-2, IL-6, and tumor necrosis factor alpha, together with IL-2 and IL-18 were also measured in serum. RESULTS: Significant differences were observed when comparing Rapa with the MMF group. IL-18 and TGF-beta(1) synthesis were up-regulated, whereas IL-6 and MCP-1 were down-regulated in FNAB sample cultures. The Rapa group showed a significant down-regulation of each cytokine receptor and of IL-2 in serum. CONCLUSIONS: Rapa was associated with a decreased synthesis of primarily monocyte-derived cytokines and enhanced production of TGF-beta(1), which in an appropriate cytokine milieu may promote allograft tolerance. The down-regulation of cytokine receptors and IL-2 may be associated with a depressed immune response towards the kidney allograft. PMID: 11923692 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE

Simple heuristics for the assembly line worker assignment and balancing problem

We propose simple heuristics for the assembly line worker assignment and balancing problem. This problem typically occurs in assembly lines in sheltered work centers for the disabled. Different from the classical simple assembly line balancing problem, the task execution times vary according to the assigned worker. We develop a constructive heuristic framework based on task and worker priority rules defining the order in which the tasks and workers should be assigned to the workstations. We present a number of such rules and compare their performance across three possible uses: as a stand-alone method, as an initial solution generator for meta-heuristics, and as a decoder for a hybrid genetic algorithm. Our results show that the heuristics are fast, they obtain good results as a stand-alone method and are efficient when used as a initial solution generator or as a solution decoder within more elaborate approaches.Comment: 18 pages, 1 figur

O Portefólio na Formação e Avaliação Profissional de Professores

Descreve o uso do portefolio na avaliação e formação profissional de professores

DESEMPENHO PRODUTIVO DE QUATRO GRUPOS GENÉTICOS DE CODORNAS (Coturnix sp.) PARA CORTE

A trial was conducted with the objective to evaluate growth performance, carcass yield, and slaughtering age of four genetic groups of meat quail, of both sexes, raised from 1 to 77 days and slaughtered weekly from 35 to 77 days. The experiment utilized 1984 birds, in a completely randomised design, with a factorial of 2 genders and 4 families (A, B, C and D), in a total of 8 treatments with 4 replicates of 62 birds each. Body weight of female quail at 28 days was higher than other ages independently of family. Family A was heavier than family B at 35, 56 and 77 days. At 42 days of age female showed higher feed consumption and low feed conversion than male. Considering the results as a whole, the best slaughtering age for both genders was 49 days. Key-words: genetic group, growing performance, meat quail, production, slaughtering age.Para avaliar o desempenho produtivo, o rendimento de carcaça e a melhor idade de abate de quatro grupos genéticos de codornas machos e fêmeas para corte, criadas de 1 a 77 dias e abatidas semanalmente de 35 a 77 dias, utilizaram-se 1984 aves, distribuídas aleatoriamente em um delineamento inteiramente casualizado, com esquema fatorial de 2 sexos x 4 famílias (A, B, C e D), num total de 8 tratamentos com 4 repetições de 62 aves cada. A partir dos 28 dias as fêmeas foram mais pesadas do que os machos, independentemente da família. A família A foi mais pesada do que a B aos 35, 56 e 77 dias. A partir dos 42 dias, as fêmeas tiveram maior consumo, mas melhor conversão alimentar do que os machos. Considerando-se conjuntamente os dados de desempenho, a melhor idade de abate para ambos os sexos foi 49 dias

Content mining framework in social media: A FIFA world cup 2014 case analysis

© 2016 Elsevier B.V.This paper proposes a social media content mining framework that consists of seven phases. The framework was tested empirically during the FIFA World Cup 2014 at Curitiba (Brazil) as one of the main host city destinations. The research focused on the mining of Twitter content with tourist services ontology (hospitality, food and beverages, and transportation). In total, 58,686 valid messages were collected, analyzed, and associated with an application ontology. Content analysis demonstrated an accurate real-time reflection of tourism services. The framework is effective to collect relevant content and identify popular topics in social media toward strategic and operational tourism management

AVALIAÇÃO DO RENDIMENTO DE CARCAÇA DE CODORNAS PARA CORTE ALIMENTADAS COM DIETAS COM DIFERENTES NÍVEIS PROTÉICOS

An experiment has been carried out aiming to evaluate the carcass yield of male and female meat quails fed with diets containing 20, 22, 24, and 26% of crude protein (CP), respectively, all of them displaying the same caloric and lysine levels. A total of 960 quails were used in a completely randomized design, with a factorial of 2 genders and 4 levels of CP, totalizing 8 treatments with 4 replicates of 30 birds each. Carcass yield was evaluated at the end of 49 days of the beginning of the experiment. The levels of CP used in this trial did not display any significant effect on most of the studied parameters. It has been observed an interaction (p < 0.05) for the yield of edible viscera, with females fed with 22% CP displaying higher averages than those fed with 24% CP. There was no effect on the protein levels upon males. Body and carcass weights and non-edible viscera yield were higher in females, while carcass and post chilling yields were higher in males (P < 0.05).Utilizaram-se 960 codornas, distribuídas num delineamento inteiramente aleatorizado com esquema fatorial de 2 sexos x 4 níveis de proteína bruta (PB), sendo as dietas isocalóricas e isolisínicas, num total de 8 tratamentos com 4 repetições de 30 aves cada, para avaliar o rendimento de carcaça de codornas para corte, machos e fêmeas, alimentadas com rações contendo 20%, 22%, 24% e 26% PB, de 1 a 49 dias. Os níveis de proteína bruta não afetaram significativamente a maioria das variáveis estudadas. Os pesos vivo e de carcaça e o rendimento de vísceras não comestíveis foram superiores nas fêmeas; o rendimentos de carcaça e o rendimento resfriado foram superiores nos machos (