Revealing doctors' prescribing choice dimensions with multivariate tools: A perceptual mapping approach

This article explores the use of multivariate techniques to build perceptual maps that show the perceived competitive positions of a set of ethical drugs. The data were drawn from a commercial panel of 283 family doctors working for the UK National Health Service. Factor analysis was applied to identify the main dimensions used by doctors to perceive and evaluate antihypertensive brands. Perceptual maps showing the competitive positions of 14 antihypertensives were produced using the factor scores of the medicines. Multiple regression analysis enabled the relative importance of each perceptual dimension to be determined. The results reveal that doctors use a small number of perceptual dimensions to evaluate competitive antihypertensive drugs, namely: 'medical support', 'long term efficacy', and the 'additional beneficial effects' provided by the brand. The implications for marketing managers in the ethical pharmaceutical industry are explained and ways in which the perceptual analysis can be used to guide strategic marketing decisions considered

Regional and temporal changes in bivalve diversity off the south coast of Portugal

12 pages, 8 figures.-- Printed version published Dec 10, 2008.From 2000 to 2006, a total of 75 bivalve species were identified, varying from 29 (spring 2001) to 54 species (spring 2005) per year. Seasonal tendencies in diversity varied according the year, thus the interpretation of long-term and regional scales is essential before drawing any conclusions in other studies. Richness and diversity consistently decreased with depth and increased with sediment grain size (from low in very coarse sand to high in coarse silt). Diversity decreased progressively from 3 to 16 m depth, thus the harsher shallower environments (due to waves and tidal air exposure) showed greater diversity than the most stable areas. Communities in finer sediments were more diverse than those in coarser sand. Evenness showed patterns opposite to diversity, overall.Diversity and evenness maps (produced with multivariate universal kriging), showed that most geographic areas with greater diversity were farer from river outflows and wastewater treatment plants. Two types of geographic pattern were observed: areas with persistently greater bivalve diversity through time and areas that changed locally from year to year. This spatial analysis can be used to establish priority conservation areas for management purposes, and to analyse the persistency of regional diversity patterns. The area with most habitat heterogeneity (Sotavento) corresponded to greatest diversity.There was a positive relationship between Spisula solida and Chamelea gallina landings and bivalve diversity 2 years and 1 year later, respectively. Possibly, local fisheries, by selectively withdrawing the commercial numerically dominant species from the ecosystem, increased diversity 1 to 2 years later, as the ecological niches of the dominants are quickly filled by several other species thereby creating a more even community. On regional scales, no significant impact was found on long-term bivalve diversity in local fisheries.This work was part of an MMR Post-doc program financed by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia BPD /14935/ 2004.Peer reviewe

Regional and temporal changes in bivalve diversity off the south coast of Portugal

12 pages, 8 figures.-- Printed version published Dec 10, 2008.From 2000 to 2006, a total of 75 bivalve species were identified, varying from 29 (spring 2001) to 54 species (spring 2005) per year. Seasonal tendencies in diversity varied according the year, thus the interpretation of long-term and regional scales is essential before drawing any conclusions in other studies. Richness and diversity consistently decreased with depth and increased with sediment grain size (from low in very coarse sand to high in coarse silt). Diversity decreased progressively from 3 to 16 m depth, thus the harsher shallower environments (due to waves and tidal air exposure) showed greater diversity than the most stable areas. Communities in finer sediments were more diverse than those in coarser sand. Evenness showed patterns opposite to diversity, overall.Diversity and evenness maps (produced with multivariate universal kriging), showed that most geographic areas with greater diversity were farer from river outflows and wastewater treatment plants. Two types of geographic pattern were observed: areas with persistently greater bivalve diversity through time and areas that changed locally from year to year. This spatial analysis can be used to establish priority conservation areas for management purposes, and to analyse the persistency of regional diversity patterns. The area with most habitat heterogeneity (Sotavento) corresponded to greatest diversity.There was a positive relationship between Spisula solida and Chamelea gallina landings and bivalve diversity 2 years and 1 year later, respectively. Possibly, local fisheries, by selectively withdrawing the commercial numerically dominant species from the ecosystem, increased diversity 1 to 2 years later, as the ecological niches of the dominants are quickly filled by several other species thereby creating a more even community. On regional scales, no significant impact was found on long-term bivalve diversity in local fisheries.This work was part of an MMR Post-doc program financed by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia BPD /14935/ 2004.Peer reviewe

Sintra vegetation and landscape

The field trip to Sintra region, as part of the 48th IAVS Symposium, aims to illustrate well-preserved and representative plant communities of Sintra municipality. It consists of two short field stops and a 3 km wal

Materiais de construção e materiais líticos nas práticas funerárias neolíticas da serra da Boa Viagem (Centro-Oeste de Portugal). O caso do monumento megalítico do Cabeço dos Moinhos, Figueira da Foz

Este trabalho contribui para o conhecimento do Neolítico do Centro-Oeste português. O caso de estudo foi o monumento megalítico do Cabeço dos Moinhos, edificado na serra da Boa Viajem, no que é hoje a freguesia da Brenha, concelho da Figueira da Foz. Para além de ser óbvio que esta região se encontrava, durante o Neolítico, no limiar de diferentes mundos culturais, o meridional e o setentrional, a partir das matérias usadas na construção do monumento e das matérias usadas no fabrico de oferendas líticas e de objetos de adorno, teceram-se algumas considerações relacionadas com as práticas funerárias, os modos de vida e de vivenciar o mundo por parte das comunidades neolíticas que aqui ergueram estes monumentos. Em relação às oferendas líticas notou-se a ausência de traços de uso o que indicia que foram fabricadas apenas para ritos funerários. Além do simbolismo intrínseco às formas, as diferentes matérias em que foram construídos (locais, regionais e inter-regionais) indiciam a importância da interligação física e simbólica das comunidades locais com lugares próximos e remotos, o que não será alheio a um modo de vida com grande abertura ao mundo exterior e, talvez, pouco sedentarizado . O mesmo se poderá interpretar em termos arquitetónicos pois, se a construção sobre um afloramento calcário e em local culminante poderá revelar assimilação das propriedades inerentes ao local e à matéria aí existente, a reunião de matérias de diferentes proveniências na câmara/corredor implicará uma interligação física e mental entre os diferentes lugares vivenciados pelos seus construtores, ou seja, entre lugares de habitat, de subsistência e de veneração dos espíritos dos antepassados.This paper contributes to the understanding of the Neolithic burial practices in Western Central Portugal. It relies on the reviewing of Santos Rocha texts, which describes research carried out in the megalithic monument of Cabeço dos Moinhos (Brenha, Figueira da Foz), fieldwork and the study of bone remains and “offerings” that were found in the monument. Cabeço dos Moinhos tomb was built on a limestone outcrop located in a hill placed on the ridgeline of Serra da Boa Viagem. From this hill there is a wide visibility to the sandy coastal plain (to the north) and to the Baixo Mondego area (to the south). Under a mound of "yellowish soil without mixture" a polygonal chamber with corridor oriented east was built. The standing stones were made of greyish white limestone (local) and of whitish, greyish, yellowish and reddish sandstone. The last two are sourced from slopes located more than 250m south of the tomb. Santos Rocha (1949: 14) found some "skeletons lying in gravel beds" and rare burnt bones. The dead were buried together with pottery, lithic and bone objects. Some of these indicate a reutilization of the monument during the Chalcolithic. The absence of use-wear in the majority of the lithics suggests that they were produced only for the burial practices. In addition to the symbolism intrinsic to morphologies, the use of different “raw” materials suggests the importance of the reunion of their own properties at the time of the burial, setting a symbolic and physical interconnection between local communities and near and remote places. The same reasoning can be applied to the architecture of the monument: if its construction on a limestone outcrop which is a culminating spot suggests the assimilation of the properties associated to the place and to the matter that exists there, the presence of “raw” materials from different sources among the standing stones of the chamber and the corridor imply a mental and physical interconnection between different places experienced by the builders. The visualized landscape must also have been significant to the people who built and attended the Cabeço dos Moinhos megalithic monument.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

NEEM: network-friendly epidemic multicast

Epidemic, or probabilistic, multicast protocols have emerged as a viable mechanism to circumvent the scalabil- ity problems of reliable multicast protocols. However, most existing epidemic approaches use connectionless transport protocols to exchange messages and rely on the intrinsic robustness of the epidemic dissemination to mask network omissions. Unfortunately, such an approach is not network- friendly, since the epidemic protocol makes no effort to re- duce the load imposed on the network when the system is congested. In this paper, we propose a novel epidemic protocol whose main characteristic is to be network-friendly. This property is achieved by relying on connection-oriented transport connections, such as TCP/IP, to support the com- munication among peers. Since during congestion mes- sages accumulate in the border of the network, the pro- tocol uses an innovative buffer management scheme, that combines different selection techniques to discard messages upon overflow. This technique improves the quality of the information delivered to the application during periods of network congestion. The protocol has been implemented and the benefits of the approach are illustrated using a com- bination of experimental and simulation results

Evaluation of Y2O3 as front layer of ceramic crucibles for vaccum induction melting of tial based alloys

During the last decades titanium alloys were found to be valuable engineering materials for many different applications. Formerly used in critical applications like aerospace, aeronautic and military equipment, where the factor cost is not relevant, titanium alloys are finding now new and different markets. However, the development of such new markets will depend on an effective cost reduction of titanium parts, in order to achieve a selling cost suitable with its application in consumer goods. A possible solution to decrease production costs might be the use of traditional casting techniques to produce near net shape functional parts. During the last years, the authors have developed extensive research work on this field, and a new technique both for melting and moulding, using ceramic multi-layered crucibles and investment casting shells was developed. This paper presents some of the results obtained during that research work: Ti-48Al alloy were melted and cooled inside CaO, MgO and Y2O3 stabilized ZrO2 crucibles with inside layer of Y2O3. The chemical composition, hardness and microstructure at the metal-crucible interface, studied by secondary ion mass spectrometry, SEM/EDS and XRS are presented. On a second step, the same alloy was melted on the same crucibles, and poured into graphite moulds, and the crucibles wall was characterized by SEM/EDS and XRS.(undefined

Verification of the functional abilities and assistance needs of children with cerebral palsy

INTRODUÇÃO: Paralisia Cerebral é uma desordem do movimento e da postura, persistente, porém variável, surgida nos primeiros anos de vida pela interferência no desenvolvimento do sistema nervoso central, causada por uma desordem cerebral não progressiva ¹. Tem como principal característica a inabilidade do corpo em enfrentar com eficiência os efeitos da gravidade. Devido às alterações motoras é importante a participação do Fisioterapeuta na equipe interdisciplinar. Para tanto, deve-se realizar avaliações das dificuldades na paralisia cerebral para possibilitar uma melhor organização do programa fisioterapêutico. OBJETIVO: Avaliar as habilidades funcionais e a necessidade de auxílio do cuidador em crianças com até 18 meses de idade, e com paralisia cerebral. Método: Foram avaliadas 7 crianças com diagnóstico médico de paralisia cerebral, entre 10 e 18 meses de idade, com média de idade correspondente a um ano e dois meses. A avaliação ocorreu por meio do P.E.D.I. e foram analisados os escores bruto e normativo nas áreas de habilidades funcionais e assistência do cuidador. RESULTADOS: Verificou-se maior dificuldade nas crianças com paralisia cerebral na área de mobilidade e, desta forma, a necessidade de maior assistência em movimentos e posturas. CONCLUSÃO: Apesar das alterações nos componentes neuromotores observadas em crianças de risco, as mesmas acabam desenvolvendo estratégias motoras que lhes permitem desempenhar atividades funcionais, como por exemplo as situações citadas na área de auto-cuidado. Os cuidadores orientados pelo fisioterapeuta podem propor facilitações que beneficiarão a função da criança, sua participação na atividade e desenvolvimento da comunicação.INTRODUCTION: Cerebral Palsy is a movement and posture disorder caused by events occurring during pregnancy, childbirth, the neonatal period or during the first two years of life. Its main characteristic is the body's inability to efficiently face the effects of gravity. Due to the motor alterations, the participation of the physiotherapist in the interdisciplinary team is important. Assessment of the difficulties in cerebral palsy should take place to enable a better organization of the physiotherapeutic program. OBJETIVE: To analyze the constraints on the functional abilities and the assistance needs of children with cerebral palsy up to 18 months of age. METHODS: Seven children with a medical diagnosis of cerebral palsy, with ages between 10 and 18 months, mean age corresponding to one year and two months, were assessed. The assessment occurred by means of P.E.D.I. and the gross and normative scores in the areas of functional abilities and caregiver's assistance were analyzed. Results: The mobility area was the one in which the children with cerebral palsy had more difficulties; thus, they needed more assistance in movements and postures. CONCLUSION: In spite of the alterations in the neuromotor components observed in risk children, the same children end up developing motor strategies that allow them to perform functional activities; for example, the situations cited in the self-care area. The caregivers, guided by the physiotherapist, can propose the means that will benefit the child's function, his/her participation in the activity and communication development

Fuzzy Method for in Control Acetaldehyde Generation in Resin Pet in the Process of Packaging Pre-Forms of Plastic Injection

In order to control the drying temperature of the PET resin in the silo of the plastic injection molding machine, during the plastic injection process in the industries producing preforms for the manufacture of beverage bottles, care is taken in the ideal temperature regulation for the better performance in controlling the generation of Acetaldehyde (AA), which alters the taste of carbonated or non-carbonated drinks, providing a citrus nuance to the palate and questioning the quality of the packaged products The objective of this work is to develop a tool based on Fuzzy logic to support the control of the drying temperature of PET resin, allowing specialists to make the ideal temperature control decisions necessary to control the generation of Acetaldehyde (AA). For the development of the proposed Fuzzy inference model, we used the Matlab Fuzzy toolbox tool, where the input variables, the fuzzyfication rules and the output variable were implemented based on the data collected from the preform injection process. From the inference model, we obtained a more precise management of the variables that influence the generation of AA, estimating a reduction of $ 240,044.00 in annual costs in the production of preforms

Characterization of TiAl alloys by secondary Ion mass spectrometry

Titanium aluminides are arising as a valuable alternative to superalloys in applications where the ratio resistance/density is important. Together with excellent mechanical and corrosion properties at high temperatures, such characteristics are very attractive for applications in the aeronautical, aerospace and automotive industries. However, the current high selling price, due to high costs of production and raw materials and the need of very specific equipment, are limitative factors for further applications. With the end of the cold war, and the decrease of traditional markets of TiAl, the strategy to develop other applications, strongly depends on the decrease of production costs. An alternative to the present production routes might be the use of traditional casting techniques, by induction melting of the alloy in a ceramic crucible and pouring into ceramic moulds, made by the investment casting process. However, due to the high reactivity of Ti alloys, the use of traditional ceramic materials cannot be used, as they lead to oxide formation and oxygen pick up both from the crucible and the moulding materials. In this work, the relative oxygen concentration of Ti-48Al castings was measured by SIMS — Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry. This technique provides a direct measurement of the isotopic composition with high sensitivity. The cylindrical samples were specially prepared to allow the analysis of the area close to the border. Oxygen profiles were acquired for samples obtained by with different mould materials. The comparison of such profiles with hardness profiles, give insight in the significance of the oxygen concentration in the properties of the alloy and in the choice of the most suitable materials for TiAl production(undefined