Criação de uma gama de iluminação para unidades hoteleiras

Mestrado em DesignDesde o domínio técnico do fogo, na aurora da Humanidade, que a iluminação artificial tem tido um papel determinante na ligação do Homem ao mundo que o rodeia, constituindo um fator indispensável no nosso quotidiano, seja no apoio à realização de tarefas laborais, de lazer ou como meio de comunicação retórica dos espaços e funções vitais. No período barroco, a iluminação protagonizou uma função simbólica como meio de caracterização cénica do espaço interior. A partir desta época, a iluminação adquiriu uma relevância maior como meio arquitetónico de modelação do espaço, adequando-o funcional e esteticamente. A tipificação e domínio técnico dos modelos de iluminação dão suporte à cenografia do habitat, tema particularmente importante no desenho da hotelaria. O objetivo da seguinte dissertação tem em vista a criação de uma gama de luminárias destinadas ao contexto hoteleiro, para produção industrial na empresa Artinox, em Águeda, respondendo aos vários requisitos funcionais impostos. O presente estudo partiu da investigação sobre as tipologias de iluminação ambiental na hotelaria confrontando esse programa com as condições tecnológicas de produção instaladas na Artinox propondo uma gama de produtos exequíveis e capaz de se colocar ao nível da oferta que caracteriza o Estado da Arte O processo de investigação partiu de uma base teórica elucidativa decorrente da revisão da literatura, de cadernos de tendências de consumo, da investigação empírica dos vários catálogos das marcas que lideram este mercado e do estágio na empresa Artinox, permitindo constatar e aprofundar tecnologias de produção tradicional recorrentemente usadas neste tipo de produtos. Os conhecimentos adquiridos integraram o desenho de uma família de quatro peças de diferentes tipologias, (Pé, Suspensão, Mesa e Parede).From the technical domain of fire, at the dawn of mankind, artificial lighting has played a decisive role in the connection of man to the world around him, which is an indispensable factor in our daily life, whether it is to support work, leisure tasks or as a means of rhetorical communication of spaces and vital functions. In the Baroque period, enlightenment played a symbolic role as a means of scenic characterization of the interior space. From that time, the lighting acquired a greater relevance as an architectural means of modeling the space, adapting it functionally and aesthetically. The typification and technical mastery of the lighting models support the scenography of the habitat, a particularly important theme in hotel design. The purpose of this dissertation is to create a range of luminaires for the hotel industry, for industrial production in the company Artinox in Águeda, responding to the various functional requirements imposed. The present study was based on the research on the typologies of ambient illumination in the hotel industry, confronting this program with the technological conditions of production installed in Artinox proposing a range of products feasible and able to be placed at the level of the offer that characterizes the State of Art The research process was based on a theoretical basis based on literature review, consumer trend notebooks, empirical research on the various catalogs of the brands that lead this market and the internship at the Artinox company, allowing to verify and deepen traditional production technologies used in this type of products. The acquired knowledge integrated the design of a family of four pieces of different typologies, (Foot, Suspension, Table and Wall)

Comparison of co-gasification of wastes mixtures obtained from rice production wastes using air or oxygen

The world annual production of rice is higher than 700.7 million tons, which generates rice husk and straw wastes. Rice culture also produces big amounts of polyethylene (PE) bags used in rice packs and for seeds and fertilizer storage that usually end up in landfills, due to their degree of contamination. The energetic valorisation of these wastes may be accomplished by different processes, co-gasification is one of the most viable, as it leads to the production of a synthetic gaseous mixture (bio-syngas) that can be used for energy production to be used during rice milling processes. Gasification of rice husks has some challenges, due to these wastes high content of silica and alkali metals that lead to the formation of solids with lower melting point, thus, leading to bed agglomeration that causes reactor erosion and serious damage. PE has lower ash content and much higher energetic content than rice husks. However, PE polymeric structure may lead to the formation of higher tar contents, which compromise most gasification gas utilisations. Co-gasification of PE and rice husks allows taking advantages of each waste favourable characteristic, diluting the unsuitable features. Co-gasification of these wastes was done in presence of steam blended with air or oxygen. Steam promoted the gasification reactions and favoured H2 production. Air or oxygen promoted the partial oxidation of the feedstocks to be co-gasified and supplied the energy necessary for the endothermic gasification reactions. The use of air has a low cost, but has the great disadvantage of diluting the bio-syngas produced, thus lowering its energetic content. On the other hand, the use of oxygen solves the problems related to gas dilution with nitrogen, but increases the operating cost. Bio-syngas composition obtained by co-gasification trials done with air enriched with different oxygen contents was compared with those obtained with air or pure oxygen to determine the best approach considering both the technical and economical sustainability

Benefits and drawbacks of energetic valorisation of Eucalyptus Globulus stumps by thermochemical processes

n the pulp and paper industry in Iberian Peninsula there is an intensive use of eucalyptus globulus that has a fast growth and a high productivity. There are large areas of forest dedicated to its growth. After 9 to 12 year rotation cycles trees are cut and the stumps are left in the fields. After 2 or 3 harvesting cycles these tree stumps are removed from the fields and considered low value biomass wastes. This corresponds to depletion on organic matter and of valuable minerals related to soil fertility. The use of these biomass wastes in thermochemical conversion processes like gasification or combustion may be a valuable alternative solution as it allows taking profit of these wastes energetic content. The solid by-products obtained by thermal conversion (ashes) may be incorporated in soils to return the valuable minerals and to ensure a good forest management system. Stumps removed from eucalyptus stands were used in combustion trials to improve the burning conditions and in gasification tests with different experimental conditions to obtain syngas suitable to be used in furnaces (chemical recover) of pulp industries. Stumps combustion and gasification processes were compared in terms of stumps energetic valorisation, gaseous emissions and gasification gas utilisation.

Olive Oil Screening

On the one hand, the olive oils’ quality is fixed by the region in which it is produced, the olive variety, the year of production, the degree of maturation, the extraction and the preservation processes, i.e., the olive oils` quality is assessed by two types of analyzes, the organoleptic and the biochemical ones. On the other hand, there are no studies linking analytical parameters to sensory data due to the nonlinearity that exists between these two types of variables. The present study aims to provide an answer to these problems by modeling the causal processes used at different types of olive and olive oil production. To this end, we called at an Artificial Neural Network approach to problem solving once it provides a way to handle the various stages of ripeness of the olives and olive oil production, by allowing one to deal with incomplete, unknown or even self-contradictory information or knowledge

Environmental remediation promoted by silver nanoparticles biosynthesized by eucalyptus leaves extract

A simple and low-cost green synthesis method was optimized to prepare stable silver nanoparticles (AgNP) using aqueous Eucalyptus globulus leaves extract. This green method allows to obtain AgNP with spherical morphology and variable size around 25 nm, and it is dependent of the reaction temperature and concentration of the plant extract. AgNP stability was followed during 3 months by zeta potential measurements and a negative zeta range from 30.7 to 33.6 was determined. Biogenic-stabilized AgNP exhibited dual-functional properties as effective in environmental remediation with bacterial growth inhibition and dye photodegradation. Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli were tested for antibacterial activity, and considerable inhibitory activity was found. High photocatalytic degradation of indigo carmine (IC) dye was performed in the presence of the AgNP as catalysts under sunlight irradiation. The degradation efficiency after 2 h of reaction was 37 %, 83 % and 98 % in the presence of UV light, visible light and sunlight irradiation, respectively. The germination of corn kernels test was used to determine the toxicity of the treated IC solutions and the results showed low toxicity after the photodegradation process.V.R. thanks to Fundação para Ciência e Tecnologia, FCT (Portugal) for her Ph.D. grant (SFRH/BD/141073/2018). P⋅F-S. would like to express their gratitude to the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness for their postdoctoral grant (Reference FJC2021-046978-I). This research work has been funded by FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC) over the projects: CQ-UM (UID/QUI/0686/2020), CEB (UIDB/04469/2020) and LABBELS (LA/P/0029/2020), and project BioTecNorte (operation NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000004), supported by the Northern Portugal Regional Operational Program (NORTE 2020), under the Portugal 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Noise rich in low frequency components, a new comorbidity for periodontal disease? An experimental study

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited."Introduction: Exposure to noise rich in low frequency components induces abnormal proliferation of extracellular matrix and collagens. The previous studies have shown alterations in the periodontium of both humans and animals. Our objective was the evaluation of collagens I, IV and V of the periodontium of Wistar rats exposed to noise rich in low frequency components. Materials and Methods: 5 groups (each with 10 animals) were exposed to continuous low frequency noise (LFN). The LFN, from previously recorded white noise, frequency filtered and amplified, was applied in growing periods of 1, 3, 5, 9 and 13 weeks, in order to characterize the alterations with exposure time. A control group of ten animals was kept in silence. These animals were used in groups of 2 as aged‑matched controls. After exposure, sections were obtained including teeth, alveolar bone and periodontium and observed after immunollabeling for collagens I, IV and V. Results: A significant increase in collagen I was observed in exposed groups (P < 0.001) (Kruskal‑Wallis test). Post‑hoc comparisons (Mann‑Whitney test with Bonferroni correction) showed an increase in collagen I in animals exposed for 3 weeks or more (P < 0.001). The same test was applied to collagen V where significant differences were found when comparing control and exposed groups (P ≤ 0.004). The t‑test for independent samples was applied to collagen type IV where no significant differences were found (P = 0.410), when comparing to the control group. Discussion: As in other organs, we can observe fibrosis and the newly formed collagen is likely to be “nonfunctional,” which could have clinical impact. Conclusion: Noise may constitute a new comorbidity for periodontal disease.

Inspecção e diagnóstico. Sistematização de informação. Casos práticos

No âmbito da aplicação de novas tecnologias ao tratamento da informação obtida nas diversas inspecções técnicas que o Núcleo de Conservação e Reabilitação de Edifícios e Património (NCREP) da Faculdade de Engenharia da Universidade do Porto (FEUP) tem efectuado, este nú- cleo tem vindo a desenvolver CDs multimédia como meios adicionais para a sistematização e divulgação da informação. Estas aplicações têm como objectivo disponibilizar a informação de uma forma simples e elucidativa, abrangendo descrições da estrutura, das patologias e dos materiais que constituem os imóveis em causa, e também de técnicas de construção e do enquadramento urbano do imóvel. No parque edificado dos centos das cidades que usualmente se agrupa em quarteirões, as construções integrantes de um mesmo quarteirão tendem a interactuar umas com as outras, dado que se encontram ligadas entre si através das paredes meeiras que são comuns a cada par de casas. Este aspecto condiciona o comportamento individual de cada uma de per si e o do conjunto, originando que qualquer intervenção realizada numa das construções tenha de ter em consideração os efeitos favoráveis ou desfavoráveis que poderá originar nas outras. Por outro lado, a forma em planta e em alçado do quarteirão introduz problemas estruturais de comportamento que interessa analisar no caso de centros históricos situados em zonas sísmicas

Is the chlorophyll derivative Zn(II)e6Me a good photosensitizer to be used in root canal disinfection?

The aim of this study was to assess antimicrobial efficacy and cytotoxic outcomes of a chlorophyll based photosensitizer (PS) Zn(II)chlorin e6 methyl ester (Zn(II)e6Me), when applied to human dentin discs and root blocks infected with 48 h biofilms. The results were compared with the ones obtained with FotoSan® (commercial Toluidine Blue O formulation) and 3% sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl).publishe