Catches in ghost-fishing octopus and fish traps in the northeastern Atlantic Ocean (Algarve, Portugal)

Ghost fishing is the term used to describe the continued capture of fish and other living organisms after a fisherman has lost all control over the gear. Traps may be lost for a variety of reasons including theft, vandalism, abandonment, interactions with other gear, fouling on the bottom (i.e., traps and ropes are caught on rocky substrate), bad weather, and human error (Laist, 1995). Annual trap loss can be as high as 20% to 50% of fished traps in some fisheries (Al-Masroori et al., 2004). Because lost traps can continue to fish for long periods, albeit with decreasing efficiency over time (e.g., Smolowitz, 1978; Breen, 1987, 1990; Guillory, 1993), ghost fishing is a concern in fisheries worldwide

Musical and cognitive abilities in children from disadvantaged backgrounds

Human beings are born with several abilities which are amenable to change. A growing number of studies have focused on the relations between musical and cognitive abilities but research with children from disadvantaged communities is scarce. This study explored the relations between musical and cognitive abilities in disadvantaged children. Participants were 169 children from deprived neighborhoods, attending the second year of primary education in public schools that do not offer music education. Children’s musical abilities (perception) were measured with the Melody, Rhythm, and Memory tests of Montreal Battery for the Evaluation of Musical Abilities and their cognitive abilities, with five WISC-III subtests (Similarities, Vocabulary, Cubes, Picture Arrangement, and Digits). Parental level of education was obtained from a questionnaire on the socio-economic status of children’s families. Results revealed (1) few and weak correlations between musical and cognitive abilities; (2) stronger correlations of Socioeconomic Status (SES) with cognitive than with musical abilities; (3) digit span predicts all musical abilities; 4) a clear factorial distinction between musical and cognitive abilities. Overall, results suggest that disadvantaged children’s musical and cognitive abilities, as measured by the present instruments, are partly independent regarding processing components.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The Smart Stage: Designing 3D interaction metaphors for immersive and ubiquitous music systems

This conceptual paper describes a work in progress in the process of design and implementation of the Smart Stage, an interactive music system prototype for collaborative musical creativity in immersive and ubiquitous environments. This system is intended to have a low entry barrier, thus more forgiving to users with lesser experience or knowledge in music, and it is designed with affordances to support intuitive progress in improvisational performance in a collaborative setting. We present a preliminary technical overview of the system and a first case study of a 3D interaction metaphor for granular synthesis, developed for this environment.Innovation Agency (Agência de Inovação, ADI, Portugal) and Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional (QREN, Portugal): VisualYzARt: Visual programming framework for augmented reality and ubiquitous natural user interfaces (QREN-ADI ref: 23201) and COMPETE - Programa Operacional Factores de Competitividade (POFC

Aromatherapy in the control of stress and anxiety

Background: Currently, complementary and alternative medicine emerge as important therapies in the prevention and treatment of various health problems. In view of this, the present study aims to evaluate the efficacy of essential oils in reducing stress and anxiety levels in aromatherapy users, at a clinic of Bragança, Portugal. Methods: A study was performed with 36 individuals divided in two distinct groups: “aroma group” and “control group”. Individuals of "aroma group" were treated with a mixture of essential oils of Lavandula angustifolia Mill and Matricaria recutita L. applied with Effleurage massage while the individuals of "control group" received only Effleurage massage. Stress and anxiety levels of all individuals participating in the study were evaluated before and after the treatment. Additionally, the chemical composition of the essential oils was evaluated by GC and GC-MS. Results: In the aromatherapy assay, the “aroma group” showed a significant decrease of 12% and 30%, in stress and anxiety levels, respectively, in the “control group” this decrease was lower (3.3% and 2.6% for stress and anxiety levels, respectively). Conclusion: In this study, aromatherapy was effective in stress and anxiety levels reduction and linalool, the major compound of the essential oil mixture, may be positively contributing for these effects.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Diffusion coefficients of perfluorinated n-alcohols in water and heavy water: experiment and computer simulation

Fluorinated surfactants find nowadays many industrial applications due to their enhanced ability to lower surface tension in aqueous solutions [1]. As a result of their extensive use, emissions of fluorinated surfactants became frequent and, because of their persistent character, have been increasingly found in the environment [2]. Both the development of theoretical models to study the environmental fate of those pollutants and the design of unit operations (e.g. adsorption) used for their removal require the knowledge of some key properties such as the diffusion coefficients in water. n-alcohols with perfluorinated carbon chains can be regarded as the most simple fluorinated surfactants, being suitable to be used as model substances that can make easier the molecular interpretation and the theoretical treatment of fluorinated surfactants in a systematic way. On the other hand, the smallest perfluorinated n-alcohols find applications in many fields, such as the pharmaceutical industry, polymer production and refrigerant technology as components of working fluids. We have recently reported intra-diffusion coefficients of 2,2,2-trifluoroethanol in water for dilute solutions as a function of composition and temperature, obtained both experimentally (NMR spin-echo) and by computer simulation (molecular dynamics) [3]. The results obtained by molecular dynamics closely reproduce the experimental ones, which has encouraged us to attempt predicting the dynamic properties of aqueous solutions of the higher fluorinated alcohols and other fluorinated surfactants. In this work, the intra-diffusion coefficients of 2,2,3,3,3-pentafluoropropan-1-ol, 2,2,3,3,4,4,4-heptafluorobutan-1-ol and 2,2,3,3,4,4,5,5,5-nonafluoropentan-1-ol in water and heavy water were measured experimentally by NMR spin-echo technique and compared with results obtained from computer simulation (molecular dynamics). The comparison that can be done between experimental and simulation results is used to test the theoretical models for this chemical family of substances and enriches the molecular interpretation of the results, which can be useful to anticipate trends for more complex fluorinated surfactants. [1] Buck, R. C.; Franklin, J.; Berger, U.; Conder, J. M.; Cousins, I. T.; de Voogt, P.; Jensen, A. A.; Kannan, K.; Mabury, S. A.; van Leeuwen, S., Integr. Environ. Assess. Manage 2011, 7, 513−541 [2] D’Hollander, W.; de Voogt, P.; De Coen, W.; Bervoets, L., Rev. Environ. Contam. Toxicol. 2010, 208, 179–215 [3] Pereira, L. A. M.; Martins, L. F. G.; Ascenso, J. R.; Morgado, P.; Prates Ramalho, J. P.; Filipe, E. J. M., submitted to publicatio

Composition variation of the essential oil from Ocimum basilicum L. cv. Genovese Gigante in response to Glomus intraradices and mild water stress at different stages of growth

In this study, a factorial experiment was carried out to investigate the effect of AMF (arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi) and water stress on the quality of fresh plants (through the analysis of essential oil composition) and also on the morphological characteristics (in terms of biomass) of basil (Ocimum basilicum L. cv. Genovese Gigante). The factors included an arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus inoculation (Glomus intraradices), irrigation level (mild water stress, 60% Field capacity) and the interaction of both AMF and water stress. In addition, the effects of harvesting at two different developmental stages were assessed with respect to the plants tolerance to abiotic stress and the quality of the fresh plant. The main essential oil (EO) constituents for this cultivar were eugenol, which varied between 7.1 and 50.8%, and linalool, 17.0–54.7%, in all the samples. The highest relative amount of eugenol (50.8%) was obtained during the vegetative stage in plants under water stress whereas samples from the control presented 16.2% for this compound. The samples which were significantly different from the control samples were the WS (water stress) samples from the vegetative stage. Additionally, this study suggests that AMF plants offset the adverse effect of water stress. In this context, and since the interaction of AMF and water stress did not significantly change the fresh plant quality, i.e. the essential oil profile in both stages of development, it is worthwhile considering this method of production. Finally, this experiment permitted an understanding of the stressor thresholds of the species used and also that, compensatory responses occur at different time scales, including between generations and also during development (developmental plasticity)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Aromatherapy: ancient solutions for recent problems

Background: Currently, complementary and alternative medicine emerge as strategy in the prevention and treatment of various health problems. The present study aims to evaluate the efficacy of aromatherapy with Lavandula angustifolia Mill and Matricaria recutita L. in reducing stress and anxiety levels. Methods: A study was performed with 36 individuals divided in two distinct groups: “aroma group” and “control group”. Individuals of "aroma group" were treated with a mixture of essential oils of Lavandula angustifolia Mill and Matricaria recutita L. applied with Effleurage massage while the individuals of "control group" received only Effleurage massage. Stress and anxiety levels of all individuals participating in the study were evaluated before and after the treatment. Additionally, the chemical composition of the essential oils was evaluated by GC and GC-MS. Results: In the aromatherapy assay, the “aroma group” showed a significant decrease of 12% and 30%, in stress and anxiety levels, respectively while lower decrease was observed in “control group” (3.3% and 2.6% for stress and anxiety levels, respectively). Conclusion: In this study, aromatherapy was effective in stress and anxiety levels reduction and linalool, the major compound of the essential oil mixture, may be positively contributing for these effects.The authors are grateful to the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT, Portugal) for financial support by national funds FCT/MCTES to CIMO (UIDB/00690/2020). The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) under UID/AMB/50017/2013, FEDER PT2020-Compete 2020. Authors are also grateful to Gabinete Terapêutico Telmo Teles, Unipessoal, Lda, Bragança, for the availability to perform the aromatherapy assay.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Physical-chemical properties of the phenolic compounds of Humulus lupulus and aromatic plant terpenes: potential for use in a cosmetic formulation

The Hop (Humulus lupulus L.) are known worldwide as an essential flavor in the beer industry. Its compounds have been showing health benefits in terms ofphytochemical, pharmacological and biological profiles, due to their antimicrobial, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anticancer activities. This study intends todevelop a gel formulation incorporating hydroalcoholic extracts of different varieties of hops such as Cascade, Polaris and Spontaneous, from the cones and thevegetative plant parts, in different percentages. The essential oil of Thymus zygis was used as a natural conservative and the analysis of the composition was made byGC and GC-MS. Later evaluation of the physical-chemical parameters, stability and capacity to inhibit microbial growth was made. The pH measurement results of theformulations tend to be adjusted to the natural pH skin. The relative density obtained values of 1 and 0.857. It was found that there were no changes in the phase separation in the centrifugation, vibration, stability and accelerated test. However, changes were observed in the UV-Visible spectra, in texture, consistency and viscosity, and in the color test. In the light test there was phase separation in the samples, which may be related to the manufacturing technique of the formulations.However, this formulations anti aging with phenols from Hop can be development in order to obtain formulations with relevant properties for the consumers and the cosmetic industry.The authors thank the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT, Portugal) and the ERDF under the PT2020 Program for their financial support to CIMO (UID/AGR/00690/2020).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A multi-granular linguistic model to evaluate the suitability of installing an ERP system

The use of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) has shown clearly useful and economically profitable in most very large organizations which manage a great deal of data in their information systems. Nevertheless, the decision of installing an ERP system is not easy and it depends on the size, future profits and other features of the companies. The assessments of the parameters (features, aspects) used to evaluate the suitability of the ERP may be vague and imprecise because they are usually perceptions of the experts. We propose the use of linguistic information to assess these parameters due to the fact that it is very suitable to model and manage human perceptions. In addition, it may be that each expert has a different knowledge about each parameter and prefers to express his/her preferences in his/her own linguistic term set. Therefore, to manage the evaluation problem of installing an ERP, in this contribution we present a multi-granular linguistic evaluation model that covers these necessities