Aplication of breathable and odorless lining to orthopaedic shoes

The main purpose of this work is to apply new materials and new finishing to improve comfort in orthopaedic footwear associated with orthosis. This desideratum will be reached through the selection and application of advanced materials, such, breathables membranes and fabric finished with anti-fungal and anti-bacteria treatments. In this work, water vapor permeability was evaluated to determine the transport property of water vapor produced by transpiration of the skin. A new lining with breathable membrane and anti-odour finishing has been developed and tested. Water vapor permeability of the new lining was compared with a commercial leather lining, commercial lining with breathable membrane - AquaStopT, breathable membrane and weave fabric. The possibility to use fabrics with anti-odour finishing’s, laminated with a hydrophilic breathable membrane, for lining proposes has been demonstrated. Application of membranes with weave fabric by lamination decreases the breathability of materials, nevertheless, the lining with hydrophilic (LF) membrane and the leather’s lining have similar values for water vapor permeability, with the advantage that LF is impermeable.FCT, COMPETE, QREN, UNIÃO EUROPEI

Development and application of a new concept of cork substrate in footwear and clothing

In the present work a “cork substrate” is developed aiming the achievement of an innovative material with ideal properties to respond to clothing and footwear applications. The preparation phases of leather processing are highly complex, with a large level of environmental aggressiveness. Garment and footwear industries are widely looking for new materials and applications able to reduce industrial pollutant charge, as well as new processes with lower water and energy consumption and higher economic advantages. Nowadays the conventional material to produce footwear is leather because it combines excellent properties such as: breathability, softness and thermal conductivity. A cork skin is laminated with membranes and textile fabrics and a comparison with leather properties has been done. The inner layer is made with a twill fabric that can be dyed and finished to confer functionalized properties. The results obtained are very promising and the possibility of using this laminated is demonstrated.We gratefully acknowledge the financial support from QREN (Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional – National Strategic Reference Framework), for this study “COLTEC”, Project no 2011/19280, co-financiado pelo FEDER, Programa Operacional Regional Norte. The authors wish to express their acknowledgment to FCT and FEDER-COMPETE funding, under the project PEst-C/CTM/UI0264/2011

Breathable, impermeable and odourless lining for orthopaedic footwear application

Is has been recognized that the breathability and impermeability of the shoes lining play a crucial role on the performance and comfort of footwear. The main goal of this work is to study the application and behaviour new materials and new finishing to improve comfort in orthopaedic footwear associated with orthosis. This desideratum is reached through the selection and application of advanced materials, such as, breathable membranes and fabric finished with anti-fungal and anti-bacteria treatments. In this study, water vapour permeability was evaluated to determine the water vapour transport property produced by skin transpiration. Furthermore, a new lining with hydrophilic breathable membrane and anti-odour finishing has been developed and tested. Water vapour permeability of the new lining was compared with other conventional materials. From the obtained results, it can be drawn that the application of membranes with weave fabric by lamination decreases the breathability of material. The possibility to use fabrics with anti-odour finishing’s, laminated with a hydrophilic breathable membrane, for lining proposes has been demonstrated.compete qren fct união europei

Influence of the hip joint modeling approaches on the kinematics of human gait

The influence of the hip joint formulation on the kinematic response of the model of human gait is investigated throughout this work. To accomplish this goal, the fundamental issues of the modeling process of a planar hip joint under the framework of multibody systems are revisited. In particular, the formulations for the ideal, dry, and lubricated revolute joints are described and utilized for the interaction of femur head inside acetabulum or the hip bone. In this process, the main kinematic and dynamic aspects of hip joints are analyzed. In a simple manner, the forces that are generated during human gait, for both dry and lubricated hip joint models, are computed in terms of the system’s state variables and subsequently introduced into the dynamics equations of motion of the multibody system as external generalized forces. Moreover, a human multibody model is considered, which incorporates the different approaches for the hip articulation, namely ideal joint, dry, and lubricated models. Finally, several computational simulations based on different approaches are performed, and the main results presented and compared to identify differences among the methodologies and procedures adopted in this work. The input conditions to the models correspond to the experimental data capture from an adult male during normal gait. In general, the obtained results in terms of positions do not differ significantly when the different hip joint models are considered. In sharp contrast, the velocity and acceleration plotted vary significantly. The effect of the hip joint modeling approach is clearly measurable and visible in terms of peaks and oscillations of the velocities and accelerations. In general, with the dry hip model, intra-joint force peaks can be observed, which can be associated with the multiple impacts between the femur head and the cup. In turn, when the lubricant is present, the system’s response tends to be smoother due to the damping effects of the synovial fluid.The first and third authors express their gratitude to the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology for the PhD grants SFRH/BD/76573/2011 and SFRH/BD/64477/2009, respectively. The authors would like to thank to the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology through the project UID/EEA/04436/2013. The authors are also gratefully acknowledge the financial support from QREN (Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional - National Strategic Reference Framework), for this study “INOVSHOES - Padronizar para Customizar Calçado Ortopédico”, project n.º 2010/12032

Sustainable and multifunctional natural fiber-based electric wire sheaths for smart textiles

Envisioning the development of sustainable products for improvement of daily life quality, a cable-like composite using natural fibers was developed to be potentially used in smart textiles. Natural fibers such as jute and hemp were used along with Bekinox®VN yarn. Bekinox®VN is a stainless steel conductive yarn often used in intelligent textiles within a wide range of applications such as antistatic, power and signal transfer, thermal conductivity or even as a heat resistant sewing yarn. Furthermore, applying a chitosan coating on the surface of the sheath will confer antibacterial properties, thus preventing the colonization and proliferation of bacteria, as well as natural fiber degradation. The chitosan coating was applied by a pad dry method. Tests were performed to evaluate the mechanical, electrical and antimicrobial properties. The results displayed that the best tensile strength was obtained for hemp fabric followed by cable composite. The antimicrobial properties were improved with the coating of chitosan and demonstrating excellent results against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Although chitosan reduces the mechanical strength of the sheath, it confers antibacterial activity, which not only will preserve the fiber in the structure but will also protect human skin against possible cross-contaminations.This work was funded by ERDF through the COP and FCT projects: UID/CTM/00264/2021, PLASMAMED PTDC/CTM TEX/28295/2017, ARCHKNIT POCI-01-0247-FEDER-039733, FATORST+ POCI-01-0247-ERDF-047124, MEDCOR PTDC/CTM-TEX/1213/2020, 4NoPressure POCI-01-0247-FEDER-039869 financed by FEDER through POCI under the “Portugal 2020” programme. RDVF and AIR also acknowledge Ph.D. scholarships SFRH/BD/145269/2019 and SFRH/BD/137668/2018, respectively

Sustainable and multifunctional natural fiber-based electric wire sheaths for smart textiles

Envisioning the development of sustainable products for improvement of daily life quality, a cable-like composite using natural fibers was developed to be potentially used in smart textiles. Natural fibers such as jute and hemp were used along with Bekinox®VN yarn. Bekinox®VN is a stainless steel conductive yarn often used in intelligent textiles within a wide range of applications such as antistatic, power and signal transfer, thermal conductivity or even as a heat resistant sewing yarn. Furthermore, applying a chitosan coating on the surface of the sheath will confer antibacterial properties, thus preventing the colonization and proliferation of bacteria, as well as natural fiber degradation. The chitosan coating was applied by a pad dry method. Tests were performed to evaluate the mechanical, electrical and antimicrobial properties. The results displayed that the best tensile strength was obtained for hemp fabric followed by cable composite. The antimicrobial properties were improved with the coating of chitosan and demonstrating excellent results against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Although chitosan reduces the mechanical strength of the sheath, it confers antibacterial activity, which not only will preserve the fiber in the structure but will also protect human skin against possible cross-contaminations.This work was funded by ERDF through the COP and FCT projects: UID/CTM/00264/2021, PLASMAMED PTDC/CTM TEX/28295/2017, ARCHKNIT POCI-01-0247-FEDER-039733, FATORST+ POCI-01-0247-ERDF-047124, MEDCOR PTDC/CTM-TEX/1213/2020, 4NoPressure POCI-01-0247-FEDER-039869 financed by FEDER through POCI under the “Portugal 2020” programme. RDVF and AIR also acknowledge Ph.D. scholarships SFRH/BD/145269/2019 and SFRH/BD/137668/2018, respectively

Antiviral properties of flame retardant bacterial nanocellulose modified with mordenite

Current COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the requirement of antiviral properties in a plethora of textile applications. These include textiles used in home areas prone to fire such as kitchens, windows and electronic panel areas, but also in the automotive industry such interior textiles and hood insulation pad covers. Therefore, this work describes the characterization of a fully sustainable textile: bacterial nanocellulose, functionalized to achieve an impressive flame retardancy

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio