Citizen science in promoting biodiversity

[Resumo] A ciência cidadã é hoje, reconhecidamente, uma das formas emergentes de aproximação da ciência aos cidadãos, mostrando a sua capacidade de contribuir para uma ciência mais participativa e o envolvimento destes nas diversas atividades desenvolvidas, nomeadamente aquelas que se debruçam sobre a educação para a sustentabilidade. Em causa não está apenas o potencial da ciência cidadã como estratégia para uma ação mais participada dos cidadãos, mas, essencialmente, o seu potencial de comprometimento e envolvimento destes nos principais desafios da sociedade atual. A preservação e promoção da biodiversidade é um dos exemplos aqui vertidos e cuja ligação entre aqueles que fazem ciências e os cidadãos é essencial para o cumprimento dos objetivos propostos. No presente caso, apresentam-se como exemplos a criação de uma base de dados de biodiversidade suportado pelo conceito da ciência cidadã e promotor da biodiversidade urbana e um projeto de redução e valorização de resíduos, impulsionador da redução de acumulação de resíduos nas cidades, desenvolvidos pelo Laboratório da Paisgaem de Guimarães. A ciência cidadã pode, por isso, ser uma ferramenta essencial na capacidade que demonstra de envolvimento dos cidadãos comuns, podendo e devendo ser utilizada como um instrumento de motivação da comunidade escolar para o seu envolvimento e responsabilização nomeadamente na proteção e promoção da biodiversidade.[Abstract] Citizen’s science is one of the emerging ways of bringing science closer to citizens, showing its capacity to contribute to a more participatory science and its involvement in several activities developed, namely those that focus on education for sustainability. Citizen’s science has a great potential for the citizen’s engagement and commitment in the main challenges of society. The preservation and promotion of biodiversity is one of the examples which the link between those who make science and the citizens is essential for the achievement of the proposed goals. The creation of a database of biodiversity supported by the concept of citizen science and promoter of urban biodiversity and a project for waste’s reduction and recovery, contributing to the reduction of waste accumulation in cities, are the two examples proposed by the Landscape Laboratory and reported here. Citizen’s science can, therefore, be an essential tool for the engagement of ordinary citizens. It also should be used as a motivating tool for the school community involving them in the protection and promotion of biodiversit

Electrochemistry combined-surface plasmon resonance biosensors: A review

Over the years, most of the literature reported applications of electrochemical and surface plasmon resonance (SPR) immunoassays for biosensing but, so far, the combination of the two methods in the same sensing spot for analytical purposes is much less explored and discussed. The aim of this Review is to highlight the great potential of electrochemistry combined-SPR (eSPR) as analytical tool for screening chemically and biologically relevant (bio)molecules by combining the unique features of SPR integrated with electrochemical readout. In the first part of the Review, we describe the urgent need of innovative methods for screening clinical biological markers (General Introduction), briefly discuss general concepts of SPR and electrochemical sensing (Concepts behind eSPR biosensors) and highlight the hyphenation of two methods to developed combined biosensing systems (Set-up configuration and eSPR principles). Firstly, we briefly give an overview of the setup for implementation of eSPR technique and discuss some relevant experimental conditions to perform the combined optical and electrochemical measurements. Then, the principles and fundamentals of eSPR biosensors are presented and described. We also present representative examples of eSPR biosensors in the literature (Applications of eSPR biosensors). In the second part, we review studies on how combined electrical and plasmonic detection contributed to the biosensing field, in particular, for the successful screening of clinically relevant biomolecules, namely proteins (Detection of proteins), nucleic acids (Detection of nucleic acids), small size chemical species (Detection of small molecules) and cells (Living-cell Analysis). Finally, we discuss the current limitations of eSPR biosensors performance and suggest possible ways to overcome these limitations (Limitations and optimization) and then we explore aspects about the development of the method and its applications and discuss areas of likely future growth (Conclusions and perspectives).This research had the financial support of FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia) and co-financed by the European Union (FEDER funds) under the Partnership Agreement PT2020, Research Grant Pest-C/QUI/UIDB/00081/2020 (CIQUP). J.A. Ribeiro (ref. SFRH/BPD/105395/2014) and C.M. Pereira (ref. SFRH/BSAB/150320/2019) acknowledge FCT under the QREN – POPH – Advanced Training, subsidized by European Union and national MEC funds. The authors acknowledge the research project MyTag (ref. PTDC/EEI-EEE/4832/2021), funded by FCT, for financial support.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A new calculation method for the temperature of the components of composite slabs under fire

Composite steel-concrete slabs are structural elements composed of a profiled steel deck which acts as a permanent formwork to the concrete topping. This layer is commonly reinforced with individual rebars and an anti-crack mesh. The Annex D of the EN 1994-1-2 provides guidelines for the calculation of the temperature of the steel components of composite slabs subjected to the standard fire. However, no revisions were made to these calculation rules during the last years. This paper proposes a new method for the estimation of the temperature of the parts of the steel deck and the rebars as well. The proposed methodology is derived from numerical analyses using a 3-D finite element model, considering perfect thermal contact between the materials.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Endovascular Stent Graft Treatment of an Iatrogenic Symptomatic Extracranial Carotid-Jugular Arteriovenous Fistula

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Electrochemical immunosensor for detection of CA 15-3 biomarker in point-of-care

This work reports the development of a simple and rapid electrochemical immunosensor for the determination of breast cancer biomarker Cancer Antigen 153 (CA153). Disposable and cost-effective chips, consisting of gold screen-printed electrodes (AuSPEs), were used to develop the portable electrochemical devices for monitoring the biomarker in point-of-care (PoC), under clinical context. The biosensor preparation consisted of two simple steps. First, a self-assembled monolayer (SAM) of mercaptosuccinic acid (MSA) was formed at the AuSPE surface. Then, the CA153 antibody was covalently bound to the carboxylic groups standing at the electrode surface using EDC/NHS chemistry. The performance of the developed immunosensor was evaluated by assessing the sensor sensitivity, linear response interval, selectivity and detection limit (LOD). The developed immunosensor provided a wide linear concentration range (from 1.0 to 1000UmL1) and low detection levels were achieved (LOD of 0.95UmL1), enabling the sensitive detection of the cancer biomarker at clinically relevant levels, using square wave voltammetry (SWV) as electroanalytical technique. Moreover, selectivity studies performed against other cancer biomarkers (CA 125 and CA 199) revealed that the antibody has high selectivity for CA15-3 antigen. The immunosensor was applied to the quantification of CA15-3 in artificial serum samples with satisfactory results.This research had the financial support of FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia) and co-financed by the European Union (FEDER funds) under the Partnership Agreement PT2020, Research Grants Pest-C/QUI/UIDB/00081/2020 (CIQUP) and NORTE-01-0247-FEDER-017834 (project RamSERS). J.A. Ribeiro (ref. SFRH/BPD/105395/2014) and C.M. Pereira (ref. SFRH/BSAB/150320/2019) acknowledge FCT under the QREN – POPH – Advanced Training, subsidized by European Union and national MEC funds.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Hypericum perforatum cultures as a tool to study plant defence mechanisms against anthracnose (colletotrichum gloeosporioides)

To elucidate the defence mechanisms of Hypericum perforatum L. against Colletotrichum gloeosporioides, we utilized cell suspension cultures. When primed with methyl jasmonate, H. perforatum cells showed a double oxidative burst upon Colletotrichum gloeosporioides elicitation typical of a hypersensitive response. Phenolic profile of the cells was modified upon various stimuli such as salicylic acid, MeJ and C. gloeosporioides. The possible importance of reactive oxygen species production and phenolics (xanthones) as components of defence mechanism of H. perforatum against biotic stress is discussed.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT

Characterization and strengthening a "ghost" building

In the middle of the eighties it was intended to build a one family dwelling at a North Portuguese Region, but a much bigger edification was constructed, without any design elements. At the end of the nineties this construction was acquired, and another architectonic and functional configuration was designed for this space. Since there were not any elements available for the existent construction, it was carried out several strategies for its geometrical, structural and material characterization. These elements gave the indispensable information for analysing the structural stability of the building, which revealed to be necessary to strengthen foundations, beams and columns. The procedures for characterizing the construction, the structural stability analysis and the strengthening strategies are described in the work

Nanostructured thin coatings from chitosan and an elastin-like recombinamer with acute stimuli-responsive behavior

Publicado em: Materials Science Forum, vols. 730-732; Online available since 2012/Nov/12In the present work, chitosan (CHI) and elastin-like recombinamers (ELRs) were used to conceive nanostructured thin films driven by sequential electrostatic layer-by-layer (LbL), a simple and versatile technique that discards the use of harmful reagents. Two similar ELRs were engineered to contain negatively charged aminoacids and organized and a single monoblock or a triblock. The buildup of the films was monitored in real time using a quartz-crystal microbalance with dissipation monitoring (QCM-D). Wettability transitions were observed from a moderate hydrophobic surface to an extremely wettable upon increasing the temperature to 50 ºC, accompanied by topography changes at the nanoscale as assessed by atomic force microscopy (AFM). Furthermore, the dependence on time for the surface molecular rearrangement was studied for the films with each ELR. The potential of this technology may stimulate the development of devices and biomaterials for biomedical applications in the near future, such as surfaces with tunable and patterned cell adhesion, while the use of ELRs will allow developing polypeptides with biological significance.The authors acknowledge the financial support through Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT, PhD grant SFRH/BD/61126/2009, ‘‘Junta de Castilla y Leon’’ (VA034A09), the MICINN (MAT 2009-14195-C03-03, ACI2009-0890, IT2009-0089, MAT2010-15310, and MAT2010- 15982), the CIBER-BBN and the ‘‘Network Center of Regenerative Medicine and Cellular Therapy of Castilla y León’’.MICINNFundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT)Junta de Castilla y LeónCIBER-BBNNetwork Center of Regenerative Medicine and Cellular Therapy of Castilla y Leó

A miniaturized self-calibrated pyrometer microsystem

paper describes the design, modeling and optimization of a miniaturized self-calibrated pyrometer to detect infrared radiation (in 5-20 µm range of wavelengths) in order to measure the real temperature of objects without contact. The microsystem consists of a thermally insulated absorbing area and two thermopiles with the hot junctions in the absorbing area and the cold junctions on a heat sink (i.e. the silicon bulk). The complete microsystem is in silicon planar technology and each thermopile has a different reference temperature, biased by a Peltier microstructure near to the cold junction of the thermopile. A silicon die passivated with a silicon nitride membrane is the ground floor of all microsystem. The absorbing area, a black gold strip on the silicon nitride membrane is obtained by anisotropic etching of the bulk silicon from the back of the wafer. The pyrometer microsystem is composed by: the IR optical filter on the top, the electronic system built in CMOS technology added by Multi-Chip-Module (MCM) techniques and the pyrometer. Application of a network of pyrometers in textile industry is the final goal.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT