Controls on monthly estuarine residuals: Eulerian circulation and elevation

The Dee Estuary, at the NW English – Welsh border, is a major asset, supporting: one of the largest wildlife habitats in Europe; industrial importance along the Welsh coastline; and residential and recreational usage along the English coast. Understanding of the residual elevation is important to determine the total water levels that inundate intertidal banks, especially during storms. While, improved knowledge of the 3D residual circulation is important in determining particle transport pathways to manage water quality and morphological change. Using mooring data obtained in February – March 2008, a 3D modelling system has been previously validated against in situ salinity, velocity, elevation and wave observations, to investigate the barotropic-baroclinic-wave interaction within this estuary under full realistic forcing. The system consists of a coupled circulation-wave-turbulence model (POLCOMS-WAM-GOTM). Using this modelling system the contribution of different processes and their interactions to the monthly residuals in both elevation and circulation is now assessed. By studying a tidally-dominated estuary under wave influence, it is found that baroclinicity induced by a weak river flow has greater importance in generating a residual circulation than the waves, even at the estuary mouth. Although the monthly residual circulation is dominated by tidal and baroclinic processes; the residual estuarine surface elevation is primarily influenced by the seasonal external forcing to the region, with secondary influence from the local wind conditions. During storm conditions 3D radiation stress becomes important for both elevation and circulation at the event scale, but is found here to have little impact over monthly time scales

Cross-cultural adaptation of the Female Sexual Function Index

Ainda hoje pouco se conhece sobre a epidemiologia das disfunções sexuais femininas. O Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI) [Índice de Função Sexual Feminina] é um questionário breve, que pode ser auto-aplicado, e que se propõe avaliar a resposta sexual feminina. Este estudo teve por objetivo avaliar a adaptação transcultural da versão em português do FSFI. O processo envolveu cinco etapas: tradução, versão, apreciação formal de equivalência, revisão crítica por especialistas em sexualidade e pré-teste do instrumento. Após a identificação de problemas semânticos, concordâncias e discordâncias, foi possível propor uma versão sintética, escolhendo e incorporando itens de uma das duas versões em português. Algumas mudanças foram realizadas após o pré-teste do questionário, para tornar a versão em português mais coloquial e aceitável para a população-alvo ao utilizar termos mais corriqueiros, como opção ou complemento à linguagem científica. Ao se comparar mais de uma versão do instrumento, no processo de equivalência transcultural, foi possível detectar problemas e dificuldades na adaptação da linguagem que poderiam ter passado despercebidos, caso não se observassem todas as fases do processo.The epidemiology of female sexual dysfunctions is still not well known. The Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI) is a short questionnaire specially designed to assess female sexual response. This study aimed to evaluate the cross-cultural equivalence of the Portuguese version of the FSFI. The cross-cultural adaptation involved five steps: translation, back-translation, formal equivalence assessment, review by specialists in sexuality, and pre-testing. After identification of semantic problems, agreements, and disagreements, a brief version was proposed, selecting and incorporating items from one of the two Portuguese versions. Some changes were made after pre-testing the questionnaire, most of which to make the Portuguese version more readily comprehensible and acceptable for the target population, using ordinary words as options or to complement the scientific language. Comparing more than one version of the instrument in the process of cross-cultural equivalence allowed detecting problems and difficulties in adapting the language, which would not have been observed otherwise

Biosorption of BF-4B Reactive Red Dye by using Leaves of Macrophytes Eichhornia crassipes

The removal potential on BF-4B reactive red dye by Eichhornia crassipes dried leaves has been investigated. Furthermore, the influence of process parameters such as solution pH, agitation, and particle size on the dye adsorption efficiency was assessed. Both kinetic and equilibrium experiments were performed in batch operation of the system. Kinetic results demonstrated that the equilibrium state was achieved after 45 min process time. The kinetic experimental data were best described by applying a pseudo-second order model that evaluated the value of rate constant 0.22 g/mg/min and an equilibrium dye concentration 8.20 mg/g. A set of isotherm models, taken from knowledge database, was tested in order to represent the equilibrium adsorption data. The Langmuir model performed the best when fitting experimental data where the maximum adsorption capacity of 20.38 mg/g was achieved. The results demonstrated that the E. crassipes has good potential to be used as a biosorbent in industrial treatment systems to remove reactive dyes from textile effluents

Exact parallel alignment of megabase genomic sequences with tunable work distribution

Sequence Alignment is a basic operation in Bioinformatics that is performed thousands of times, on daily basis. The exact methods for pairwise alignment have quadratic time complexity. For this reason, heuristic methods such as BLAST are widely used. To obtain exact results faster, parallel strategies have been proposed but most of them fail to align huge biological sequences. This happens because not only the quadratic time must be considered but also the space should be reduced. In this paper, we evaluate the performance of Z-align, a parallel exact strategy that runs in user-restricted memory space. Also, we propose and evaluate a tunable work distribution mechanism. The results obtained in two clusters show that two sequences of size 24MBP (Mega Base Pairs) and 23MBP, respectively, were successfully aligned with Z-align. Also, in order to align two 3MBP sequences, a speedup of 34.35 was achieved for 64 processors. The evaluation of our work distribution mechanism shows that the execution times can be sensibly reduced when appropriate parameters are chosen. Finally, when comparing Z-align with BLAST, it is clear that, in many cases, Z-align is able to produce alignments with higher score

In the Era of Computers, Internet and Multimedia, are we still Teaching Composers to become Chapel-Masters?

The ongoing paradigm shift from traditional methods of teaching music composition towards new approaches based on computer technology for sound production is the main focus of the article. The paper reviews the evolution of teaching methods throughout the Classical, Romantic and Modern periods, demonstrating how certain standard practices from former ages, based on the professional profile of the Chapel-Master, become theoretical golden principles for subsequent periods. After the French Revolution the traditional method of individual practical exchange between master and disciple was upgraded at the Conservatory. Classes for groups of students required a new approach based on theory abstraction. Although none of these teaching methods have been abandoned up today, a new paradigm appears when the tools of computer technology became widespread. An unpredictable equilibrium between the traditional methods and the new techniques of computer-assisted or computer-generated music composition tends to emerge

In the Era of Computers, Internet and Multimedia, are we still Teaching Composers to become Chapel-Masters?

The ongoing paradigm shift from traditional methods of teaching music composition towards new approaches based on computer technology for sound production is the main focus of the article. The paper reviews the evolution of teaching methods throughout the Classical, Romantic and Modern periods, demonstrating how certain standard practices from former ages, based on the professional profile of the Chapel-Master, become theoretical golden principles for subsequent periods. After the French Revolution the traditional method of individual practical exchange between master and disciple was upgraded at the Conservatory. Classes for groups of students required a new approach based on theory abstraction. Although none of these teaching methods have been abandoned up today, a new paradigm appears when the tools of computer technology became widespread. An unpredictable equilibrium between the traditional methods and the new techniques of computer-assisted or computer-generated music composition tends to emerge

Hibridismo, Consistência e Processos de Significação na Música Modernista de Villa-Lobos

A análise do Rudepoema, peça chave na produção de Villa-Lobos, demonstra sua técnica no uso de coleções simétricas no contexto pós-tonal, seguindo o caminho aberto por Debussy e Stravinsky. Suas conquistas podem ser comparadas às de Bartók na Hungria no que diz respeito à utilização do folclore brasileiro na linguagem modernista. Todavia a dissecação dos materiais revela um uso intensivo e inesperado de transformações motívicas e temáticas que se prestam à unificação da estrutura em blocos predominante. Deste processo de integração resulta uma forma híbrida de grande envergadura que sintetiza as funções formais da forma sonata com o caráter seccional dos conjuntos de variações. Este tropo de formas pode ser chamado de sonata-variações. Villa-Lobos também recupera a alternância de significações tópicas, característica do período clássico, para conseguir um processo de desenvolvimento da forma e, ao mesmo tempo, sugerir interpretações de exotismo do almejado público parisiense. Colorindo o discurso com tópicas contrastantes, Villa-Lobos nos permite correlacionar os materiais aos sentidos de “civilizado” e “selvagem”, uma oposição entre dois campos tópicos que representava um tema favorito das culturas francesa e brasileira daquele período

The embryo splitting as an alternative to improve gestation indices from embryo transfer in horses

A transferência de embriões (TE) já vem sendo utilizada em eqüinos há pelo menos duas décadas, sempre a partir de ovulação simples. Para aumentar a eficiência reprodutiva, este estudo avaliou a bipartição embrionária como uma alternativa para melhorar os índices de gestação na transferência de embriões em eqüinos. Foram utilizadas 21 éguas de diferentes padrões raciais, com idade variando entre 4 e 15 anos de idade, pesando entre 270 a 480kg. A partir da identificação do cio (rufiação), os animais foram monitorados através de exames ultra-sonográficos trans-retais até o momento da ovulação, sendo as receptoras, uma vez ao dia e as doadoras três vezes ao dia. As receptoras utilizadas ovularam um dia antes ou até três dias depois das doadoras. As doadoras foram coletadas entre 144 e 156 horas após a ovulação (D0). Foram recuperados 20 embriões (mórulas) em 29 coletas (68,96%), sendo que 10 embriões foram transferidos inteiros (T1), e 10 embriões foram bipartidos (T2), originando 20 hemi-embriões e transferidos para 20 receptoras. Não houve diferença na taxa de prenhez entre os grupos, T1, 70% (7/10), e T2, 50% (10/20) (P>0,05). Em relação ao número inicial de embriões em cada grupo (10), houve diferença na taxa de prenhez entre os grupos, T1, 70% (7/10) e T2, 100% (10/10) (P0.05). Looking at the original number of embryos, there was a significant difference in pregnancy rate (70% vs 100% for T1 and T2 respectively P<0.05). These results show the possibility of increasing the number of gestations using embryo splitting and transfer in horses per embryo collected. This technique may improve pregnancy indices for ET in horses

Morphological Description of Selected Pigeonpea (\u3ci\u3eCajanus cajan\u3c/i\u3e (L.) Millsp.) Lines

Seventeen pigeonpea pure line accessions selected for desirable forage traits and three commercial cultivars were described according to morphological characters. The following descriptors were used: growth habit, plant height, number of primary and secondary branches, stem color and thickness, leaf shape and hairiness, flower base and second color, pattern of flower streaks, flowering pattern, immature and mature pod color, pod form and hairiness, seed color pattern, base and second seed color, seed eye (region around hilum) color and seed shape and width. Each individual line and cultivar was satisfactorily distinguished from the others by the chosen characters

Consistency analysis of a nonbirefringent Lorentz-violating planar model

In this work analyze the physical consistency of a nonbirefringent Lorentz-violating planar model via the analysis of the pole structure of its Feynman propagators. The nonbirefringent planar model, obtained from the dimensional reduction of the CPT-even gauge sector of the standard model extension, is composed of a gauge and a scalar fields, being affected by Lorentz-violating (LIV) coefficients encoded in the symmetric tensor $\kappa_{\mu\nu}$. The propagator of the gauge field is explicitly evaluated and expressed in terms of linear independent symmetric tensors, presenting only one physical mode. The same holds for the scalar propagator. A consistency analysis is performed based on the poles of the propagators. The isotropic parity-even sector is stable, causal and unitary mode for $0\leq\kappa_{00}<1$. On the other hand, the anisotropic sector is stable and unitary but in general noncausal. Finally, it is shown that this planar model interacting with a $\lambda|\varphi|^{4}-$Higgs field supports compactlike vortex configurations.Comment: 11 pages, revtex style, final revised versio