Synthesis of Bis(3-indolyl)methanes Mediated by Potassium tert-Butoxide

The authors thank the Fundação para a Ciênciae Tecnologia for the fellowship PD/BD/142876/2018.This work was supported by the Associate Laboratory for Green Chemistry– LAQV which is financed by national funds from FCT/MCTESUIDB/50006/2020,UIDP/50006/2020(LAQV).The National NMR Facility is supported by FCT,ROTEIRO/0031/2013-PINFRA/22161/2016,co-financed by FEDER through COMPETE2020,POCI,andPORLandFCT through PIDDAC)and CERMAX(022162).LBM also thanks to FCT/MCTES for the CEEC-Individual Program Contract(CEECIND/03810/2017)The indole moiety is an important N-heterocycle found in natural products, and a key structural component of many value-added chemicals including pharmaceuticals. In particular, bis(3-indolyl)methanes (BIMs) are an important subgroup of indoles, composed of two indole units. Herein, we report the development of a simple method to access BIMs derivatives in yields of up to 77 % by exploiting a tBuOK-mediated coupling reaction of indoles and benzyl alcohols.publishersversionpublishe

description of the methodological approach

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Mood Modulates Auditory Laterality of Hemodynamic Mismatch Responses during Dichotic Listening

Hemodynamic mismatch responses can be elicited by deviant stimuli in a sequence of standard stimuli even during cognitive demanding tasks. Emotional context is known to modulate lateralized processing. Right-hemispheric negative emotion processing may bias attention to the right and enhance processing of right-ear stimuli. The present study examined the influence of induced mood on lateralized pre-attentive auditory processing of dichotic stimuli using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Faces expressing emotions (sad/happy/neutral) were presented in a blocked design while a dichotic oddball sequence with consonant-vowel (CV) syllables in an event-related design was simultaneously administered. Twenty healthy participants were instructed to feel the emotion perceived on the images and to ignore the syllables. Deviant sounds reliably activated bilateral auditory cortices and confirmed attention effects by modulation of visual activity. Sad mood induction activated visual, limbic and right prefrontal areas. A lateralization effect of emotion-attention interaction was reflected in a stronger response to right-ear deviants in the right auditory cortex during sad mood. This imbalance of resources may be a neurophysiological correlate of laterality in sad mood and depression. Conceivably, the compensatory right-hemispheric enhancement of resources elicits increased ipsilateral processing

The national inventory of geological heritage: methodological approach and results

A existência de um inventário nacional de património geológico é fundamental para se poderem implementar estratégias de geoconservação. Este trabalho apresenta a metodologia usada no desenvolvimento do mais completo inventário de geossítios, realizado até ao momento em Portugal, assim como os principais resultados obtidos. O inventário vai integrar o Sistema de Informação do Património Natural e o Cadastro Nacional dos Valores Naturais Classificados, ambos geridos pelo Instituto de Conservação da Natureza e da Biodiversidade.The existence of a national inventory of the geological heritage is of paramount importance for the implementation of a geoconservation strategy. This paper presents the methodological approach used to produce the most complete geosites inventory in Portugal, so far, and the obtained results. This inventory will be uploaded into the National Database of Natural Heritage managed by the Portuguese authority for nature conservation.Este trabalho é apoiado pela Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, através do financiamento plurianual do CGUP e do projecto de investigação “Identificação, caracterização e conservação do património geológico: uma estratégia de geoconservação para Portugal” (PTDC/CTE-GEX/64966/2006).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Shared Pattern of Endocranial Shape Asymmetries among Great Apes, Anatomically Modern Humans, and Fossil Hominins

Anatomical asymmetries of the human brain are a topic of major interest because of their link with handedness and cognitive functions. Their emergence and occurrence have been extensively explored in human fossil records to document the evolution of brain capacities and behaviour. We quantified for the first time antero-posterior endocranial shape asymmetries in large samples of great apes, modern humans and fossil hominins through analysis of “virtual” 3D models of skull and endocranial cavity and we statistically test for departures from symmetry. Once based on continuous variables, we show that the analysis of these brain asymmetries gives original results that build upon previous analysis based on discrete traits. In particular, it emerges that the degree of petalial asymmetries differs between great apes and hominins without modification of their pattern. We indeed demonstrate the presence of shape asymmetries in great apes, with a pattern similar to modern humans but with a lower variation and a lower degree of fluctuating asymmetry. More importantly, variations in the position of the frontal and occipital poles on the right and left hemispheres would be expected to show some degree of antisymmetry when population distribution is considered, but the observed pattern of variation among the samples is related to fluctuating asymmetry for most of the components of the petalias. Moreover, the presence of a common pattern of significant directional asymmetry for two components of the petalias in hominids implicates that the observed traits were probably inherited from the last common ancestor of extant African great apes and Homo sapiens

Human toxocariasis: contribution by Brazilian researchers

In the present paper the main aspects of the natural history of human infection by Toxocara larvae that occasionally result in the occurrence of visceral and/or ocular larva migrans syndrome were reviewed. The contribution by Brazilian researchers was emphasized, especially the staff of the Tropical Medicine Institute of São Paulo (IMT)

SARS-CoV-2 introductions and early dynamics of the epidemic in Portugal

Genomic surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 in Portugal was rapidly implemented by the National Institute of Health in the early stages of the COVID-19 epidemic, in collaboration with more than 50 laboratories distributed nationwide. Methods By applying recent phylodynamic models that allow integration of individual-based travel history, we reconstructed and characterized the spatio-temporal dynamics of SARSCoV-2 introductions and early dissemination in Portugal. Results We detected at least 277 independent SARS-CoV-2 introductions, mostly from European countries (namely the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Italy, and Switzerland), which were consistent with the countries with the highest connectivity with Portugal. Although most introductions were estimated to have occurred during early March 2020, it is likely that SARS-CoV-2 was silently circulating in Portugal throughout February, before the first cases were confirmed. Conclusions Here we conclude that the earlier implementation of measures could have minimized the number of introductions and subsequent virus expansion in Portugal. This study lays the foundation for genomic epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 in Portugal, and highlights the need for systematic and geographically-representative genomic surveillance.We gratefully acknowledge to Sara Hill and Nuno Faria (University of Oxford) and Joshua Quick and Nick Loman (University of Birmingham) for kindly providing us with the initial sets of Artic Network primers for NGS; Rafael Mamede (MRamirez team, IMM, Lisbon) for developing and sharing a bioinformatics script for sequence curation (https://github.com/rfm-targa/BioinfUtils); Philippe Lemey (KU Leuven) for providing guidance on the implementation of the phylodynamic models; Joshua L. Cherry (National Center for Biotechnology Information, National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health) for providing guidance with the subsampling strategies; and all authors, originating and submitting laboratories who have contributed genome data on GISAID (https://www.gisaid.org/) on which part of this research is based. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not reflect the view of the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Health and Human Services, or the United States government. This study is co-funded by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia and Agência de Investigação Clínica e Inovação Biomédica (234_596874175) on behalf of the Research 4 COVID-19 call. Some infrastructural resources used in this study come from the GenomePT project (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-022184), supported by COMPETE 2020 - Operational Programme for Competitiveness and Internationalisation (POCI), Lisboa Portugal Regional Operational Programme (Lisboa2020), Algarve Portugal Regional Operational Programme (CRESC Algarve2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), and by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio