Nuno Portas and the Spanish influence on the definition of housing policies in Portugal in the period of democratic transition

Taking the housing crisis and the SAAL program as a central interest point of architects and sociologists in the aftermath of the Portuguese revolution, this chapter tracks the influence of Spanish architecture in Portugal and the relations of Portuguese and Spanish architects, signaling the main role of Nuno Portas. It begins by introducing the background of the architecture exchange between Portugal and Spain, since the 1960’s, through the diffusion and interchange activities of Nuno Portas (section 2). It continues to discuss the role of architects on urban change during the revolutionary process from the viewpoint Joan Antonio Solans experiences and writings (Section 3). Then it takes on the social movements debate with Manuel Castells reflections and writings about the new housing policies and experiences (Section 4). Finally, a short reflection on the interchange of ideas and experiences between Portugal and Spain in presented in the conclusion (Section 5).info:eu-repo/semantics/submittedVersio

Black hole entropy, flat directions and higher derivatives

Higher order derivative corrections to the Einstein--Maxwell action are considered and an explicit form is found for the corrections to the entropy of extremal black holes. We speculate on the properties of these corrections from the point of view of small black holes and in the case when the classical black hole potential exhibits flat directions. A particular attention is paid to the issue of stability of several solutions, including large and small black holes by using properties of the Hessian matrix of the effective black hole potential. This is done by using a model independent expression for such matrix derived within the entropy function formalism.Comment: 21 pages, PACS numbers: 04.50.Gh, 04.70.Dy, 04.65.+

Differential mesenteric fat deposition in bovines fed on silage or concentrate is independent of glycerol membrane permeability

© The Animal Consortium 2011In the meat industry, the manipulation of fat deposition in cattle is of pivotal importance to improve production efficiency, carcass composition and ultimately meat quality. There is an increasing interest in the identification of key factors and molecular mechanisms responsible for the development of specific fat depots. This study aimed at elucidating the influence of breed and diet on adipose tissue membrane permeability and fluidity and their interplay on fat deposition in bovines. Two Portuguese autochthonous breeds, Alentejana and Barrosã, recognized as late- and early-maturing breeds, respectively, were chosen to examine the effects of breed and diet on fat deposition and on adipose membrane composition and permeability. Twenty-four male bovines from these breeds were fed on silage-based or concentrate-based diets for 11 months. Animals were slaughtered to determine their live slaughter and hot carcass weights, as well as weights of subcutaneous and visceral adipose depots. Mesenteric fat depots were excised and used to isolate adipocyte membrane vesicles where cholesterol content, fatty acid profile as well as permeability and fluidity were determined. Total accumulation of neither subcutaneous nor visceral fat was influenced by breed. In contrast, mesenteric and omental fat depots weights were higher in concentrate-fed bulls relative to silage-fed animals. Membrane fluidity and permeability to water and glycerol in mesenteric adipose tissue were found to be independent of breed and diet. Moreover, the deposition of cholesterol and unsaturated fatty acids, which may influence membrane properties, were unchanged among experimental groups. Adipose membrane lipids from the mesenteric fat depot of ruminants were rich in saturated fatty acids, and unaffected by polyunsaturated fatty acids dietary levels. Our results provide evidence against the involvement of cellular membrane permeability to glycerol on fat accumulation in mesenteric fat tissue of concentrate-fed bovines, which is consistent with the unchanged membrane lipid profile found among experimental groups.This study was supported by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) through grant PTDC/CVT/2006/66114 and individual fellowships to Ana P. Martins (SFRH/BD/2009/65046), Ana S. H. Costa (SFRH/BD/2009/61068) and Susana V. Martins (SFRH/BPD/2009/63019). Paula A. Lopes is a researcher from the program ‘‘Ciência 2008’’ from FC

Eigenfunctions of the Laplacian and associated Ruelle operator

Let $\Gamma$ be a co-compact Fuchsian group of isometries on the Poincar\'e disk \DD and $\Delta$ the corresponding hyperbolic Laplace operator. Any smooth eigenfunction $f$ of $\Delta$, equivariant by $\Gamma$ with real eigenvalue $\lambda=-s(1-s)$, where $s={1/2}+ it$, admits an integral representation by a distribution \dd_{f,s} (the Helgason distribution) which is equivariant by $\Gamma$ and supported at infinity \partial\DD=\SS^1. The geodesic flow on the compact surface \DD/\Gamma is conjugate to a suspension over a natural extension of a piecewise analytic map T:\SS^1\to\SS^1, the so-called Bowen-Series transformation. Let $\ll_s$ be the complex Ruelle transfer operator associated to the jacobian $-s\ln |T'|$. M. Pollicott showed that \dd_{f,s} is an eigenfunction of the dual operator $\ll_s^*$ for the eigenvalue 1. Here we show the existence of a (nonzero) piecewise real analytic eigenfunction $\psi_{f,s}$ of $\ll_s$ for the eigenvalue 1, given by an integral formula \psi_{f,s} (\xi)=\int \frac{J(\xi,\eta)}{|\xi-\eta|^{2s}} \dd_{f,s} (d\eta), \noindent where $J(\xi,\eta)$ is a $\{0,1\}$-valued piecewise constant function whose definition depends upon the geometry of the Dirichlet fundamental domain representing the surface \DD/\Gamma

Income inequality and technological adoption

We relate technological adoption (of different technologies) with income inequality. We discovered that some technologies such as aviation, cell phones, electric production, internet, telephone, and TV are skill-complementary in raising inequality. We constructed standardized indexes of skill-complementary technological adoption for modern Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), older ICT, production and transport technologies. We found strong evidence that older ICT and transport technologies (and less frequently modern ICT) tend to increase inequality. Additionally, we discovered that results are much stronger in rich countries than in poor ones. Our results are quite robust to a series of changes in specifications, estimators, samples, and measurement of technology adoption. These results may bring insights to the design of incentive-schemes for technology adoption

Urban planning policies to the renewal of riverfront areas: The Lisbon metropolis case

Urban planning offers various design possibilities to solve fundamental challenges faced in urban areas. These include the need to physically renew old industrial and harbour riverside areas into liveable, inclusive and sustainable living spaces. This paper investigates the way urban planning policies have helped to renew the waterfront areas in the Lisbon metropolis in the past decades. For this purpose, the contribution of the European Union (EU) and national urban development plans over the past decades are analysed. The results demonstrate an intense renewal of the waterfront areas in the Lisbon metropolitan area (LMA), particularly in Lisbon over the past three decades into leisure, ecologic and touristic areas, vis-à-vis the previous industrial and harbour vocationinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Vanishing Viscosity Limits and Boundary Layers for Circularly Symmetric 2D Flows

We continue the work of Lopes Filho, Mazzucato and Nussenzveig Lopes [LMN], on the vanishing viscosity limit of circularly symmetric viscous flow in a disk with rotating boundary, shown there to converge to the inviscid limit in $L^2$-norm as long as the prescribed angular velocity $\alpha(t)$ of the boundary has bounded total variation. Here we establish convergence in stronger $L^2$ and $L^p$-Sobolev spaces, allow for more singular angular velocities $\alpha$, and address the issue of analyzing the behavior of the boundary layer. This includes an analysis of concentration of vorticity in the vanishing viscosity limit. We also consider such flows on an annulus, whose two boundary components rotate independently. [LMN] Lopes Filho, M. C., Mazzucato, A. L. and Nussenzveig Lopes, H. J., Vanishing viscosity limit for incompressible flow inside a rotating circle, preprint 2006