Impact Assessment and Recommendations: Making Sense H2020 CAPS Project

The aim of this report is to address the impact of Making Sense, considering not only citizens and communities involved on the ground level, but also the organizations behind it. We chose to aggregate, summarize and break down our review into five dimensions, adopting a STEEP model and looking into sub-topics inside each of them: Social (Values, representations and practices; Community extension effects; Collective events as awareness raising; Internal communication; Inclusion and fairness; Exchanges and synergies with other organisations), Technoscientific (Open hardware, software and other open tools; Training and education; Materials and tools for local communities; Technical and scientific outputs; Open source platforms), Economic (New entrepreneurial initiatives; Alternative relationships with economic assets; Job creation; Direct exploitation and transfer), Environmental (Igniting environmental changes; Reducing environmental harm; Collective measuring and calibration events; Networking effects; Sustainability plan), Policy (New ways and channels of participation; Communities capacity to impact policy decisions; Organisational influence in political or power dynamics). Through our strategies to measure and assess impact we were able to conclude that Making Sense impact goals were clearly fulfilled, recalling its main intended impacts established at the beginning, first divided in societal objectives: “Make visible and tangible the invisible”, “Understand their environment”, “Turn data and insight into compelling stories & action”, “Using public networks of low cost, open source sensors”, and second into desired results: “Better informed, more engaged citizens”, “Impactful dialogues between citizens and governments”, “More data, more insight, better policies”, “More enjoyable, social, inclusive, healthy & livable cities”.JRC.I.2-Foresight, Behavioural Insights and Design for Polic

#Blockchain4EU: Blockchain for Industrial Transformations

The project #Blockchain4EU is a forward looking exploration of existing, emerging and potential applications based on Blockchain and other DLTs for industrial / non-financial sectors. It combined Science and Technology Studies with a transdisciplinary policy lab toolbox filled with frameworks from Foresight and Horizon Scanning, Behavioural Insights, or Participatory, Critical and Speculative Design. Amid unfolding and uncertain developments of the Blockchain space, our research signals a number of crucial opportunities and challenges around a technology that could record, secure and transfer any digitised transaction or process, and thus potentially affect large parts of current industrial landscapes. This report offers key insights for its implementation and uptake by industry, businesses and SMEs, together with science for policy strategic recommendations.JRC.I.2-Foresight, Behavioural Insights and Design for Polic

(Re)construção de Percursos Formativos ao Longo da Vida: O caso dos Cursos de Educação e Formação de Adultos (EFA)

Os Cursos de Educação e Formação de Adultos (adiante designados Cursos EFA), assumeme como uma das respostas formativas e de qualificação disponíveis no sistema de educação e dequalificação em Portugal. Desde a sua criação, até à data, ocorreram alterações várias, sob oponto de vista legal, metodológico e pedagógico. Procurou-se efectuar uma breve descrição daoferta EFA, apontando-se duas dimensões: (i) a sua génese e evolução; (ii) as especificidades doeu modelo de formação/ estrutura curricular, relacionando essas dimensões com a importância doprincípio de Aprendizagem ao Longo da Vida (ALV). Como palavras-chave destaque paraeducação e formação de adultos e aprendizagem ao longo da vida

Brain interference: Revisiting the role of IFNγ in the central nervous system

Interferon gamma (IFN-gamma) is a pro-inflammatory cytokine, first described as a secreted molecule capable of interfering with viral replication. Since then, numerous other important actions in the context of the immune response to invading pathogens (including those invading the brain) have been ascribed to this pleiotropic cytokine. Nevertheless, the precise role of IFN gamma in neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders, and its possible contribution to the regulation of normal brain function, remains enigmatic. This review integrates and considers current knowledge about IFN gamma actions with accumulating evidence of its importance on neurocytogenesis, synaptic plasticity and neurodegeneration within the framework of brain health and disease.Portuguese Science Foundation (FCT) for providing fellowships to S. Monteiro (SFRH/BD/69311/2010) and S. Roque (SFRH/BPD/72710/2011). Work by the authors was co-funded by Programa Operacional Regional do Norte (ON.2 – O Novo Norte), Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional (QREN), through the Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER), the “Programa Operacional Regional do Norte (ON.2 SR&TD Integrated Program – NORTE-07-0124-FEDER-000021), Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional (QREN), através do Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER)”, and by national funds from the FCT (PEst-C/SAU/LA0026/2013), and “Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER), através do COMPETE (FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-037298)”info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Parameters of thyroid function throughout and after pregnancy in an iodine-deficient population

BACKGROUND: The thyroid hormone milieu is of crucial importance for the developing fetus. Pregnancy induces physiological changes in thyroid homeostasis that are influenced by the iodine status. However, longitudinal studies addressing thyroid function during pregnancy and after delivery are still lacking in mild-to-moderate iodine-deficient populations. Here we characterize the serum parameters of thyroid function throughout pregnancy, and until 1 year after delivery, in a population of pregnant women whom we have previously reported to be iodine deficient (median urinary iodine levels below 75 microg/L). METHODS: One hundred eighteen pregnant women were studied. Clinical data were recorded and serum was collected. Serum total and free thyroxine (T(4)) and triiodothyronine (T(3)), thyroid-stimulating hormone, thyroxine-binding globulin, and thyroglobulin were measured. RESULTS: Mean total T(4) ranged from 159 at the start of gestation to 127 nmol/L at 1 year after delivery, free T(4) from 14.2 to 17.8 pmol/L, total T(3) from 2.4 to 2.1 nmol/L, free T(3) from 6.7 pmol/L to 6.4 pmol/L, thyroid-stimulating hormone from 1.2 to 1.4 mIU/L, T(4)-binding globulin from 62.0 to 26.9 mg/L, and thyroglobulin from 11 to 10 microg/L. CONCLUSION: The pregnant women in this study had an absence of the usual free T(4) spike and a smaller than expected increment in total T(4), described during pregnancy in iodine-sufficient populations. A greater number of women had subclinical hypothyroidism compared with iodine-sufficient populations. This hormonal profile, most likely due to iodine insufficiency, may result in inadequate thyroid hormone supply to the developing fetus. We conclude that care should be taken when reviewing the results of thyroid hormone tests in iodine-insufficient populations and when no gestation-specific reference values have been established. In addition, we recommend iodine supplementation in our population and populations with similar iodine status, particularly during pregnancy and lactation.The contributions of the authors were as follows: M.J.C., S. A., S. R., J.A.P., and G. M. E. planned and conducted the research, discussed the data, and drafted the manuscript. P.O. conducted the statistical analysis together with the other authors. J.A.P. is the principal investigator of the project that funded this research. This study was supported by the Portuguese Science Foundation (FCT)-European Fund of Regional Development (FEDER) grant POCTI_PSI_60948_2004 and by the Integrated Actions for Exchange of Scientists "Portugal-Spain E-84/2006.

The role of proteomics in progressing insights into plant secondary metabolism

The development of omics has enabled the genome-wide exploration of all kinds of biological processes at the molecular level. Almost every field of plant biology has been analyzed at the genomic, transcriptomic and proteomic level. Here we focus on the particular contribution that proteomic technologies have made in progressing knowledge and characterising plant secondary metabolism (SM) pathways since early expectations were created 15 years ago. We analyzed how three major issues in the proteomic analysis of plant SM have been implemented in various research studies. These issues are: (i) the selection of a suitable plant material rich in secondary metabolites of interest, such as specialized tissues and organs, and in vitro cell cultures; (ii) the proteomic strategy to access target proteins, either a comprehensive or a differential analysis; (iii) the proteomic approach, represented by the hypothesis-free discovery proteomics and the hypothesis-driven targeted proteomics. We also examine to what extent the most-advanced technologies have been incorporated into proteomic research in plant SM and highlight some cutting edge techniques that would strongly benefit the progress made in this field.This work has been supported by grants from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (BIO2011-29856-C02-02; BIO2014-51861-R), European Funds for Regional Development (FEDER) and Conselleria d’Educacio, Cultura i Sport de la Generalitat Valenciana (FPA/2013/A/074). JM-C acknowledges a postdoctoral and research grants from SENESCYT GOVERNMENT OF ECUADOR (006-IECE-SMG5-GPLR-2012 and Programa1_Senescyt_2014) and a grant from UTEQ (UTEQ-Ambiental-9-FCAmb-IFOR-2014-FOCICYT002)

A Dige proteomic analysis of weat flag lea treated with terra-sorb foliar, a free amino acid high content biostimulator

Comunicaciones a congreso

Top-down and bottom-up quantitative proteomic approaches to characteriza the development of grape berry tissues

Comunicaciones a congreso

Co-Designing Participatory Approaches for Communities: Making Sense H2020 CAPS Project

This report is focused on the main outputs of a co-design and generative tools workshop with partners and key players from the Making Sense communities, in which the main results were targeted for use “on the ground” with collective ownership by those who would benefit the most from them. It is an enriched textual and visual summary of the workshop, its methods and main exercises, aiming at producing flexible and encompassing participatory framework for urban citizen sensing. The document is structured as follows: Section 1) Co-Creation and Participation in Community Engagement describes the main purposes, key activities and outcomes of the co-design and generative tools workshop; Section 2) Open Shared Framework to Build and Sustain Communities describes the framework that emerged in the final session of the workshop, while also drawing from presentations and exchanges that took place throughout the two days; Section 3) Proposing a Minimally Viable Open Manifesto for Making Sense puts forward a set of principles or guidelines as recommendations for conducting a participatory approach within community engagement contexts for collective environmental monitoring.JRC.I.2-Foresight, Behavioural Insights and Design for Polic