Diversity in the maps of a Lisbon neighbourhood: community and ‘official’ discourses about the renewed Mouraria

The neighbourhood of Mouraria in the center of Lisbon is today home to three main groups of residents: traditional residents, new gentrifiers, and immigrants. This diversity is simultaneously a strength of and a threat to its social cohesion and its current urban rehabilitation process, undertaken by the City Council of Lisbon (CCL). This study has three main goals: 1) to analyze how the ‘community identity’ maps of the neighbourhood are constructed by residents’ discourse; 2) to analyze how the ‘official’ cultural map of the neighbourhood is constructed in the discourses of the press and the CCL; and 3) to compare the ‘official’ and the ‘community’ maps. In drafting the ‘community’ maps, 22 interviews were conducted with traditional residents (14), new gentrifiers (6), and immigrants (2). The ‘official’ cultural map was re-constructed through a press analysis (four articles from two reference newspapers: Público, 2014; Expresso, 2013) and an in-depth interview with the coordinator of the CCL office in Mouraria. Findings show that the rehabilitation program is represented in the ‘official’ discourse in a more positive way than in residents’ discourses. The main divergence concerns the targets of the intervention. However, in both discourses there is agreement regarding the social problems of Mouraria. The stories of the past told by traditional residents, although mentioning the loss of the traditional character of Mouraria, show the importance of public spaces for place attachment and place identity. The discourses of new residents highlight the role of places in building connections between past and present, and in helping maintain a sense of continuity. We discuss the importance of community identity mapping in understanding the ‘battle of ideas’ around urban rehabilitation and the impact that different perspectives can have. The study can be a source of information for decision-makers, helping strengthen the communication bridge between them and the community.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Transcriptome of the deep-sea black scabbardfish, Aphanopus carbo (Perciformes: Trichiuridae) : tissue-specific expression patterns and candidate genes associated to depth adaptation

Deep-sea fishes provide a unique opportunity to study the physiology and evolutionary adaptation to extreme environments. We carried out a high throughput sequencing analysis on a 454 GS-FLX titanium plate using unnormalized cDNA libraries from six tissues of A. carbo. Assemblage and annotations were performed by Newbler and InterPro/Pfam analyses, respectively. The assembly of 544,491 high quality reads provided 8,319 contigs, 55.6% of which retrieved blast hits against the NCBI nonredundant database or were annotated with ESTscan. Comparison of functional genes at both the protein sequences and protein stability levels, associated with adaptations to depth, revealed similarities between A. carbo and other bathypelagic fishes. A selection of putative genes was standardized to evaluate the correlation between number of contigs and their normalized expression, as determined by qPCR amplification. The screening of the libraries contributed to the identification of new EST simple-sequence repeats (SSRs) and to the design of primer pairs suitable for population genetic studies as well as for tagging and mapping of genes. The characterization of the deep-sea fish A. carbo first transcriptome is expected to provide abundant resources for genetic, evolutionary, and ecological studies of this species and the basis for further investigation of depth-related adaptation processes in fishes.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

The issue of outwelling in the Guadiana River estuary (Portugal): some findings and research suggestions in the context of recent evidence

Abstract The ‘‘Outwelling Theory’’ states that salt marshes play a major role in exporting production to adjacent estuarine and coastal ecosystems. However, it has been found that some marshes act as net importers instead of net exporters of organic matter and nutrients. Once we include mangroves and refine the analysis to comprehend bacterioplankton, organic and stable isotope tracers, the picture became, more complex, making room for a revival of the outwelling idea. The exchanges between the Castro Marim salt marsh and the main estuary were tentatively established determining periodically, in a selected cross-section, the concentrations of TSS, FSS, VSS, NH4, NO2, NO3, NKjeldhal, SiO4, PO4, TDP, Chlorophyll a and Pheopigments, measuring their fluxes along tidal cycles and computing the corresponding budgets. Apparently, the sedimentary behaviour of the marsh will be close to equilibrium during the period of study. However, it will import mainly inert matter and export mainly organic matter in the same period. Moreover, extrapolating these results to the entire Guadiana salt marshes, the exchanges of sediment do not seem to be significant. Particularly, the marshes will not trap a significantly amount sediment transported by the main river (0.5%). It also seems to follow, that in a general way, the Guadiana salt marshes might have a more significant role than was anticipated in the system economy ofOMand nutrients and their outwelling to coastal waters, assuring outputs that could amount to something like 6% of the river load of N, 1.2% of the river load of P, and 20-57% of the river load of TOC, for an average year, and 42% of the river load of Nand 35% of the river load of P in a dry year. These findings suggest that a more detailed investigation, over an extended period of time, is certainly worthwhile

Neonatal Brachial Plexus Palsy: Risk Factors and Its Prognostic Value

Introduction: Neonatal brachial plexus palsy affects 0.7 to 5.8 per 1,000 newborns and is characterised by upper limb paresis detected in the immediate neonatal period. Shoulder dystocia, instrumental delivery and foetal macrosomia are well-known risk factors. Most neonatal brachial plexus palsy evolve favourably, while 3%-27% of newborns have sequelae. Methods: A retrospective cross-sectional study was conducted to characterise neonatal brachial plexus palsy in the newborn population of a hospital with differentiated perinatal support and to assess the rela - tionship between the risk factors and lesion prognosis. The authors reviewed the newborn medical records referred to the physical medicine and rehabilitation clinic between January 2006 and December 2016. Results: During the study period, 137 cases of neo- natal brachial plexus palsy were identified in 36,833 births, which translate into an incidence of 3.7/1,000 live births. Foetal macrosomia was found in 41% and shoulder dystocia in 40%. According to the Narakas clas- sification, 58% were included in group I, 30% in group II, 9% in group III and 3% in group IV. The majority of patients were discharged without sequelae. Newborns with group II, III and IV lesions as well as macrosomic newborns were more likely to develop sequelae (p < 0.05). Shoulder dystocia and operative delivery did not present a statistically significant relationship with the prognosis of the lesion. Discussion: The incidence of neonatal brachial plexus palsy in this population was similar to is described in other series. The relationship between macrosomia and neonatal brachial plexus palsy with sequelae found may be of importance in the attempt to prevent this lesioninfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio