... tantes de três décadas de movimentos migra-tórios complexos (refugiados do processo de descol... more ... tantes de três décadas de movimentos migra-tórios complexos (refugiados do processo de descolonização, regresso dos ex-emigrantes portadores de novos estilos de vida, início dos novos movimentos migratórios proveni-entes da Europa de Leste e da América La-tina). ...
The concept of public sphere is being challenged by new interesting questions: what’s the meaning... more The concept of public sphere is being challenged by new interesting questions: what’s the meaning of public sphere, today, in face of the changes introduced by Internet? Are those changes still compatible with the idea of publicity behind the conceptual classic models drawn by Habermas? Are still compatible with the strong notion and high normative demands that are implied in those models? The aim of this text is to reflect on the connections among democratic deliberation and the role performed by online news media in a context of growing pluralism. In order to perform that reflection, we intend to develop a theoretical discussion on the limits of the classic concept of public sphere in face of the social factum consisting in the increasing fragmentation induced by digital media. Today, most of political communication passes trough expert communicators. This communicative division of labor threatens to undermine the quality of communication. Will the many-to-many communication possi...
Political Communication is often restricted and confined to the area of institutional politics, f... more Political Communication is often restricted and confined to the area of institutional politics, forgetting public opinion, public sphere and social movements. However, Political Communication ‘is also about understanding and making sense of civic affairs’ (Kaid 2004: 13). One claims that political communication must not be limited to the instrumental communicative strategies from institutions and political parties. It can and should study spontaneous and informal public spheres, considering public conversation, political discussion and collective action. Additionally, it must observe the changes and mutations induced by the appearance of new communicative environments and their impact on political activity
Spoken word recognition and production require fast transformations between acoustic, phonologica... more Spoken word recognition and production require fast transformations between acoustic, phonological, and conceptual neural representations. Bilinguals perform these transformations in native and non-native languages, deriving unified semantic concepts from equivalent, but acoustically different words. Here we exploit this capacity of bilinguals to investigate input invariant semantic representations in the brain. We acquired EEG data while Dutch subjects, highly proficient in English listened to four monosyllabic and acoustically distinct animal words in both languages (e.g., "paard"-"horse"). Multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA) was applied to identify EEG response patterns that discriminate between individual words within one language (within-language discrimination) and generalize meaning across two languages (across-language generalization). Furthermore, employing two EEG feature selection approaches, we assessed the contribution of temporal and oscillatory EE...
La incorporación del teléfono móvil en la vida diaria del ser humano no sólo altera las dimension... more La incorporación del teléfono móvil en la vida diaria del ser humano no sólo altera las dimensiones de tiempo y espacio, sino que también modifica su percepción y manera de relacionarse con el ecosistema. Metodología. A partir del concepto de intimidad tecnológica, que describe los niveles de interacción entre el hombre y la tecnología, empleado por Boyce y Hancock, se analiza el estado de arte y se propone una metodología que permita explorar cuestiones, cada vez más acuciantes, principalmente respecto a la delimitación de las esferas pública y privada así como de la interacción en el espacio común. Resultados y conclusiones. Siguiendo, en particular, las teorías de Castells, Heidegger, Meyrowitz y Habermas, se articulan un conjunto de categorías que permiten profundizar en los conceptos de espacialización, voluntariedad y perfil, identificados en esta primera etapa del proyecto como elementos clave para el análisis del ser humano como portal de comunicación.
Naphthoquinones interact with biological systems by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) that... more Naphthoquinones interact with biological systems by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) that can damage cancer cells. The cytotoxicity and the antitumor activity of 3‑acyl‑2‑phenylamino‑1,4‑naphthoquinones (DPB1‑DPB9) were evaluated in the MCF7 human breast cancer cell line and in male Ehrlich tumor‑bearing Balb/c mice. DPB4 was the most cytotoxic derivative against MCF7 cells (EC50 15 µM) and DPB6 was the least cytotoxic one (EC50 56 µM). The 1,4‑naphthoquinone derivatives were able to cause DNA damage and promote DNA fragmentation as shown by the plasmid DNA cleavage assay (FII form). In addition, 1,4‑naphthoquinone derivatives possibly interacted with DNA as intercalating agents, which was demonstrated by the changes caused in the fluorescence of the DNA‑ethidium bromide complexes. Cell death of MCF7 cells induced by 3‑acyl‑2‑phenylamino‑1,4‑naphthoquinones was mostly due to apoptosis. The DNA fragmentation and subsequent apoptosis may be correlated to the redox potential of...
Technology and health care : official journal of the European Society for Engineering and Medicine, 2014
Total joint replacements provide many benefits to patients but expose them to a variety of possib... more Total joint replacements provide many benefits to patients but expose them to a variety of possible complications. Revision surgery is demanding and associated to a greater number of risks and possible complications than primary joint replacement. We describe the unsuccessful technique of percutaneous cementing in a loosened revision total knee arthroplasty. We report on a 66-year old male patient, admitted to our clinic with a painful left knee, four months after percutaneous cementation without implant exchange of the loosened rotating hinge implant was performed. Although less demanding, for the surgeon and the patient, it resulted in a delayed revision surgery. This attempt at avoiding revision surgery could have led to even further complications. This case emphasizes the need to avoid novel techniques on patients, with no previous studies and to refer these patients to specialized joint replacement centers for revision surgery.
Secondary patella resurfacing is a controversial procedure which is applied in patients with ante... more Secondary patella resurfacing is a controversial procedure which is applied in patients with anterior knee pain after a bicondylar knee arthroplasty (with unresurfaced patella). A group of 46 patients were submitted to this procedure and their satisfaction, range of motion and pain improvement was evaluated. 52.2% of the patients were satisfied with the procedure, with an improvement in pain (Visual Analogue Scale) of 65% and an improvement in range of motion in 56,5%, with roundabout half of the patients having no resolution to their complaints. Whilst an improvement was not achieved in all patients, as it was initially hypothesised, this procedure should be considered when a revision knee arthroplasty is performed with an unresurfaced patella.
Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities, 2015
Support bearings have a very important role in the structural performance of bridges. As an integ... more Support bearings have a very important role in the structural performance of bridges. As an integral part of the bridge, bearings must guarantee a service life compatible with that of the remaining bridge components. However, relatively often the service life of support bearings is lower than that of the bridge, leading to repair or replacement operations, which can be relatively expensive and may cause considerable inconvenience to the traffic flow. This paper follows a recent study performed by the authors, in which an inspection and diagnosis system for road bridge structural bearings was proposed. It presents the application of the system to a sample of 152 support bearings in Portuguese road bridges, which is also deemed representative of bridge bearings in most European countries. The results obtained allowed performing a statistical analysis in which a number of aspects were evaluated, namely the characteristics of the bearings, the anomalies, their causes and degree of urgency of intervention, the inspection and diagnosis methods and the most appropriate maintenance and rehabilitation techniques. The results obtained allow characterizing and understanding in further depth the behaviour of these bridge components, providing a number of lessons to be learned on bridge bearing design, execution and maintenance.
During the last H1N1 pandemic has emerged the importance of crisis communication as an essential ... more During the last H1N1 pandemic has emerged the importance of crisis communication as an essential part of health crisis management. The Project aims specifically to improve the understanding of crisis communication dynamics and effective tools and to allow public health institutions to communicate better with the public during health emergencies. THE PROJECT WILL PERFORM DIFFERENT ACTIVITIES: i) state of the art review; ii) identification of key stakeholders; iii) communicational analysis performed using data collected on stakeholder communication activities and their outcomes considering the lessons learnt from the analysis of the reasons for differing public reactions during pandemics; iv) improvement of the existing guidelines; v) development of Web 2.0 tools as web-platform and feed service and implementation of impact assessment algorithms; vi) organization of exercises and training on this issues. In the context of health security policies at an EU level, the project aims to fi...
... tantes de três décadas de movimentos migra-tórios complexos (refugiados do processo de descol... more ... tantes de três décadas de movimentos migra-tórios complexos (refugiados do processo de descolonização, regresso dos ex-emigrantes portadores de novos estilos de vida, início dos novos movimentos migratórios proveni-entes da Europa de Leste e da América La-tina). ...
The concept of public sphere is being challenged by new interesting questions: what’s the meaning... more The concept of public sphere is being challenged by new interesting questions: what’s the meaning of public sphere, today, in face of the changes introduced by Internet? Are those changes still compatible with the idea of publicity behind the conceptual classic models drawn by Habermas? Are still compatible with the strong notion and high normative demands that are implied in those models? The aim of this text is to reflect on the connections among democratic deliberation and the role performed by online news media in a context of growing pluralism. In order to perform that reflection, we intend to develop a theoretical discussion on the limits of the classic concept of public sphere in face of the social factum consisting in the increasing fragmentation induced by digital media. Today, most of political communication passes trough expert communicators. This communicative division of labor threatens to undermine the quality of communication. Will the many-to-many communication possi...
Political Communication is often restricted and confined to the area of institutional politics, f... more Political Communication is often restricted and confined to the area of institutional politics, forgetting public opinion, public sphere and social movements. However, Political Communication ‘is also about understanding and making sense of civic affairs’ (Kaid 2004: 13). One claims that political communication must not be limited to the instrumental communicative strategies from institutions and political parties. It can and should study spontaneous and informal public spheres, considering public conversation, political discussion and collective action. Additionally, it must observe the changes and mutations induced by the appearance of new communicative environments and their impact on political activity
Spoken word recognition and production require fast transformations between acoustic, phonologica... more Spoken word recognition and production require fast transformations between acoustic, phonological, and conceptual neural representations. Bilinguals perform these transformations in native and non-native languages, deriving unified semantic concepts from equivalent, but acoustically different words. Here we exploit this capacity of bilinguals to investigate input invariant semantic representations in the brain. We acquired EEG data while Dutch subjects, highly proficient in English listened to four monosyllabic and acoustically distinct animal words in both languages (e.g., "paard"-"horse"). Multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA) was applied to identify EEG response patterns that discriminate between individual words within one language (within-language discrimination) and generalize meaning across two languages (across-language generalization). Furthermore, employing two EEG feature selection approaches, we assessed the contribution of temporal and oscillatory EE...
La incorporación del teléfono móvil en la vida diaria del ser humano no sólo altera las dimension... more La incorporación del teléfono móvil en la vida diaria del ser humano no sólo altera las dimensiones de tiempo y espacio, sino que también modifica su percepción y manera de relacionarse con el ecosistema. Metodología. A partir del concepto de intimidad tecnológica, que describe los niveles de interacción entre el hombre y la tecnología, empleado por Boyce y Hancock, se analiza el estado de arte y se propone una metodología que permita explorar cuestiones, cada vez más acuciantes, principalmente respecto a la delimitación de las esferas pública y privada así como de la interacción en el espacio común. Resultados y conclusiones. Siguiendo, en particular, las teorías de Castells, Heidegger, Meyrowitz y Habermas, se articulan un conjunto de categorías que permiten profundizar en los conceptos de espacialización, voluntariedad y perfil, identificados en esta primera etapa del proyecto como elementos clave para el análisis del ser humano como portal de comunicación.
Naphthoquinones interact with biological systems by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) that... more Naphthoquinones interact with biological systems by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) that can damage cancer cells. The cytotoxicity and the antitumor activity of 3‑acyl‑2‑phenylamino‑1,4‑naphthoquinones (DPB1‑DPB9) were evaluated in the MCF7 human breast cancer cell line and in male Ehrlich tumor‑bearing Balb/c mice. DPB4 was the most cytotoxic derivative against MCF7 cells (EC50 15 µM) and DPB6 was the least cytotoxic one (EC50 56 µM). The 1,4‑naphthoquinone derivatives were able to cause DNA damage and promote DNA fragmentation as shown by the plasmid DNA cleavage assay (FII form). In addition, 1,4‑naphthoquinone derivatives possibly interacted with DNA as intercalating agents, which was demonstrated by the changes caused in the fluorescence of the DNA‑ethidium bromide complexes. Cell death of MCF7 cells induced by 3‑acyl‑2‑phenylamino‑1,4‑naphthoquinones was mostly due to apoptosis. The DNA fragmentation and subsequent apoptosis may be correlated to the redox potential of...
Technology and health care : official journal of the European Society for Engineering and Medicine, 2014
Total joint replacements provide many benefits to patients but expose them to a variety of possib... more Total joint replacements provide many benefits to patients but expose them to a variety of possible complications. Revision surgery is demanding and associated to a greater number of risks and possible complications than primary joint replacement. We describe the unsuccessful technique of percutaneous cementing in a loosened revision total knee arthroplasty. We report on a 66-year old male patient, admitted to our clinic with a painful left knee, four months after percutaneous cementation without implant exchange of the loosened rotating hinge implant was performed. Although less demanding, for the surgeon and the patient, it resulted in a delayed revision surgery. This attempt at avoiding revision surgery could have led to even further complications. This case emphasizes the need to avoid novel techniques on patients, with no previous studies and to refer these patients to specialized joint replacement centers for revision surgery.
Secondary patella resurfacing is a controversial procedure which is applied in patients with ante... more Secondary patella resurfacing is a controversial procedure which is applied in patients with anterior knee pain after a bicondylar knee arthroplasty (with unresurfaced patella). A group of 46 patients were submitted to this procedure and their satisfaction, range of motion and pain improvement was evaluated. 52.2% of the patients were satisfied with the procedure, with an improvement in pain (Visual Analogue Scale) of 65% and an improvement in range of motion in 56,5%, with roundabout half of the patients having no resolution to their complaints. Whilst an improvement was not achieved in all patients, as it was initially hypothesised, this procedure should be considered when a revision knee arthroplasty is performed with an unresurfaced patella.
Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities, 2015
Support bearings have a very important role in the structural performance of bridges. As an integ... more Support bearings have a very important role in the structural performance of bridges. As an integral part of the bridge, bearings must guarantee a service life compatible with that of the remaining bridge components. However, relatively often the service life of support bearings is lower than that of the bridge, leading to repair or replacement operations, which can be relatively expensive and may cause considerable inconvenience to the traffic flow. This paper follows a recent study performed by the authors, in which an inspection and diagnosis system for road bridge structural bearings was proposed. It presents the application of the system to a sample of 152 support bearings in Portuguese road bridges, which is also deemed representative of bridge bearings in most European countries. The results obtained allowed performing a statistical analysis in which a number of aspects were evaluated, namely the characteristics of the bearings, the anomalies, their causes and degree of urgency of intervention, the inspection and diagnosis methods and the most appropriate maintenance and rehabilitation techniques. The results obtained allow characterizing and understanding in further depth the behaviour of these bridge components, providing a number of lessons to be learned on bridge bearing design, execution and maintenance.
During the last H1N1 pandemic has emerged the importance of crisis communication as an essential ... more During the last H1N1 pandemic has emerged the importance of crisis communication as an essential part of health crisis management. The Project aims specifically to improve the understanding of crisis communication dynamics and effective tools and to allow public health institutions to communicate better with the public during health emergencies. THE PROJECT WILL PERFORM DIFFERENT ACTIVITIES: i) state of the art review; ii) identification of key stakeholders; iii) communicational analysis performed using data collected on stakeholder communication activities and their outcomes considering the lessons learnt from the analysis of the reasons for differing public reactions during pandemics; iv) improvement of the existing guidelines; v) development of Web 2.0 tools as web-platform and feed service and implementation of impact assessment algorithms; vi) organization of exercises and training on this issues. In the context of health security policies at an EU level, the project aims to fi...
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