•Effect size of urban design variables is measured regarding solar energy potential.•Impact of urban form factors on solar potential is analysed to a tropical climate.•A Statistical factorial design ...methodology is coupled to a Simplified Radiosity Algorithm.•Albedo and built density have inverse first order effect on surface irradiation.•Albedo and Aspect ratio account for 37% of overall impact on solar energy potential.
Today, 75% of global energy consumption occurs in cities. On the topic of climate change, adapting urban settlements to face this growing demand is a priority issue, especially for fast-growing cities in developing countries such as Brazil. Planning the urban morphology of the built environment is a key issue in shifting to a climate adapted urban environment. This paper addresses an important threefold energy challenge of tropical cities: the major potential of harnessing solar energy as renewable resource for local electricity production and the energy-saving paradox of reducing the undesirable solar heat gains in buildings while providing satisfactory levels of daylight. It aims at measuring the effect size of urban form factors regarding these energy goals. This study applies the Design Of Experiments (DOE) approach. A DOE analysis is a statistical technique that provides a set measure of how design parameters are correlated and the effective contribution of each one to a given response of interest. This study proposes a fractional factorial DOE method coupled to a Simplified Radiosity Algorithm (SRA) aiming to evaluate the irradiation availability on building envelopes while taking a large representative sample of contrasted urban block geometries into account. The buildings’ envelope solar irradiation availability assesses a set of energy-related morphological parameters. Results indicate a significant impact of the aspect ratio, the distance between buildings and the surface equivalent albedo. Establishing high values of street aspect ratio may cut solar irradiation on roofs by 130kWh/m2year, while increasing the plot ratio may only yield 26kWh/m2year. The results also point out important first order interaction effects between certain variables.
This study investigates the latest research on the profile of the Brazilian prison population, its demography and current laws and regulations. It aims in the direction of ensuring the human right to ...health. Brazilian prison system is a complex universe in which state and federal criminal contexts keep more than 607,000 people in custody. This population is composed of 75% of young and black people, 67% poorly educated and 41% are pre-trial detainees, living in overcrowded prisons and architecturally vandalized, with population growth of around 575% in 24 years, making this environment a major focus of production of diseases. The prison becomes the object of differentiated intervention by public bodies linked to the executive and the judiciary - it is worth remarking that the data show the high level of inequalities and health vulnerabilities among the prison population, whose needs involve a set of cross-sector of transverse public policies actions towards penal execution.
The municipality of Boa Nova, in northeastern Brazil, is in an ecotone zone between the Caatinga and Atlantic Forest phytogeographic domains. The transition phytophysiognomy is seasonal forest and ...known locally as
mata de cipó
. In these phytophysiognomies there are
lajedos
, which are rock outcrops colonized by vegetation well-adapted to extreme microclimatic variation and vegetation diversity is affected by the vegetation types of the surrounding areas. Due to the singularity of these environments and the relevance of floristic studies for conservation, this work aimed to identify the species richness and compare the similarity of the flora on four rock outcrops in Boa Nova. The flora was surveyed during exploratory walks along
lajedos
between 2016 and 2019. In total, 162 species were identified on the Boa Nova outcrops. The flora has a composition and structure similar to semiarid outcrops, as well as endemic species that also occur in surrounding phytophysiomies. Despite the proximity, a similarity index revealed there is floristic dissimilarity between the areas. Nine new occurrences were recorded for the region, five species are threatened with extinction (
Aosa gilgiana, Ficus cyclophylla, Hippeastrum stigmovittatum, Pleroma caatingae
and
Trixis pruskii
), and 43 species are common in anthropogenic areas. This reinforces the importance of actions to conserve these areas.
Organoid cultivation in suspension culture requires agitation at low shear stress to allow for nutrient diffusion, which preserves tissue structure. Multiplex systems for organoid cultivation have ...been proposed, but whether they meet similar shear stress parameters as the regularly used spinner flask and its correlation with the successful generation of brain organoids has not been determined.
Here we used computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to simulate two multiplex culture conditions: steering plates on an orbital shaker and the use of a previously described bioreactor. The bioreactor had low speed and high shear stress regions that may affect cell aggregate growth, depending on volume, whereas the computed variables of the steering plates were closer to those of the spinning flask.
Our protocol improves the initial steps of the standard brain organoid formation, and the produced organoids displayed regionalized brain structures, including retinal pigmented cells. Overall, we conclude that suspension culture on orbital steering plates is a cost-effective practical alternative to previously described platforms for the cultivation of brain organoids for research and multiplex testing.
Zika virus (ZIKV) is a global public health emergency due to its association with microcephaly, Guillain-Barré syndrome, neuropathy, and myelitis in children and adults. A total of 87 countries have ...had evidence of autochthonous mosquito-borne transmission of ZIKV, distributed across four continents, and no antivirus therapy or vaccines are available. Therefore, several strategies have been developed to target the main mosquito vector,
, to reduce the burden of different arboviruses. Among such strategies, the use of the maternally-inherited endosymbiont
has been applied successfully to reduce virus susceptibility and decrease transmission. However, the mechanisms by which
orchestrate resistance to ZIKV infection remain to be elucidated. In this study, we apply isobaric labeling quantitative mass spectrometry (MS)-based proteomics to quantify proteins and identify pathways altered during ZIKV infection;
infection; co-infection with
ZIKV in the
heads and salivary glands. We show that
regulates proteins involved in reactive oxygen species production, regulates humoral immune response, and antioxidant production. The reduction of ZIKV polyprotein in the presence of
in mosquitoes was determined by MS and corroborates the idea that
helps to block ZIKV infections in
The present study offers a rich resource of data that may help to elucidate mechanisms by which
orchestrate resistance to ZIKV infection in
, and represents a step further on the development of new targeted methods to detect and quantify ZIKV and
directly in complex tissues.
Paracoccidioidomycosis (PCM) is an endemic mycosis in Latin America caused by the thermodimorphic fungi of the genus
Paracoccidioides
spp.
Paracoccidioides lutzii
(PL) is one of the 5 species that ...constitute the
Paracoccidioides
genus. PL expresses low amounts of glycoprotein (Gp) 43 (PLGp43) and PLGp43 displays few epitopes in common with the
P. brasiliensis
(PB) immunodominant antigen PBGp43, which is commonly used for serological diagnosis of PCM. This difference in structure between the glycoproteins markedly reduces the efficiency of serological diagnosis in patients infected with PL. We previously demonstrated that peptide 10 (P10) from the PBGp43 induces protective immune responses in
in vitro
and
in vivo
models of PB PCM. Since, P10 has proven to be a promising therapeutic to combat PB, we sought to identify peptides in PL that could similarly be applied for the treatment of PCM. PL yeast cell proteins were isolated from PL: dendritic cell co-cultures and subjected to immunoproteomics. This approach identified 18 PL peptides that demonstrated
in silico
predictions for immunogenicity. Eight of the most promising peptides were synthesized and applied to lymphocytes obtained from peptide-immunized or PL-infected mice as well as to
in vitro
cultures with peptides or dendritic cells pulsed the peptides. The peptides LBR5, LBR6 and LBR8 efficiently promoted CD4
+
and CD8
+
T cell proliferation and dendritic cells pulsed with LBR1, LBR3, LBR7 or LBR8 stimulated CD4
+
T cell proliferation. We observed increases of IFN-γ in the supernatants from primed T cells for the conditions with peptides without or with dendritic cells, although IL-2 levels only increased in response to LBR8. These novel immunogenic peptides derived from PL will be employed to develop new peptide vaccine approaches and the proteins from which they are derived can be used to develop new diagnostic assays for PL and possibly other
Paracoccidioides
spp. These findings identify and characterize new peptides with a promising therapeutic profile for future against this important neglected systemic mycosis.
Zika is a vector-borne disease caused by an arbovirus (ZIKV) and overwhelmingly transmitted by
Ae. aegypti
. This disease is linked to adverse fetal outcomes, mostly microcephaly in newborns, and ...other clinical aspects such as acute febrile illness and neurologic complications, for example, Guillain-Barré syndrome. One of the most promising strategies to mitigate arbovirus transmission involves releasing
Ae. aegypti
mosquitoes carrying the maternally inherited endosymbiont bacteria
Wolbachia pipientis
. The presence of
Wolbachia
is associated with a reduced susceptibility to arboviruses and a fitness cost in mosquito life-history traits such as fecundity and fertility. However, the mechanisms by which
Wolbachia
influences metabolic pathways leading to differences in egg production remains poorly known. To investigate the impact of coinfections on the reproductive tract of the mosquito, we applied an isobaric labeling-based quantitative proteomic strategy to investigate the influence of
Wolbachia w
Mel and ZIKV infection in
Ae. aegypti
ovaries. To the best of our knowledge, this is the most complete proteome of
Ae. aegypti
ovaries reported so far, with a total of 3913 proteins identified, were also able to quantify 1044
Wolbachia
proteins in complex sample tissue of
Ae. aegypti
ovary. Furthermore, from a total of 480 mosquito proteins modulated in our study, we discuss proteins and pathways altered in
Ae. aegypti
during ZIKV infections,
Wolbachia
infections, coinfection
Wolbachia
/ZIKV, and compared with no infection, focusing on immune and reproductive aspects of
Ae. aegypti
. The modified aspects mainly were related to the immune priming enhancement by
Wolbachia
presence and the modulation of the Juvenile Hormone pathway caused by both microorganism’s infection.
As florestas estacionais brasileiras apresentam elevada biodiversidade e altos índices de degradação, principalmente devido ao uso do solo para várias atividades humanas como expansão urbana e ...agropecuária. Como a elaboração de planos de conservação para florestas não é possível sem a utilização de dados disponíveis sobre a biodiversidade local, o objetivo deste estudo foi identificar a composição florística, as características ecológicas e o status de conservação das espécies vegetais de quatro remanescentes de floresta estacional da bacia do rio Catolé Grande, município de Itapetinga, Bahia, Brasil. No total foram registrados 232 indivíduos, pertencentes a 81 espécies de 24 famílias botânicas. A maioria (63,9%) das espécies vegetais dos remanescentes florestais é composta por espécies secundárias e duas espécies ameaçadas de extinção foram registradas, Apuleia leiocarpa (N=6) e Melanoxylon brauna, ambas enquadradas na categoria Vulnerável. A riqueza de espécies vegetal dos remanescentes é maior do que a registrada em outras florestas estacionais no estado da Bahia. Adicionalmente, o maior fragmento estudado possui as menores abundância e riqueza de espécies de todos os fragmentos. Os resultados demonstram que os remanescentes de floresta estacional da bacia do rio Catolé estão em estágio intermediário de regeneração e são importantes habitats para a sobrevivência de várias espécies arbóreas, inclusive ameaçadas de extinção, e precisam ser conservados.
As a contribution to the deepwater oil and gas industry, this paper addresses the use of optimization techniques together with a design of experiments (DOE) assessment, as a way of automating the ...design of compliant vertical access risers (CVARs) while also leading to an optimal riser configuration based on some desired efficiency parameters. The CVAR is a new riser concept that can improve the structural performance of the production system and also provide several operational benefits. The DOE is a statistical technique that provides an objective measure of how design parameters are correlated and the effective contribution of each one at the riser performance. Based on such a study some general conclusive remarks on the global behavior of CVAR will be presented. Such results also play an important role for the optimization process, as it can highlight significant design parameters, enabling design simplifications and efficiency improvement. For optimization assessment, geometric parameters are taken as the design variables and the design constraints consider both structural integrity and operational criteria. A multi-objective approach is considered taking into account the structural performance and geometric criteria. Optimal solution is obtained by NSGA-II method. Extreme and operational environmental conditions of a Brazilian offshore field are used as the base case.
▸DOE analysis followed by an optimization process is applied for CVAR design. ▸Design variables have different significance for each response parameter. ▸ Most significant variables: outer diameter, floater volume, well offset, overlength. ▸ Found less significant variables: stress-joints length and upper slick pipe length. ▸ Optimization gain: 35% for the stress utilization factor; 46% for the volume factor.
This study aimed to discuss the close relationship between mental health, the criminal justice system and the prison system, whose specific interfaces are the HCTP (Hospital de Custódia e Tratamento ...Psiquiátrico, or Judicial Psychiatric Hospital) conflict and the person with mental disorder in conflict with the law. There will be presented extensive discussions on the Penal Execution Law and the Brazilian Psychiatric Reform Law, as well as cross-sector actions taken by the judiciary and the federal government (Brazilian National Health System - SUS and National Social Assistance System - SUAS) to bring the criminal justice system and the prison system to the anti-asylum combat. Two successful experiences in the states of Minas Gerais and Goiás will also be presented for they reflect the emergence of a new strategy on public health policy: The Evaluation Service and Monitoring Therapeutic Measures for the Person with Mental Disorder in Conflict with the Law, device connector between systems, willing to operate in the process of deinstitutionalization of people with mental disorders of HCPT.
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