Ilustração de livros de literatura infantojuvenil em Portugal [2000-2009]: tipificação, tendências e padrões de recetividade do público-alvo

Tese de Doutoramento em Estudos da Criança (área de especialização em Comunicação Visual e Expressão Plástica)

Cross-language influences on new second language vocabulary acquisition: the effect of learning method

Dissertação de mestrado integrado em Psicologia

Estudo acústico de /a/ acentuado na fala bracarense: potenciais aplicações

Dissertação de mestrado em Ciências da Linguagem

Influence of saliva and mucin on the adhesion of Candida oral clinical isolates

Objectives: This research work intends to clarify the role of artificial saliva, in particularly the role of mucin, a salivary protein, on the surface properties and adhesion ability of Candida spp. oral clinical isolates to abiotic surfaces. Methods: Four oral clinical isolates of Candida spp. were used: two Candida albicans strains (AC; AM) and two Candida parapsilosis strains (AD; AM2). The strains were isolated from patients using oral prosthesis. The microorganisms were cultured in the absence or presence of mucin and artificial saliva, and their adhesion to an abiotic surface (coated with mucin and artificial saliva) was evaluated. Results: The presence of mucin per se onto the abiotic surface decreased the adhesion of all strains, although the combination of mucin with artificial saliva had reduced this effect. No direct correlation between adhesion and the surface free energies of adhesion of the microorganisms was found. Significance: Candida spp. were human commensal microorganisms that became pathogenic when the host immune defenses were compromised. Medical devices were colonized by Candida spp. particularly, oral prostheses, which might lead to the degradation of the prostheses and systemic infections. The salivary secretions that constantly cover the oral cavity influenced Candida spp. adhesion process. Therefore, it was important to understand the interactions between Candida spp., salivary proteins and the characteristic of oral prosthesis when developing materials for oral prostheses.

Mosaic maternal ancestry in the Great Lakes region of East Africa

The Great Lakes lie within a region of East Africa with very high human genetic diversity, home of many ethno-linguistic groups usually assumed to be the product of a small number of major dispersals. However, our knowledge of these dispersals relies primarily on the inferences of historical, linguistics and oral traditions, with attempts to match up the archaeological evidence where possible. This is an obvious area to which archaeogenetics can contribute, yet Uganda, at the heart of these developments, has not been studied for mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) variation. Here, we compare mtDNA lineages at this putative genetic crossroads across 409 representatives of the major language groups: Bantu speakers and Eastern and Western Nilotic speakers. We show that Uganda harbours one of the highest mtDNA diversities within and between linguistic groups, with the various groups significantly differentiated from each other. Despite an inferred linguistic origin in South Sudan, the data from the two Nilotic-speaking groups point to a much more complex history, involving not only possible dispersals from Sudan and the Horn but also large-scale assimilation of autochthonous lineages within East Africa and even Uganda itself. The Eastern Nilotic group also carries signals characteristic of West-Central Africa, primarily due to Bantu influence, whereas a much stronger signal in the Western Nilotic group suggests direct West-Central African ancestry. Bantu speakers share lineages with both Nilotic groups, and also harbour East African lineages not found in Western Nilotic speakers, likely due to assimilating indigenous populations since arriving in the region ~3000 years ago.

Educação bilingue em Moçambique: um estudo de caso, na Província de Gaza, centrado nas práticas pedagógicas do ensino básico

Em contextos como o de Moçambique que apresenta uma diversidade linguística, o uso de mais de uma língua no ensino é quase que obrigatório. Assim, urge a necessidade de formalizar a Educação Bilingue (EB) nas escolas moçambicanas. A modalidade de EB em Moçambique é de transição e manutenção, nas primeiras classes (1ª, 2ª e 3ª) usa-se a língua local como meio de instrução e o Português é uma disciplina, a partir da 4ª classe há uma inversão. Dessa estratégia o aluno deve estar em condições na 5ª classe de enfrentar o exame nacional, que é feito em língua oficial Portuguesa, para transitar do 1º para o 2º grau. O trabalho tem como problema esta interrogação: De que modo o programa curricular de Educação Bilingue se traduz nas práticas pedagógicas nas escolas do Ensino Básico que usam a língua Portuguesa e Changana no distrito de Bilene, na província de Gaza? O estudo empírico é de natureza qualitativa e quantitativa, com a utilização de técnicas de recolha de dados como a análise documental, entrevistas, questionário e provas escrita e oral aos alunos. Do estudo conclui-se: i) Não existe um programa de base especificamente para EB; ii) Há incongruência entre o programa e as práticas pedagógicas e iii) Os alunos apresentam maior dificuldades de compreensão, na escrita do que na oralidade, nas provas de conhecimento nas disciplinas básicas (Português e Matemática) em língua Portuguesa.

The music of language: an ERP investigation of the effects of musical training on emotional prosody processing

Recent studies have demonstrated the positive effects of musical training on the perception of vocally expressed emotion. This study investigated the effects of musical training on event-related potential (ERP) correlates of emotional prosody processing. Fourteen musicians and fourteen control subjects listened to 228 sentences with neutral semantic content, differing in prosody (one third with neutral, one third with happy and one third with angry intonation), with intelligible semantic content (semantic content condition--SCC) and unintelligible semantic content (pure prosody condition--PPC). Reduced P50 amplitude was found in musicians. A difference between SCC and PPC conditions was found in P50 and N100 amplitude in non-musicians only, and in P200 amplitude in musicians only. Furthermore, musicians were more accurate in recognizing angry prosody in PPC sentences. These findings suggest that auditory expertise characterizing extensive musical training may impact different stages of vocal emotional processing.

The relevance of bacterial interactions on oral health

Dissertação de mestrado integrado em Engenharia Biomédica (área de especialização em Engenharia Clínica)

Modelling and verifying smell-free architectures with the Archery language

Architectural (bad) smells are design decisions found in software architectures that degrade the ability of systems to evolve. This paper presents an approach to verify that a software architecture is smellfree using the Archery architectural description language. The language provides a core for modelling software architectures and an extension for specifying constraints. The approach consists in precisely specifying architectural smells as constraints, and then verifying that software architectures do not satisfy any of them. The constraint language is based on a propositional modal logic with recursion that includes: a converse operator for relations among architectural concepts, graded modalities for describing the cardinality in such relations, and nominals referencing architectural elements. Four architectural smells illustrate the approach.

Silver nanoparticles to fight Candida coinfection in the oral cavity

[Exert] This chapter is focused on the activity of silver nanoparticles (SN) as an antifungal agent against Candida albicans and Candida glabrata biofilms, which are involved in oral candidosis. A discussion focusing on the influence of the stabilizing agent, diameter of SN on its antibiofilm activity, influence of chemical stability of SN on Candida biofilms, the effect of SN against adhered cells and biofilms, the effect on extracellular matrix composition and structure of Candida biofilms, the combination of SN with conventional antifungal drugs, and the incorporation of SN into denture acrylic resin is incorporated in the present chapter. Because of the resistance of Candida biofilms to conventional drugs and the positive effect of SN against them, these nanoparticles can be used as an alternative antifungal agent (...).

Role of biofilms in the oral health of animals

In humans the importance of biofilms in disease processes is now widely recognised together with the difficulties in treating such infections once established. One of the earliest and certainly most studied biofilm in humans is that of dental plaque which is responsible for two of the most prevalent human infections, namely dental caries and periodontal disease. However, comparable studies of dental plaque in animals are relatively limited, despite the fact that similar infections also occur, and in the case of farm animals there is an associated economic impact. In addition, biofilms in the mouths of animals can also be detrimental to human health when transferred by animal bites. As a result, an understanding of both the microbial composition of animal plaque biofilms together with their role in animal diseases is important. Through the use of modern molecular studies, an insight into the oral microflora of animals is now being obtained and, to date, reveals that despite differences in terms of microbial species and relative proportions occurring between humans and animals, similarities do indeed exist. This information can be exploited in our efforts to both manage and treat infections in animals arising from the presence of an oral biofilm. This Chapter describes our current understanding of the microbial composition of animal plaque, its role in disease and how oral hygiene measures can be implemented to reduce subsequent infection.

Dentro e fora da sala de aula: espaços articulados de promoção da oralidade

Relatório de estágio de mestrado em Ensino de Inglês e de Espanhol no 3º Ciclo do Ensino Básico e no Ensino Secundário

Perceção e produção de sons consonânticos do português europeu por aprendentes chineses

Dissertação de mestrado em Português Língua Não Materna (PLNM): Português Língua Estrangeira (PLE) Português Língua Segunda (PL2)