Chitosan-based magnetic nanoparticles for osteosarcoma theranostic

Cancer is a well-known disease with a significant impact in society not only due to its incidence, more evident in more developed countries, but also due to the expenses related to medical treat-ments. Cancer research is considered an increasingly logical science with great potential for the development of new treatment options. Advances in nanomedicine have resulted in rapid devel-opment of nanomaterials with considerable potential in cancer diagnostics and treatment. The combination of diagnosis and treatment in a single nano-platform is named theranostic. In this PhD thesis a theranostic system for osteosarcoma was proposed, composed by a magnetic core, a polymeric coating, and a chemotherapeutic drug. The presence of a specific targeting agent, in this case a monoclonal antibody, provides high specificity to the proposed theranostic system. For the core of the proposed theranostic system, stable aqueous suspensions of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles with an average diameter of 9 nm were produced. Chitosan-based poly-meric nanoparticles with a hydrodynamic diameter around 150 nm were successfully produced. Incorporation of iron oxide nanoparticles into the polymeric ones increased their hydrodynamic diameter to at least 250 nm. A monoclonal antibody specific for a transmembranar protein (car-bonic anhydrase IX) present in solid tumors was developed by hybridoma technology. Functional hybridomas producing the desired monoclonal antibodies were obtained. The proposed theranostic system functionality was evaluated in separated parts of its components. Uncoated and coated iron oxide nanoparticles with chitosan-based polymers generated heat under the application of an external alternating magnetic field. Uncoated iron oxide nanoparticles sta-bilized with oleic acid were able to enhance contrast in magnetic resonance imaging. Drug deliv-ery studies were conducted in chitosan-based polymeric nanoparticles without and with the in-corporation of iron oxide nanoparticles, demonstrating to be an effective drug delivery platform for doxorubicin. The theranostic system proposed in this PhD thesis is very promising for cancer theranostic, demonstrating to be applicable in solid tumors such as osteosarcoma.

Orchestration of heterogeneous middleware services and its application to a comand and control platform

MSC Dissertation in Computer Engineering

Human-robot teamwork: a knowledge-based solution

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores

Time-domain optimization of amplifiers based on distributed genetic algorithms

Thesis presented in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Sigla WEBGIS portal: an open source Web-based GIS application for the portuguese bluetongue Entomologiacal surveillance program.

Dissertação apresentada como requisito parcial para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Ciência e Sistemas de Informação Geográfica

Development of new biomaterials based on liquid crystalline phases of cellulose derivatives

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Biomédica

A process-based control for evolvable production systems

Dissertação apresentada na Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa para a obtenção do grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores

Modulation of inflammatory mediators by Opuntia ficus-indica and Prunus avium bioproducts using an in vitro cell-based model of intestinal inflammation

Dissertation to obtain a Master Degree in Biotechnology

gvSIG An Open Source GIS solution for the Android Platform

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies

Design and implementation of 3D buildings integration for a Webgl-Based Virtual Globe: a case study of Valencian Cadastre and Fide Building Mode

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies.

A Web based geospatial application for disaster preparedness in Uganda

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies.

A multiagent based shop floor transportation system simulator

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores

A framework for developing motion-based games

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Informática

Business model analysis of Mobitto: How to solve the chicken and egg problem of a multi-sided platform?

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Management from the NOVA – School of Business and Economics

Petri net based development of globally-asynchronous locally-synchronous distributed embedded systems

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Doutor em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores