Contribuição à citogenética de testudines e análise de assimetria flutuante em Eretmochelys imbricata, Cheloniidae

This work has contributed to knowledge of the order Testudines from cytogenetic and morphological point of view. With regard to the aspects proposed cytogenetic characterization of the species Mesoclemmys tuberculata (n = 5), endemic to the Caatinga biomes, through conventional techniques of cytogenetics and molecular levels. This species presented 2n = 58, NF = 64, the first submetacentric pair, the second metacentric and third subtelocentric, and the other microchromosome telocentric. This species showed a nucleolar bearing pair, coincident with the 18S ribosomal rDNA and that proved to be heterochromatic. Small heterochromatic blocks were also found in the centromeres of the largest chromosomes, as well as terminal regions in most other chromosomes of the complement, that were GC +. Telomeric sequences showed variable patterns of signal intensity, with some repeats more intense in microchromosomes and subtly in the larger ones. When compared with other species of the genus, the G-banding patterns showed a marked similarity between them. The first karyotypic description of the species will aid in future studies and the understanding of evolutionary aspects of this family. From the morphological point of view, we carried out studies of fluctuating asymmetry in sea turtle Eretmochelys imbricata, using methods of benchmarking between hatchlings and adults and their implications for natural selection. Data were collected at two different times: first during the spawning female and the second during the outbreak and birth of the nest. The analyzed characteristics consisted of measurements of length and width of front and rear flippers (CANT, LANT, CPOS and LPOS) also collected data on the number of hull plates, side plates (NPL), the surrounding plates (NPCIRC), and plastron; plates power plants (NPP), inframarginais plates (NPIM). With the values of asymmetry we calculated the value of strict heritability for these traits, the calculation was based on only one parent. A nonparametric analysis Mann-Whitneywas performed to compare the groups (females X hatchlings, newborn hatchlings X dead hatchlings). Adult females showed no bilateral fluctuating asymmetry (FA = 0) on the number plates of the hull and plastron, while offspring, living and dead, showed a greater level of variation in these meristic parameters. In the analysis of females x hatchlings we found a significant difference between the levels of asymmetry in hoof plates (p=0.006) an the width of hindlimbs (p=0.001). Levels of FA suggest an accurate indicator as to the viability or maintenance of the individual to the reproductive phase. The coefficient of heritability (h2) of FA , obtained from the regression analysis, showed that both have low and not statistically significant values(p> 0.1). In the case of exclusion of the effective role of genetics in the generation of FA, reproductive strategies based on high number of subsidiaries products, such as those observed in E. imbricata seems to implicate the production of individuals with high level of developmental instability

Efeitos individuais e interativos da diversidade de detritos, contexto e variabilidade ambiental sobre a magnitude e estabilidade do processo de decomposição

Studies on the effects of changes in biodiversity and ecosystem functioning have been a central theme in ecology over the past two decades. Several studies have showed that the diversity of plant debris differently affects the decomposition process in aquatic and terrestrial environments, but we know very about the effects of detritus diversity on decomposition under fluctuating environmental conditions. We tested whether and how the environmental contexts, as well as the dynamic of their alternation, influence the effects of detritus diversity on the decomposition process. We performed a field experiment where we manipulate the litter diversity of 8 species of terrestrial plants decomposing (litterbags) in single and in mixture containing the eight species together in three different environmental contexts: the terrestrial environment (T), aquatic (A) and interface (I) - experimental treatment that simulates variation in flooding regime. We measured the rate of decomposition through the loss of mass of the community and each individual detritus in monocultures and mixtures. Species richness and environmental variability had no effects on the magnitude and stability of the decomposition process. However, there were significant diversity effects on the decomposition of an individual alien species, F. benjamina. Environmental context had significant effects on the magnitude and variability of decomposition. Detritus decomposition was faster and more variable on aquatic, interface and terrestrial conditions, respectively. Our results demonstrate that the diversity of plant detritus has minor effects to the decomposition across disparate environmental conditions and suggest that it is necessary to consider the potential of other abiotic factors in affect the magnitude and variability of the decomposition processes

Um estudo de aplicação das teorias da expectativa e da ancoragem na motivação para o desempemho de alunos do ensino médio

This thesis presents a study on Tversky & Kahneman s (1974) Anchoring theory, and Vroom s (1964) Expectance theory in the context of education and students motivation. It is surveyed 424 students of a secondary and agricultural technical school in Brazil Northeast (EAJ). The survey form try to capture the Vroom s Expectance Theory constructs of Valence, Instrumentality, Expectation and Motivational Force, and also the Tversky and Kahneman Anchoring effect in terms of grade expected. The main findings suggest that the minimum grade required by the school is much strong in driving the students motivation and performance than the Expectancy Theory. It was found that the different grades required drive the students to pursue different grade in the same way

A Transposição Didádica dos Gêneros do domínio do discursivo publicitários nos livros didáticos

Advertising text has been a subject of many investigations, because of its multimodal universe. Embodied by a linguistic and discursive materiality laying on scene persuasion, argumentation and power imagery of multissemiotics elements, the advertising text acts as an instrument of power, creating and destroying, promising and denying (CARVALHO, 2007). Advertising not only invites us to act for it, but directs us to look at it. It was under this moving look - of charm and interrogations - that discussions raised in this research were born. Investigations are directed to the school environment, in special, for the discursive advertising domain in Portuguese Language Textbook. It is from this environment that was born our research whose main objective is to analyze how does the didactic transposition of textual genres, described by Marcuschi (2008) as belonging to the "advertising" discourse domain (focusing on advertising genre) in didactic books teaching Portuguese Language before and after the advent of the PCN. Textbooks taken as reference for the study are historically situated in the 90s of the twentieth century and 10 century. Such books refer to elected 7th and 8th grades, currently corresponding to the 8th and 9th grades of elementary school. The choice is justified by the fact that in these Textbook teaching series the presence of advertising domain is recurrent and "didactized". In addition, we are also concerned in analyzing books that circulated around us and our regional reality. Hence, we elected books that were used by two public high schools: Municipal School Clementina Ana da Conceição in Jaçanã city in the Rio Grande do Norte state, State School for Elementary and High school Carlota Barreira in Areia city, Paraíba state. In our research the following categories of analysis were highlighted: (1) presence of advertising in DB, (2) fluctuation terminology: concepts and classifications; (3) The complexity of concepts facilitation, (4) what they propagate, and from which nature are the explored advertisements. From our analysis, we observe how the treatment of textual "advertising" genres have been inserted into Textbooks, and how occurs, in general, their didactic transposition. Focusing on the issue of fluctuating terminology, we noted the difficulty in drawing boundaries between the genres of advertising domain in the Textbooks. However, this also would result in the complexity - in the field of scientific knowledge - of delimiting genres of the same domain. To accomplish our studies, it was required a thorough and systematic dialogue with theories regarding the concept of "Didactic Transposition", due to the theoretical Chevallard Yves (1991), research on the textual genres - Bezerra (2005), Marcuschi (2008), Bazerman (2005), Swales (2004), among others - and studies involving the field of "Advertising" - Sandmann (2002), Carvalho (2007) and others

Propriedades ópticas de nanocristais de SiGe: efeitos de dopagem e desordem

We have used ab initio calculations to investigate the electronic structure of SiGe based nanocrystals (NC s). This work is divided in three parts. In the first one, we focus the excitonic properties of Si(core)/Ge(shell) and Ge(core)/Si(shell) nanocrystals. We also estimate the changes induced by the effect of strain the electronic structure. We show that Ge/Si (Si/Ge) NC s exhibits type II confinement in the conduction (valence) band. The estimated potential barriers for electrons and holes are 0.16 eV (0.34 eV) and 0.64 eV (0.62 eV) for Si/Ge (Ge/Si) NC s. In contradiction to the expected long recombination lifetimes in type II systems, we found that the recombination lifetime of Ge/Si NC s (τR = 13.39μs) is more than one order of magnitude faster than in Si/Ge NC s (τR = 191.84μs). In the second part, we investigate alloyed Si1−xGex NC s in which Ge atoms are randomly positioned. We show that the optical gaps and electron-hole binding energies decrease linearly with x, while the exciton exchange energy increases with x due to the increase of the spatial extent of the electron and hole wave functions. This also increases the electron-hole wave functions overlap, leading to recombination lifetimes that are very sensitive to the Ge content. Finally, we investigate the radiative transitions in Pand B-doped Si nanocrystals. Our NC sizes range between 1.4 and 1.8 nm of diameters. Using a three-levels model, we show that the radiative lifetimes and oscillator strengths of the transitions between the conduction and the impurity bands, as well as the transitions between the impurity and the valence bands are strongly affected by the impurity position. On the other hand, the direct conduction-to-valence band decay is practically unchanged due to the presence of the impurity

Efeito do alerta e valência emocional nos componentes de lembrança e familiaridade da memória episódica

The episodic memory system allows us to retrieve information about events, including its contextual aspects. It has been suggested that episodic memory is composed by two independent components: recollection and familiarity. Recollection is related to the vivid e detailed retrieval of item and contextual information, while familiarity is the capability to recognize items previously seen as familiars. Despite the fact that emotion is one of the most influent process on memory, only a few studies have investigated its effect on recollection and familiarity. Another limitation of studies about the effect of emotion on memory is that the majority of them have not adequately considered the differential effects of arousal and positive/negative valence. The main purpose of the current work is to investigate the independent effect of emotional valence and arousal on recollection and familiarity, as well as to test some hypothesis that have been suggested about the effect of emotion on episodic memory. The participants of the research performed a recognition task for three lists of emotional pictures: high arousal negative, high arousal positive and low arousal positive. At the test session, participants also rated the confidence level of their responses. The confidence ratings were used to plot ROC curves and estimate the contributions of recollection and familiarity of recognition performance. As the main results, we found that negative valence enhanced the component of recollection without any effect on familiarity or recognition accuracy. Arousal did not affect recognition performance or their components, but high arousal was associated with a higher proportion of false memories. This work highlight the importance of to consider both the emotional dimensions and episodic memory components in the study of emotion effect on episodic memory, since they interact in complex and independent way

Motivação para o trabalho: um estudo com os profissionais de saúde das unidades básicas de saúde do município de Natal RN

This thesis studied the motivation to work among health professionals of the Basic Unities (BUH) in the health network of the city of Natal (RN). It was understood that the work motivation is a process. Then, the expectation theory was applied and motivation components (results of work, expectative, valence, instrumentality, and motivational force) were used to analyses. It s understanding the motivation as multifaceted phenomenon, the psycho sociological perspective was adopted. The research was developed in two phases: one with application of Work Motivation and Meaning Inventory (WMMI), and another with interview. In the first phases, the analysis of results revealed that the major factors contributing to increase the motivational force to health professionals in the BUH´s are: in valence, Self Expression and Personal Realization (VF2), Personal and Family Survival (VF3); in expectative, Self Expression and Work Justice (EF1), Safety and Dignity (EF2) and Responsibility (EF4); in instrumentality, Involvement (IF1) and Recognition and Economic Independence (IF4). In opposition, the factors that more contribute to reduce the motivational force are Wear and Dehumanization factors in valence (VF4), in expectative (EF3), and in instrumentality (IF4), behind the Work Justice Factor (IF2). Basing in content analysis of interviews, it was possible to associate by equivalence, the senses presented by health professionals with obtained results of first phase, indicating that the results of second phase corroborated and complemented those of first one. This possibility broadened the comprehension of the studied phenomenon. In speaking of the respondents, it was visible the presence of contents showing that they perceive the Health System and BUH´s in degradation. In the first phase, the participants´ instruction also predict the results in motivation, and in the interviews can be saw that the instruction is associated with the opportunities in outside of system. As work motivation is a process, the impact of personal and occupational characteristics tend to interact with contextual aspects. It was concluded the majority of health professionals present the moderated motivational force, but it was falling because they experience and perceive a degrading context with work condition increasingly unfavorable.