Geosynthetic-Reinforced Soil Structure Built to Restore Original Geometry of a 12 m High Slope After Failure Using Local Soil

This paper presents a study case in which a geosynthetic-reinforced soil (GRS) structure was used to rebuild a 12 m high slope after its failure. The failed slope is located between the parking lot of a private company and a public school. Due to surrounding structures restrictions, this project required a solution with rapidity in execution. In addition, as a requirement established by its owner, this structure should recover the original geometry of the slope. Besides the importance regarding surrounding constructions, an interesting aspect of this study case relies on the versatility of geosynthetic materials. A woven geotextile was used as reinforcement. Five other geosynthetic materials were used in this study case. Facing comprised a geocell filled with local soil cover and grass mats, resulting in a green facing. A geonet was used to hold the grass mats in place before grass roots development. Regarding the drainage system, geocomposite drains and geopipes were installed to drain subsurface water. A nonwoven geotextile was used as filter in drainage trenches, which were placed near the structure toe. Additionally to the GRS structure, the lower portion of the slope was reinforced with soil nailing technique. The face of the nailed soil portion was covered with sandbags and shotcrete. It emphasizes the flexibility of GRS structures regarding their application with other technical options in Geotechnical Engineering. The economic aspect of this study case also deserves attention. It did not require soil transportation and other design and construction steps, e.g. concrete structures design and construction.

Cobertura e depósito de calda fitossanitária em plantas de café pulverizadas com equipamento original e adaptado para plantas altas

The objective of this study was to evaluate the coverage of spray droplets on coffee plants as well as their deposition using a sprayer with and without adaptation of an auxiliary branch for tall plants. The experiment was conducted following a randomized block design with six treatments and four replications to evaluate the percentage of coverage for the spraying liquids in water sensitive paper fixed at four quadrants and two heights (lower and upper) of the plants, and the spray deposit with metallic marker (MnSO4) on sheets in the same positions of the water sensitive paper in two spray volumes (450 and 750 L h(-1)). The experiment was conducted in October 2011 in the town of Patroc nio-MG, and the experimental plots consisted of 30 plants of Catua IAC-99, with approximately 12 years of age and average height of 3.50 meters. The experiments were conducted following a randomized block design with six treatments and four replications to evaluate the coverage and deposition, in two spray volumes (450 and 750 L ha(-1)). Leaves were collected in four positions and also at the top four in the lower canopy. The results of the evaluations were analysed statistically by F test and for comparison of means by Tukey test at 5% probability. The auxiliary branch installed at the rear of the equipment is the most suitable when compared to use of equipment without this feature or installed in the front of the equipment. Furthermore, the application volume of 450 L ha(-1) results in coverages and deposits of spraying liquids equivalents to volume of 750 L ha(-1), considered sufficient according to the parameters evaluated.

O sujeito lírico em Dispersão: aspectos da modernidade na obra de Mário de Sá-Carneiro

Pós-graduação em Estudos Literários - FCLAR

Haroldo de Campos e a utopia da escritura original

The aim ofthis article is to discuss the existence ofan original writing utopia in Haroldo de Campos, which seems to be more important to his work than the concretist utopia. It is possible to understand the Haroldo's poetry project since the establishment of a parallel between the epic aedo and the haroldian attitudes concerning the invention and the tradition, taking them as difference in the constitution of Haroldo's identity. Once he assumes a impossibility to rescue the origin itself, the haroldian project turns to the 'jetzeit" and that, secondly Agamben is very contemporaneous.

A criação verbal inovadora e original de Jules Laforgue

The aim of this paper is to show some aspects of the aesthetic of Jules Laforgue, French symbolistic poet, who used verbal creations such as neologisms, archaism, foreignism revealing how creative and modern he was in his period.

Jean Bodin, o Methodus e a Clio tucidideana: as figurações heroicizantes do historiador

Apreciando as representações figuradas na ideia de uma Clio Tucidideana por fins do século XVI, propõe-se refletir sobre a associação entre a concepção antiga de herói e a moderna de gênio como parâmetro epistemológico que catalisa a apreciação da excelência da práxis historiográfica. Aborda-se essa reflexão tomando em particular as proposições elaboradas sobre a escrita da História no Metodus de Jean Bodin que juntamente com La Popelinière e Thomas Hobbes configuram historiograficamente a ideia da Clio Tucidideana conceituada por Cesare Ripa.

O Beethoven de DeNora: o contexto está no texto

Estudo sobre a repercussão do livro de DENORA (1995), e discussão sobre os conceitos que vêm à tona, a partir de uma abordagem sociológica do fenômeno do "gênio criador"; do surgimento do conceito de "música séria"¹ em oposição ao entretenimento; das estratégias de ocupação de um determinado campo cultural e suas aplicações em novos contextos. Todos os fatores que elegeram Beethoven são inoperantes num mundo em que novas regras se impõem na produção artística, tanto quanto na produção de mercadorias em geral: essa a principal contribuição do livro, que passou despercebida pela maioria das resenhas publicadas à época de sua publicação. Os esquissos do projeto da música dita "séria" são facilmente detectáveis na obra de Beethoven, em que sua busca de profundidade, em oposição à música leve, atinge novos patamares pari passu com sua posição social como compositor.

Acceso y obtención del documento original

[ES] Presentación en Powerpoint en la que se explica cómo acceder a los documentos necesarios, interpretando la información con la que se parte. La misma está incluida en el curso Adquisición de habilidades en informacón. Nivel I ofertado por la Biblioteca Universitaria en el marco del Programa RAÍL.

Acceso y obtención del documento original

[ES] Tutorial del curso virtual Adquisición de Habilidades en Información. Nivel I. En él se recoge los pasos a seguir para interpretar la documentación obtenida de una bibliografía y dónde acceder a ella.

Development of original analytical methods for the therapeutic drug monitoring of CNS druges: Antipsychotics, Antidepressants and Anxiolytics-hypnotics

Great strides have been made in the last few years in the pharmacological treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders, with the introduction into the therapy of several new and more efficient agents, which have improved the quality of life of many patients. Despite these advances, a large percentage of patients is still considered “non-responder” to the therapy, not drawing any benefits from it. Moreover, these patients have a peculiar therapeutic profile, due to the very frequent application of polypharmacy, attempting to obtain satisfactory remission of the multiple aspects of psychiatric syndromes. Therapy is heavily individualised and switching from one therapeutic agent to another is quite frequent. One of the main problems of this situation is the possibility of unwanted or unexpected pharmacological interactions, which can occur both during polypharmacy and during switching. Simultaneous administration of psychiatric drugs can easily lead to interactions if one of the administered compounds influences the metabolism of the others. Impaired CYP450 function due to inhibition of the enzyme is frequent. Other metabolic pathways, such as glucuronidation, can also be influenced. The Therapeutic Drug Monitoring (TDM) of psychotropic drugs is an important tool for treatment personalisation and optimisation. It deals with the determination of parent drugs and metabolites plasma levels, in order to monitor them over time and to compare these findings with clinical data. This allows establishing chemical-clinical correlations (such as those between administered dose and therapeutic and side effects), which are essential to obtain the maximum therapeutic efficacy, while minimising side and toxic effects. It is evident the importance of developing sensitive and selective analytical methods for the determination of the administered drugs and their main metabolites, in order to obtain reliable data that can correctly support clinical decisions. During the three years of Ph.D. program, some analytical methods based on HPLC have been developed, validated and successfully applied to the TDM of psychiatric patients undergoing treatment with drugs belonging to following classes: antipsychotics, antidepressants and anxiolytic-hypnotics. The biological matrices which have been processed were: blood, plasma, serum, saliva, urine, hair and rat brain. Among antipsychotics, both atypical and classical agents have been considered, such as haloperidol, chlorpromazine, clotiapine, loxapine, risperidone (and 9-hydroxyrisperidone), clozapine (as well as N-desmethylclozapine and clozapine N-oxide) and quetiapine. While the need for an accurate TDM of schizophrenic patients is being increasingly recognized by psychiatrists, only in the last few years the same attention is being paid to the TDM of depressed patients. This is leading to the acknowledgment that depression pharmacotherapy can greatly benefit from the accurate application of TDM. For this reason, the research activity has also been focused on first and second-generation antidepressant agents, like triciclic antidepressants, trazodone and m-chlorophenylpiperazine (m-cpp), paroxetine and its three main metabolites, venlafaxine and its active metabolite, and the most recent antidepressant introduced into the market, duloxetine. Among anxiolytics-hypnotics, benzodiazepines are very often involved in the pharmacotherapy of depression for the relief of anxious components; for this reason, it is useful to monitor these drugs, especially in cases of polypharmacy. The results obtained during these three years of Ph.D. program are reliable and the developed HPLC methods are suitable for the qualitative and quantitative determination of CNS drugs in biological fluids for TDM purposes.

Development of Original Analytical Methods for the Determination of Drugs of Abuse in Biological Samples

Drug abuse is a major global problem which has a strong impact not only on the single individual but also on the entire society. Among the different strategies that can be used to address this issue an important role is played by identification of abusers and proper medical treatment. This kind of therapy should be carefully monitored in order to discourage improper use of the medication and to tailor the dose according to the specific needs of the patient. Hence, reliable analytical methods are needed to reveal drug intake and to support physicians in the pharmacological management of drug dependence. In the present Ph.D. thesis original analytical methods for the determination of drugs with a potential for abuse and of substances used in the pharmacological treatment of drug addiction are presented. In particular, the work has been focused on the analysis of ketamine, naloxone and long-acting opioids (buprenorphine and methadone), oxycodone, disulfiram and bupropion in human plasma and in dried blood spots. The developed methods are based on the use of high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled to various kinds of detectors (mass spectrometer, coulometric detector, diode array detector). For biological sample pre-treatment different techniques have been exploited, namely solid phase extraction and microextraction by packed sorbent. All the presented methods have been validated according to official guidelines with good results and some of these have been successfully applied to the therapeutic drug monitoring of patients under treatment for drug abuse.

Original analytical methods for the determination of psychoactive compounds in complex matrices

This thesis work aims to develop original analytical methods for the determination of drugs with a potential for abuse, for the analysis of substances used in the pharmacological treatment of drug addiction in biological samples and for the monitoring of potentially toxic compounds added to street drugs. In fact reliable analytical techniques can play an important role in this setting. They can be employed to reveal drug intake, allowing the identification of drug users and to assess drug blood levels, assisting physicians in the management of the treatment. Pharmacological therapy needs to be carefully monitored indeed in order to optimize the dose scheduling according to the specific needs of the patient and to discourage improper use of the medication. In particular, different methods have been developed for the detection of gamma-hydroxybutiric acid (GHB), prescribed for the treatment of alcohol addiction, of glucocorticoids, one of the most abused pharmaceutical class to enhance sport performance and of adulterants, pharmacologically active compounds added to illicit drugs for recreational purposes. All the presented methods are based on capillary electrophoresis (CE) and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled to various detectors (diode array detector, mass spectrometer). Biological samples pre-treatment was carried out using different extraction techniques, liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) and solid phase extraction (SPE). Different matrices have been considered: human plasma, dried blood spots, human urine, simulated street drugs. These developed analytical methods are individually described and discussed in this thesis work.

Comparison of the diagnostic performance of the original and modified Wells score in inpatients and outpatients with suspected deep vein thrombosis

The original and modified Wells score are widely used prediction rules for pre-test probability assessment of deep vein thrombosis (DVT). The objective of this study was to compare the predictive performance of both Wells scores in unselected patients with clinical suspicion of DVT.