Current approaches and future perspectives on strategies for the development of personalized tissue engineering therapies

Personalized tissue engineering and regenerative medicine (TERM) therapies propose patient-oriented effective solutions, considering individual needs. Cell-based therapies, for example, may benefit from cell sources that enable easier autologous set-ups or from recent developments on IPS cells technologies towards effective personalized therapeutics. Furthermore, the customization of scaffold materials to perfectly fit a patientâ s tissue defect through rapid prototyping technologies, also known as 3D printing, is now a reality. Nevertheless, the timing to expand cells or to obtain functional in vitrotissue substitutes prior to implantation prevents advancements towards routine use upon patient´s needs. Thus, personalized therapies also anticipate the importance of creating off-the-shelf solutions to enable immediately available tissue engineered products. This paper reviews the main recent developments and future challenges to enable personalized TERM approaches and to bring these technologies closer to clinical applications.

Engineering a commercial cold-adapted xylanase for improved low pH stability

Dissertação de mestrado em Genética Molecular

The Need for Pedagogical Qualifications for Teaching Cardiology to Undergraduate Students

OBJECTIVE: To report a training program in cardiology emphasizing changes in its pedagogical practice. These changes were put into practice by some teachers at the Medical School of Porto Alegre of the University of Rio Grande do Sul (FAMED/UFRGS) aiming to make faculty and student activities more dynamic and to promote more efficacious learning. The training program is directed at 5th semester medical students and aims at a behavioral change in teachers and students to promote more interaction, to favor exchanges, and to make the teaching-learning process easier, always maintaining the patient in the center of the medical activity. METHODS: The program emphasizes the definition of general and specific objectives for each activity to be developed by the students, with training in the area of admission to the cardiology service, with special emphasis on behavioral change in the cognitive, motor, affective, and attitudinal areas. Knowledge was developed by means of interactive seminars with initial and final assessment tests to identify students' and teachers' performance. The students were evaluated in an immediate, continuous, and progressive way in their daily activities and through comparison of the results of 2 tests, one applied at the beginning of the training and the other at its end. These 2 tests contained the same questions. RESULTS: We systematically assessed 560 students over 4 years. The mean grades of the tests performed prior to and after the 244 seminars were 7.38±1.66 and 9.17± 0.82, respectively (p<0.0001). For the tests applied at the beginning and at the end of the training, the mean grades were 5.61±1.61 and 9.37±0.90, respectively (p<0.0001). CONCLUSION: The program proved to be efficient both for the students' learning and for assessing their performance in a systematic and objective way.

Development of composite auxetic structures for civil engineering applications

Tese de Doutoramento em Engenharia Têxtil

Biographical narratives in teaching: a study of rofessors on postgraduate courses

Literature and research have shown that professional development constitutes an essential dimension in constructing both work and professional identity. An important aspect in such development is training. In the field of adult education, different authors (Pratt, 1993; Mezirow, 1985; Schön, 1996; Silva, 2007) emphasize the importance of placing trainees at the center of the learning and cognitive processes and within their corresponding social and historical contexts. Training is supported by a comprehensive adult learning theory. Therefore, the acquired knowledge is not only the result of an external and objective reality but also of a complex construction in which the appropriation of experience plays a relevant role. This paper reveals the findings obtained through biographical narratives in a five-year work program with teachers at different levels (from pre-school to higher education) on postgraduate courses. The core issue is the importance of biographical narratives, as an identification strategy for personal experience, knowledge construction and professional identity. This strategy provided the opportunity for recognition of practical experience, as a provider of learning, as well as his/her own authorship, which are important conditions in the understanding of professional identity.

Ingeniería de glicanos: diseño de inmunógenos y ligandos de lectinas. Glycan engineering: design of immunogens and ligand of lectins.

La ingeniería de glicanos es un área de investigación emergente, la que posee múltiples aplicaciones en medicina. Mediante esta herramienta se intentará reducir la flexibilidad de las uniones glicosídicas de antígenos tumorales, como la del antígeno T (Galbeta3GalNAcalfa-Ser/Thr). Aquí se realizarán las menores alteraciones posibles en la topología de glicanos que generen la mejor respuesta inmune hacia el antígeno de interés. Por otra parte, se buscará ligandos de alta afinidad que interaccionen con lectinas involucradas en diseminación de metástasis. Mediante ensayos teóricos de Docking se tratará de hallar modificaciones topológicas de glicanos que potencialmente tengan propiedades anti-adhesivas para células tumorales. Este proyecto constará de tres etapas: una teórica, utilizando programas de cálculos para ensayos de Docking y mínimos energéticos de glicanos. Otra de síntesis, generando los glicoconjugados sugeridos en la etapa anterior. En la última, se verificará si estos glicanos rediseñados adquirieron las propiedades biológicas deseadas. Así se determinará si generan una respuesta inmune que reconozca antígenos y células tumorales. También, se analizarán las propiedades anti-adhesivas de los glicanos utilizando diferentes modelos experimentales. Finalmente, se determinará si los inmunógenos producidos y/o glicoconjugados rediseñados poseen efecto en el desarrollo tumoral y sobrevida animal.

Teaching Basic Life Support to Students of Public and Private High Schools

Background:Despite being recommended as a compulsory part of the school curriculum, the teaching of basic life support (BLS) has yet to be implemented in high schools in most countries.Objectives:To compare prior knowledge and degree of immediate and delayed learning between students of one public and one private high school after these students received BLS training.Methods:Thirty students from each school initially answered a questionnaire on cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and use of the automated external defibrillator (AED). They then received theoretical-practical BLS training, after which they were given two theory assessments: one immediately after the course and the other six months later.Results:The overall success rates in the prior, immediate, and delayed assessments were significantly different between groups, with better performance shown overall by private school students than by public school students: 42% ± 14% vs. 30.2% ± 12.2%, p = 0.001; 86% ± 7.8% vs. 62.4% ± 19.6%, p < 0.001; and 65% ± 12.4% vs. 45.6% ± 16%, p < 0.001, respectively. The total odds ratio of the questions showed that the private school students performed the best on all three assessments, respectively: 1.66 (CI95% 1.26-2.18), p < 0.001; 3.56 (CI95% 2.57-4.93), p < 0.001; and 2.21 (CI95% 1.69-2.89), p < 0.001.Conclusions:Before training, most students had insufficient knowledge about CPR and AED; after BLS training a significant immediate and delayed improvement in learning was observed in students, especially in private school students.

On the stepwise and disciplined engineering of adaptive service-oriented applications

Magdeburg, Univ., Fak. für Informatik, Habil.-Schr., 2010

Hypermodelling : next level software engineering with data warehouses

Magdeburg, Univ., Fak. für Informatik, Diss., 2013

Energieeffizienz in Gebäuden durch innovative Gebäudetechnik, Durchgängiges Engineering von Gebäudesystemen

Aufbauend auf den Arbeiten von Prof. Dr. Müller (Hochschule Wismar) wird am Beispiel eines Fachklinikums mit Forschungslaboratorien eine Methode und Struktur der integrierten Planung zur Gebäudetechnik und Gebäudeautomation vorgestellt. Die linear integrierte Planung der HOAI wird aufgelöst in einen auf mehreren Varianten basierenden Planungsablauf, der durch die variablen Kriterien Energieeffizienz und Ökonomie zu einer optimierten Gesamtlösung führt.

Verwendung von Merkmalen im Engineering von Systemen

Magdeburg, Univ., Fak. für Elektrotechnik und Informationstechnik, Diss., 2015

Algorithm engineering for expression dag based number types

Magdeburg, Univ., Fak. für Informatik, Diss., 2015

Einfluss der Gravitation auf humane Chondrozyten : Tissue Engineering des Knorpels

Universität Magdeburg, Univ., Dissertation, 2015

National Aquaculture Development Plan / prepared by the Joint Subcommittee on Aquaculture of the Federal Coordinating Council on Science, Engineering and Technology.

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