Determinação do potencial biológico e antioxidante de extratos de casca de raiz de Maytenus ilicifolia (Celastraceae)

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Caracterização do pontencial biológico de Leiothrix spiralis Ruhland E Syngonanthus nitens (Bong.) Ruhland (Eriocaulaceae)

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Resistência de genótipos de tomateiro a Tuta absoluta (Meyrick, 1917) (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae) e efeito no comportamento e desenvolvimento de podisus nigrispinus (Dallas, 1851) (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae)

Pós-graduação em Agronomia (Entomologia Agrícola) - FCAV

Uso sustentável da biodiversidade brasileira: prospecção químico-farmacológica em plantas superiores : Guapira ssp

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Avaliação do potencial biológico de extratos hidroetanólicos de Astronium sp incorporados ou não em sistemas nanoestruturados: in vitro e in vivo: in vitro e in vivo

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Diterpenos tetranorlabdanos e isocumarinas produzidos por Botryosphaeria parva, um fungo endofítico em Eugenia jambolana Lam. (Myrtaceae)

Pós-graduação em Química - IQ

Fungos endofíticos em Eugenia brasiliensis: prospecção química, biológica, enzimática e avaliação do co-cultivo e epigenética em Xylaria cubensis, Diaporthe sp. e Colletotrichum sp.

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Surface sediment analyses, bivalve and gastropod taxa of marine sediments from the Banc d'Arguin, Mauritania

High-nutrient tropical carbonate systems are known to produce sediments that, in terms of skeletal composition, are reminiscent of their extra-tropical counterparts. Such carbonate systems and associated carbonate grain assemblages in the tropics are rare in the present-day world. Nonetheless, it is crucial to gain a better understanding of those ecosystems, including their drivers and players because such settings potentially represent models for ancient depositional systems as well as for predicted future environmental conditions. One of the modern occurrences of eutrophic tropical carbonate systems is the northern Mauritanian Shelf. The marine environment is characterized by an eastern boundary upwelling system that pushes cool and nutrient-rich intermediate waters onto a wide epicontinental platform (Golfe d'Arguin) where the waters warm up to tropical temperatures. The resulting facies is mixed carbonate-siliciclastic with a dominant foramol association grading into bimol and barnamol grain assemblages in the shallowest areas forming the Banc d'Arguin. Besides this cool water-related heterozoan association, the carbonate sediment is characterized by tropical molluskan species, while chlorozoan biota (e.g., corals and algal symbiont-bearing foraminifers) are entirely absent. We here present a first comprehensive facies analysis of this model example of eutrophic tropical carbonates. Furthermore, we reconstruct the loci of carbonate production and provide a conclusive depositional model of the Banc d'Arguin that received little attention to date due to its poorly accessible nature.

Millenial variability of dust in South Atlantic sediment records

Fluxes of lithogenicmaterial and fluxes of three palaeo productivity proxies (organic carbon, biogenic opal and alkenones) over the past 100,000 years were determined using the 230Th-normalization method in three sediment cores from the Subantarctic South Atlantic Ocean. Features in the lithogenic flux record of each core correspond to similar features in the record of dust deposition in the EPICA Dome C ice core. Biogenic fluxes correlate with lithogenic fluxes in each sediment core. Our preferred interpretation is that South American dust, most probably from Patagonia, constitutes a major source of lithogenic material in Subantarctic South Atlantic sediments, and that past biological productivity in this region responded to variability in the supply of dust, probably due to biologically available iron carried by the dust. Greater nutrient supply as well as greater nutrient utilization (stimulated by dust) contributed to Subantarctic productivity during cold periods, in contrast to the region south of the Antarctic Polar Front (APF), where reduced nutrient supply during cold periods was the principal factor limiting productivity. The anti-phased patterns of productivity on opposite sides of the APF point to shifts in the physical supply of nutrients and to dust as cofactors regulating productivity in the Southern Ocean.

A splice variant of alpha 6 integrin is associated with malignant conversion in mouse skin tumorigenesis.

The epithelial-specific integrin alpha 6 beta 4 is suprabasally expressed in benign skin tumors (papillomas) and is diffusely expressed in carcinomas associated with an increase in the proliferating compartment. Analysis of RNA samples by reverse transcriptase-PCR and DNA sequencing revealed that chemically or oncogenically induced papillomas (n = 8) expressed a single transcript of the alpha 6 subunit, identified as the alpha 6 A splice variant. In contrast, carcinomas (n = 13) expressed both alpha 6A and an alternatively spliced form, alpha 6B. Primary keratinocytes and a number of keratinocyte cell lines that vary in biological potential from normal skin, to benign papillomas, to well-differentiated slowly growing carcinomas exclusively expressed alpha 6A. However, I7, an oncogene-induced cell line that produces highly invasive carcinomas, expressed both alpha 6A and alpha 6B transcript and protein. The expression of alpha 6B in I7 cells was associated with increased attachment to a laminin matrix compared to cell lines exclusively expressing alpha 6A. Furthermore, introduction of an alpha 6B expression vector into a papilloma cell line expressing alpha 6A increased laminin attachment. When a papilloma cell line was converted to an invasive carcinoma by introduction of the v-fos oncogene, the malignant cells expressed both alpha 6A and alpha 6B, while the parent cell line and cells transduced with v-jun or c-myc, which retained the papilloma phenotype, expressed only alpha 6A. Comparative analysis of alpha 6B expression in cell lines and their derived tumors indicate that alpha 6B transcripts are more abundant in tumors than cell lines, and alpha 6B is expressed to a greater extent in poorly differentiated tumors. These results establish a link between malignant conversion and invasion of squamous tumor cells and the regulation of transcript processing of the alpha 6 beta 4 integrin.

Estudo dos marcadores genéticos dos sistemas CODIS e ESS na população imigrante de Cabo Verde residente em Lisboa

Tese de mestrado, Medicina Legal e Ciências Forenses, Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Medicina, 2016

Morphometric redefinition of the component chronospecies of the Globorotalia conoidea - G. inflata lineage in DSDP Hole 29-284

Phylo-zonations (or lineage-zonations) are based upon morphological changes within individual evolutionary lineages. These zonations, although potentially of use for stratigraphic subdivision and correlation, often suffer from a lack of quantitative exactness in the definitions of chronospecies. Thus exact reproducibility is hindered for stratigraphic determinations. The potential of morphometrically defined phylo-zonations is demonstrated on a temperate South Pacific Late Cenozoic lineage of planktonic foraminifera (Globorotalia conoidea through intermediate forms to Globorotalia inflata in DSDP Site 284) exhibiting phyletic gradualism. Our sampling interval is about 0.1 m.y. during the last 8 m.y. Changes in the number of chambers in the final whorl, test conicalness, percentage of keeled forms, and test roundness or inflatedness, are used to quantitatively define the following five chronospecies: G. conoidea (Late Miocene; 6.1->8.3 m.y.), G. conomiozea (latest Miocene ; 5.3-6.1 m.y.), G. puncticulata sphericomiozea (earliest Pliocene; 4.5-5.3 m.y.), G. puncticulata puncticulata (Early-Middle Pliocene; 2.9-4.5 m.y.), and G. inflata (Late Pliocene-Quaternary; 0-2.9 m.y.). This phylo-zonation is directly applicable to temperate cool subtropical Southern Hemisphere areas where the evolution took place (Kennett, 1967, 1973; Scott, 1979). It is still not known if the lineage occurs elsewhere; thus the applicability of the phylo-zonation over broader areas is still uncertain. Trends in general size and aperture shape seem to be climatically controlled, and thus may be only of local stratigraphic utility. The practical applications of morphometric phylo-zonation for stratigraphy is to a large extent dependent upon the amount of time and effort required to statistically define the trends. Experiments with large numbers of subsamples from this lineage demonstrate that accurate stratigraphic determinations are possible from measurements on only 15 specimens per sample, except for those very close to chronospecies boundaries.

Análise fitoquímica e avaliação das atividades anti-inflamatória, antipeçonhenta e citotóxica de extratos aquosos de Aspidosperma pyrifolium e Ipomoea asarifolia

Envenomation caused by venomous animals, mainly scorpions and snakes, are a serious matter of public health. Tityus serrulatus is considered the most venomous scorpion in South America because of the high level of toxicity of its venom. It is responsible for causing serious accidents, mainly with kids. The species Bothrops jararaca is a serpent that has in its venom a complex mixture of enzyme, peptides and other molecules. The toxins of the venom of B. jararaca induce local and systemic inflammatory responses. The treatment chosen to serious cases of envenomation is the intravenous administration of the specific antivenom. However, the treatment is not always accessible to those residents in rural areas, so that they use medicinal plant extracts as the treatment. In this context, aqueous extracts, fractions and isolated compounds of Aspidosperma pyrifolium (pereiro) and Ipomoea asarifolia (salsa, salsa-brava), used in popular medicine, were studied in this research to evaluate the anti-inflammatory activity in the peritonitis models induced by carrageenan and peritonitis induced by the venom of the T. serrulatus (VTs), and in the local oedema model and inflammatory infiltrate induced by the venom of the B. jararaca, administrated intravenously. The results of the assays of cytotoxicity, using the MTT, showed that the aqueous extracts from the plant species presented low toxicity to the cells that came from the fibroblast of the mouse embryo (3T3).The chemical analysis of the extracts by High Performance Liquid Chromatography revealed the presence of the rutin flavonoid, in A. pyrifoliu, and rutin, clorogenic acid and caffeic acid, in I. asarifolia. Concerning the pharmacological evaluation, the results showed that the pre-treatment using aqueous extracts and fractions reduced the total leukocyte migration to the abdominal cavity in the peritonitis model caused by the carrageenan and in the peritonitis model induced by the T. serulatus venom. Yet, these groups presented anti-oedematous activity, in the local oedema model caused by the venom of the B. jararaca, and reduced the inflammatory infiltrate to the muscle. The serum (anti-arachnid and anti-bothropic) specific to each venom acted inhibiting the inflammatory action of the venoms and were used as control. The compounds identified in the extracts were also tested and, similar to the plant extracts, showed meaningful anti-inflammatory effects, in the tested doses. Thus, these results are indicating the potential anti-inflammatory activity of the plants studied. This is the first research that evaluated the possible biological effects of the A. pyrifolium and I. asarifolia, showing the biological potential that these species have.