As Ciências Espaciais, o saber e o fazer docente no ensino fundamental

This study aims to include topics related to Space Science in elementary education from an experiment that aims to rescue the science teachers in public schools of São Tomé, RN, a taste for experimentation and exploration of advanced technologies. During this research with teachers found that they knew enough about the subject, but this knowledge was restricted to the events disclosed by the media. Regarding scientific knowledge, that same surface, they had many conceptual difficulties which hindered the approach of these topics in their classes. To overcome this difficulty, a workshop was held where teachers had the opportunity to discuss the historical aspect of Space Science, some physical concepts related to it, and the conduct of experiments with PET bottle rockets that recover from the curiosity typical of how the science. The results were outlined in the form of Planning Didactic built by teachers and using themes related to space science, from there, discussing content already provided in the composition of the schools curriculum. Therefore, this work allowed the teachers a minimum training required for them to not only reproduce, but readjusted and build, from this, their own paths in the classroom at the fundamental level

Atividades experimentais no ensino de biologia em escolas públicas do estado do Rio Grande do Norte, Brasil: caracterização geral e concepção de professores

Recent research has revealed that the majority of Biology teachers believe the practice of experimental activities as a didactical means would be the solution for the improvement of the Biology teaching-learning process. There are, however, studies which signal the lack of efficiency in such practice lessons as far as building scientific knowledge is concerned. It is also said that despite the enthusiasm on the teachers‟ part, such classes are rarely taught in high school. Several studies point pedagogical difficulties as well as nonexistence of a minimal infrastructure needed in laboratories as cause of low frequency in experimental activities. The poor teacher performance in terms of planning and development of classes; the large number of students per class; lack of financial stimulus for teachers are other reasons to be taken into account among others, in which can also be included difficulties of epistemological nature. That means an unfavorable eye of the teacher towards experimental activities. Our study aimed to clarify if such scenario is generalized in high schools throughout the state of Rio Grande do Norte Brazil. During our investigation a sample of twenty teaching institutions were used. They were divided in two groups: in the first group, five IFRN- Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia do Rio Grande do Norte schools. Two of those in Natal, and the other three from the country side. The second group is represented by fifteen state schools belonging to the Natal metropolitan area. The objectives of the research were to label schools concerning laboratory facilities; to identify difficulties pointed by teachers when performing experiment classes, and to become familiar with the conceptions of the teachers in regarding biology experiment classes. To perform such task, a questionnaire was used as instrument of data collecting. It contained multiple choice, essay questions and a semi-structured interview with the assistance of a voice recorder. The data analysis and the in loco observation allowed the conclusion that the federal schools do present better facilities for the practice of experimental activities when compared to state schools. Another aspect pointed is the fact that teachers of federal schools have more time available for planning the experiments; they are also better paid and are given access a career development, which leads to better salaries. All those advantages however, do not show a significantly higher frequency regarding the development of experiments when compared to state school teachers. Both teachers of federal and state schools pointed infra-structure problems such as the availability of reactants, equipments and consumption supplies as main obstacle to the practice of experiments in biology classes. Such fact leads us to conclude that maybe there are other problems not covered by the questionnaire such as poor ability to plan and execute experimental activities. As far as conceptions about experimental activities, it was verified in the majority of the interviewees a inductive-empiric point of view of science possibly inherited during their academic formation and such point of view reflected on the way they plan and execute experiments with students

Orientação de imagens CBERS-2B usando o modelo rigoroso de colinearidade com dados orbitais

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

Extração de feições retas com precisão subpixel: estudo comparativo entre três métodos

In the fields of Machine Vision and Photogrammetry, extracted straight lines from digital images can be used either as vector elements of a digital representation or as control entities that allow the determination of the camera interior and exterior orientation parameters. Applications related with image orientation require feature extraction with subpixel precision, to guarantee the reliability of the estimated parameters. This paper presents three approaches for straight line extraction with subpixel precision. The first approach considers the subpixel refinement based on the weighted average of subpixel positions calculated on the direction perpendicular to the segmented straight line. In the second approach, a parabolic function is adjusted to the grey level profile of neighboring pixels in a perpendicular direction to the segmented line, followed by an interpolation of this model to estimate subpixel coordinates of the line center. In the third approach, the subpixel refinement is performed with a parabolic surface adjustment to the grey level values of neighboring pixels around the segmented line. The intersection of this surface with a normal plane to the line direction generates a parabolic equation that allows estimating the subpixel coordinates of the point in the straight line, assuming that this is the critical point of this function. Three experiments with real images were made and the approach based on parabolic surface adjustment has presented better results.

A influência das injunções de orientação relativa na calibração de um sistema dual de câmeras digitais

Image acquisition systems based on multi-head arrangement of digital frame cameras, such as the commercial systems DMC, UltraCam, besides others, are attractive alternatives enabling larger imaging area when compared to a single frame camera. Considering that in these systems, cameras are tightly attached to an external mount, it is assumed that relative position and orientation between cameras are stable during image acquisition and, consequently, these constraint can be included in the calibration step. This constraint is acceptable because estimates of the relative orientation (RO) parameters between cameras, from previously estimated exterior orientation parameters, present higher and significant deviations than the expected physical variations, due to error propagation. In order to solve this problem, this work presents an approach based on simultaneous calibration of two or more cameras using constraints that state that the relative rotation matrix and the distance between the cameras head are stable. Experiments with images acquired by an arrangement of two Hasselblad H2D cameras were accomplished, without and with the mentioned constraints. The experiments showed that the calibration process with RO constraints allows better results than the approach based on single camera calibration, provided that the estimation has included only images with good target distribution.

An Anisotropic Model of Damage and Unilateral Effect for Brittle Materials

This work deals with the initial applications and formulation of an aniscitropic plastic-damage constitutive model proposed for non-linear analysis of reinforced concrete structures submitted to a loading with change of the sign. The original constitutive model is based on the fundamental hypothesis of energy equivalence between real and continuous medium following the concepts of the Continuum Damage Mechanics. The concrete is assumed as an initial elastic isotropic medium presenting anisotropy, permanent strains and bimodularity (distinct elastic responses whether traction or compression stress states prevail) induced by damage evolution. In order to take into account the bimodularity, two damage tensors governing the rigidity in tension or compression regimes are introduced. Then, some conditions are introduced in the original version of the model in order to simulate the damage unilateral effect. The three-dimensional version of the proposed model is analyzed in order to validate its formulation when compared to micromechanical theory. The one-dimensional version of the model is applied in the analyses of a reinforced concrete beam submitted to a loading with change of the sign. Despite the parametric identification problems, the initial applications show the good performance of the model.

Phytase immobilization on modified electrodes for amperometric biosensing

Phytase (myo-inositol hexaphosphate phosphohydrolase) and phytic acid (myo-inositol hexaphosphate) play an important environmental role, in addition to being a health issue in food industry. Phytic acid is antinutritional due to its ability to chelate metal ions and may also react with proteins decreasing their bioavailability. In this work, we produced biosensors with phytase immobilized in Layer-by-Layer (LbL) films, which could detect phytic acid with a detection limit of 0.19 mmol L-1, which is sufficient to detect phytic acid in seeds of grains and vegetables. The biosensosrs consisted of LbL films containing up to eight bilayers of phytase alternated with poly(allylamine) hydrochloride (PAH) deposited onto an indium-tin oxide (ITO) substrate modified with Prussian Blue. Amperometric detection was conducted in an acetate buffer solution (at pH 5.5) at room temperature, with the biosensor response attributed to the formation of phosphate ions. In subsidiary experiments with the currents measured at 0.0 V (vs. SCE), we demonstrated the absence of effects from some interferents, pointing to a good selectivity of the biosensor. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

New insights into trypanosomatid U5 small nuclear ribonucleoproteins

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

Influência de fatores individuais e sociais sobre as respostas endócrina e comportamental de callithrix jacchus a desafios ambientais físicos e sociais

Regarding the growing number of human beings with physical and mental pathologies associated to different stressor agents, attempts are being made to validate animal models with a close phylogenetic resemblance to man, to study stress response. Callithrix jacchus has been widely used in biomedical research, including on stress, but there is scarce information in the literature about how individual and social factors modulate stressor response in this species. This study uses 4 approaches to investigate the response of male and female adult C. jacchus, under situations of stress, and in the first we show evidence of the importance of this animal as an experimental model in research involving the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis. And we investigate if sex and baseline cortisol levels modulate the behavioral and hormonal response to separation. In two additional approaches investigate if type of social support (co-specific parent or non-parent) and social rank interfere in behavioral and hormonal when the animal are exposure to a new environment, paired with a co-specific (F2), exposure of the animal to a new environment, isolated (F3) or during reunion (F4). Finally, we also investigated the androgen levels in the males, with a focus on the challenge hypothesis, referring to environmental responsiveness and male-male exposure to relatives and non-relatives of C. jacchus. It was observed that: (1) the baseline cortisol of the animal is predictive of cortisol reactivity at separation; (2) males and females do not show dimorphism in the response of cortisol to stressors, although the females have higher baseline levels of this hormone and exhibit higher frequencies of anxiety-related behaviors; (3) only social support provided by relatives proved to be effective in buffering the cortisol response. In behavioral terms this response was dimorphic, showing that only the male dyads displayed an attenuated response to stress; (4) the males showed differences in cortisol levels as a function of social rank and study phases, whereas in the females no such alterations were observed. The males with indefinite dominance hierarchy (IDH) had reduced cortisol in F2 and F4, while the IDH females showed an increase in F3 and F4; (5) the males of relative and non-relative dyads did not exhibit variations in androgen levels as a function of a new environment. These results, taken together, (a) corroborate the use of C. jacchus as a good animal model for stress-related studies, given that they exhibit similar behavioral and physiological alterations to those of human beings in response to stressor agents; (b) point to the importance of considering individual and social modulating factors during experiments with stressors; (c) provide more reliable comparison parameters in studies where these primates are used as animal models, and (d) show that androgens vary as a function of genetic proximity (relative or non-relative) when the animals are faced with physical and social environmental challenges, thus providing important information for studying the challenge hypothesis in this species

Estudo da organização funcional do sistema circadiano por meio de ferramentas computacionais e matemáticas

Circadian rhythms are variations in physiological processes that help living beings to adapt to environmental cycles. These rhythms are generated and are synchronized to the dark light cycle through the suprachiasmatic nucleus. The integrity of circadian rhythmicity has great implication on human health. Currently it is known that disturbances in circadian rhythms are related to some problems of today such as obesity, propensity for certain types of cancer and mental disorders for example. The circadian rhythmicity can be studied through experiments with animal models and in humans directly. In this work we use computational models to gather experimental results from the literature and explain the results of our laboratory. Another focus of this study was to analyze data rhythms of activity and rest obtained experimentally. Here we made a review on the use of variables used to analyze these data and finally propose an update on how to calculate these variables. Our models were able to reproduce the main experimental results in the literature and provided explanations for the results of experiments performed in our laboratory. The new variables used to analyze the rhythm of activity and rest in humans were more efficient to describe the fragmentation and synchronization of this rhythm. Therefore, the work contributed improving existing tools for the study of circadian rhythms in mammals

Lógica por trás dos contratos sociais

Natural selection shapes body and behavior of each species. For primates, the social environment constituted one of the greatest selective pressure for the development of their cognition. When we consider gender differences, we see that sexual selection also operates through different selective pressures for men and women not only in physical terms but in terms of cognitive skills. Among these, the primary cognitive abilities - that emerge naturally - and secondary - that rely on an artificial environment for learning - develop differently for each sex, making them suitable for specific tasks in different capacities. Previous studies utilized the Wason Selection Test a conditional logic tool - to measure, among several other things, the ability to recognize violation of rules in abstract contexts and social contexts. Subjects generally had better performance in the latter, however, in these studies possible differences motivated by learning in formal logic or genre were not considered. Our study investigated these two variables, as well as the time spent to solve each task. Furthermore, we used an index to take into account the rights and wrongs of the participants in tasks. We realized that although learning in formal logic does not bring significant differences in solving tests, the gender differences are strongly observed when we consider the social contexts and abstract. Women perform better in social tasks. This can be explained due to different sexual selective pressures for this gender in terms of one-on-one relationships within the group. Men are better at tasks of abstract context and this is probably due to the same reason. Their capabilities for territory defense, habitat navigation and forming coalitions depends on primary cognitive abilities that support secondary cognitive skills of abstraction. Thus, gender differences are a factor to be taken into account in controlling future experiments with the same tool

A DOE based approach for the design of RBF artificial neural networks applied to prediction of surface roughness in AISI 52100 hardened Steel turning

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Degradation of [D-Leu]-Microcystin-LR by solar heterogeneous photocatalysis (TiO2)

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Influência do cálcio na calda de pulverização sobre a eficácia do carfentrazone-ethyl no controle de Euphorbia heterophylla

Alguns herbicidas podem ter sua eficácia de controle das plantas daninhas diminuída quando o cálcio encontra-se presente na calda de pulverização. Sendo assim, o presente trabalho foi desenvolvido com o objetivo de estudar a influência do cálcio na eficácia do herbicida carfentrazone-ethyl aplicado em pós-emergência sobre plantas adultas de Euphorbia heterophylla. Foram conduzidos dois experimentos com as concentrações de cálcio variando de 30 a 240 ppm e de 0 a 1.000 ppm respectivamente em cada experimento. O delineamento experimental utilizado foi o de blocos ao acaso, com quatro repetições. Observou-se que a eficácia do herbicida carfentrazone-ethyl não é afetada pela presença de cálcio em concentrações na calda de pulverização de até 1.000 ppm e que, na dose de 30 g i.a.ha-1 o herbicida é eficiente no controle de plantas adultas de E. heterophylla.

Conciliação entre modelos de mecanismos avançados de oxidação eletroquímica

Many pollutants dumped in waterways, such as dyes and pesticides, have become so ubiquitous that they represent a serious threat to human health. The electrochemical oxidation is presented as an alternative clean, efficient and economic degradation of wastewater containing organic compounds and a number of advantages of this technique is to just not make use of chemical reagents, since only electrical energy is consumed during the removal of pollutants organic. However, despite being a promising alternative, still needs some tweaking in order to obtain better efficiency in the elimination of persistent pollutants. Thus, this study sought a relationship between a recently discovered phenomenon that reflects the participation of dissolved oxygen in solution in the electrochemical oxidation process, as an anomaly, present a kinetic model that shows instantaneous current efficiency (ICE) above 100% limited by theory, manifested for some experiments with phenolic compounds with H2SO4 or HClO4 as supporting electrolyte with electrodes under anodic oxidation on boron doped diamond (BDD). Therefore it was necessary to reproduce the data ICE exposes the fault model, and thus the 2-naphthol was used as phenolic compound to be oxidised at concentrations of 9, 12 and 15 mmol L-1, and H2SO4 and HClO4 to 1 mol L-1 as a supporting electrolyte under a current density of 30 mA cm-2 in an electrochemical reactor for continuous flow disk configuration, and equipped with anodes DDB at room temperature (25 oC). Experiments were performed using N2 like as purge gas for eliminate oxygen dissolved in solution so that its influence in the system was studied. After exposure of the anomaly of the ICE model and investigation of its relationship with dissolved O2, the data could be treated, making it possible for confirmation. But not only that, the data obtained from eletranálise and spectroscopic analysis suggest the involvement of other strongly oxidizing species (O3 (ozone) and O radicals and O2 -), since the dissolved O2 can be consumed during the formation of new strong oxidizing species, not considered until now, something that needs to be investigated by more accurate methods that we may know a little more of this system. Currently the performance of the electrocatalytic process is established by a complex interaction between different parameters that can be optimized, so it is necessary to the implementation of theoretical models, which are the conceptual lens with which researchers see