Does Gender Affect Visiting a World Heritage Site?

The city of Guimar˜aes in Portugal is a place of strong symbolic and cultural significance, and the nomination of its historical center as a World Heritage Site in 2001 enhanced its tourism potential. This study presents the results of a survey conducted in 2010 and 2011 to capture the profile and motivations of tourists visiting Guimar˜aes as a cultural tourism destination. The study addressed two main issues: whether males and females have similar or different preferences in choosing the city as their destination, and whether there are gender differences in the perception of the attributes of Guimar˜aes. A better understanding of the gendered nature of the destination is a valuable cue for shaping products and services according to visitors’ preferences. The results suggest that both men and women are aware of the main elements responsible for the city’s World Heritage status. That the destination is a Heritage Site that also offers the opportunity to tour the region has a significant positive effect on male tourists’ choice of Guimar˜aes. Regarding the perceived attributes of the city, results indicate minor gender differences with one exception: Women expressed more apprehension than men regarding the perceived security of the destination.

Residents’ perspectives on tourism impacts of portuguese world heritage historic centers: Angra do Heroísmo and Évora

The aim of this study is twofold. First, the study analyzes local community perspectives of the importance of the World Heritage Site (WHS) classification of the historic centers of Angra do Heroísmo and Évora. Second, the study analyzes local residents’ perceived tourism impacts on the municipalities of Angra do Heroísmo and Évora. The methodology comprises quantitative research based on a self-administered survey applied to convenience samples of local residents of the two Portuguese municipalities in 2014. The main results reveal that local residents have a strongly positive perception of the WHS designation in both municipalities. With regard to the perceived tourism impacts, residents from Angra do Heroísmo have a stronger agreement about the impacts of tourism on their city than the residents of Évora, except for the negative social and cultural impacts. The comparison of the mean scores of these impacts across residents that live near and far from the historic centers reveals that the most valued and least valued impacts in the three categories of impacts (economic, social and cultural, and environmental) are common to all groups of residents. Nevertheless, residents living in or near the historic center of Angra do Heroísmo have higher means in the majority of tourism impacts (in all categories), with only one negative impact to concern the majority of respondents. Among the residents from Évora, residents living in or near the historic center have higher means in the majority of economic impacts but lower means in almost social and cultural impacts. With regard to the environmental impacts, residents living in or near the historic center have higher means scores in the positive impacts and lower means scores in the negative environmental impacts.

WAML World Congress: Direito Médico Mundial em Portugal

Eis que existem boas notícias científicas em Portugal. O WAML World Congress é o maior e mais prestigiado congresso mundial de direito médico. E, desta vez, vai ter lugar em Portugal, mais em concreto na Cidade capital do Mondego, Coimbra, entre os próximos dias 2 e 7 de Agosto de 2015. O seu Presidente ou Chairman, será o especialista português em direito médico, professor da Faculdade de Direito da Universidade de Coimbra, Doutor André Gonçalo Dias Pereira. Especialista que já esteve a fazer um excelente Seminário em Barcelos, Escola Superior de Gestão do Instituto Politécnico do Cávado e do Ave, no dia 26 de Maio de 2014, com o título de “O Direito da Concorrência: análise de um caso real”. Tema que relacionou com a poderosa indústria farmacêutica, entre outros aspectos conexos. § Behold, there are good scientific news in Portugal. The WAML World Congress is the largest and most prestigious world congress of medical law. And this time, will take place in Portugal, more specifically in the Mondego capital city, Coimbra, between 2nd and August 7, 2015. The President or Chairman, will be the Portuguese expert in medical law professor Faculty of Law, University of Coimbra, Doctor André Gonçalo Dias Pereira. Specialist who has been doing an excellent Seminar in Barcelos, School of Management Cávado Polytechnic Institute and Ave, on May 26, 2014, with the title "The Competition Law: analysis of a real case." Theme related to the powerful pharmaceutical industry, and other related aspects.

Responsabilidade Financeira e Criminal, o livro (Recensão)

“Responsabilidade Financeira e Criminal § Direitos Constitucionais Sociais, Dinheiros Públicos e Recuperação de Activos”, com Prefácio do Sr. Prof. Associado com Agregação, da Faculdade de Direito da Universidade de Coimbra, Doutor Jónatas E.M. Machado, é o título e tema do nosso último livro jurídico dado à estampa pela chancela da Editora Juruá, Curitiba e Lisboa, 2015. Livro o qual está disponível em Portugal nas livrarias Almedina ou em inúmeras livrarias do Brasil. Ou ainda através da loja virtual daquela que é uma das maiores editoras do mundo em língua portuguesa, a Editora Juruá que tem mais de 46 anos de vida: www.jurua.com.br § "Financial Responsibility and Criminal § Constitutional Social Rights, Public Moneys and Assets Recovery" with Prof. Mr. Preface Associated with aggregation, the Law Faculty of the University of Coimbra, Doctor Jónatas E.M. Machado is the title and theme of our last legal book given to the press by the seal of Editora Jurua, Curitiba and Lisbon, 2015. Book which is available in Portugal Almedina in bookstores or in several bookstores in Brazil. Or through the online store of what is one of the largest publishers in the world in English, Editora Jurua which has more than 46 years: www.jurua.com.br

Computer-aided recognition of dental implants in X-ray images

Dental implant recognition in patients without available records is a time-consuming and not straightforward task. The traditional method is a complete user-dependent process, where the expert compares a 2D X-ray image of the dental implant with a generic database. Due to the high number of implants available and the similarity between them, automatic/semi-automatic frameworks to aide implant model detection are essential. In this study, a novel computer-aided framework for dental implant recognition is suggested. The proposed method relies on image processing concepts, namely: (i) a segmentation strategy for semi-automatic implant delineation; and (ii) a machine learning approach for implant model recognition. Although the segmentation technique is the main focus of the current study, preliminary details of the machine learning approach are also reported. Two different scenarios are used to validate the framework: (1) comparison of the semi-automatic contours against implant’s manual contours of 125 X-ray images; and (2) classification of 11 known implants using a large reference database of 601 implants. Regarding experiment 1, 0.97±0.01, 2.24±0.85 pixels and 11.12±6 pixels of dice metric, mean absolute distance and Hausdorff distance were obtained, respectively. In experiment 2, 91% of the implants were successfully recognized while reducing the reference database to 5% of its original size. Overall, the segmentation technique achieved accurate implant contours. Although the preliminary classification results prove the concept of the current work, more features and an extended database should be used in a future work.

Competitividade das nações: análise da métrica utilizada pelo World Economic Forum

A competitividade das nações é assunto relevante aos tomadores de decisão quando se trata da escolha do país que poderá render melhores resultados aos investimentos. Nessa linha, busca-se analisar a métrica de competitividade dos países utilizando conceitos da estatística multivariada, a fim de simplificar e evitar resultados dúbios quanto ao tema. Para isso, utilizaram-se as bases de dados de 2010 publicadas pelo World Economic Forum (WEF), que utiliza 12 pilares para estabelecer a condição competitiva de 133 países. Verificou-se que a métrica utilizada pelo WEF é redundante, já que utiliza pilares que representam o mesmo constructo. Verificou-se, ainda, que a prontidão tecnológica explica a competitividade do país em 86,5% e que a combinação entre estabilidade macroeconômica, qualidade do ensino superior e sofisticação dos negócios eleva esse percentual para 95,7%.