Desenvolvimento de um instrumento portátil para detectar falha em rolamento de motor de indução, pela técnica do envelope, usando um DSP de 16 bits e a transformada de Hilbert

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Projeto de um motor 4 tempos a gasolina monocilíndrico: calculo termodinâmico, desenho, usinagem e montagem da parte alternativa

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Análise do desempenho de um gerador elétrico de pequeno porte acionado a motor de combustão a quatro tempos

Pós-graduação em Engenharia Mecânica - FEG

Indução de plasticidade cerebral por remoção da matriz extracelular após lesão isquêmica no córtex sensório-motor de ratos

O acidente vascular cerebral (AVC) é a terceira maior causa de mortalidade e incapacidade no mundo e a principal causa de mortes no Brasil. Após a lesão isquêmica, pela capacidade limitada do Sistema Nervoso Central (SNC) se regenerar, os déficits funcionais geralmente são incapacitantes e permanentes. A incapacidade de regeneração decorre, dentre outros fatores, do acúmulo de proteoglicanos de sulfato de condroitina (PGSC) no local da lesão, inibindo a plasticidade no microambiente extracelular. A enzima condroitinase ABC (ChABC) tem se mostrado eficiente para degradar os PGSC, proporcionando plasticidade. Esta pesquisa se propõe a avaliar o efeito da remoção de PGSC após uma lesão isquêmica no córtex sensório-motor primário de ratos. Para tal, utilizou-se 20 ratos Wistar, em 4 grupos experimentais, controle e tratado, com tempo de sobrevida de 7 e 14 dias. Induziu-se uma lesão isquêmica através de microinjeções do vasoconstritor ET-1 (Endotelina-1) no córtex sensório-motor, implantou-se um polímero de Etileno vinil acetato saturado com ChABC (tratado) ou BSA (controle). Morfologicamente, avaliamos a área de lesão, que se mostrou sem diferença estatística entre grupo controle 7 dias (média de 1653,8 ± 162,57mm²), tratado 7 dias (média de 2067,3 ± 235,42mm²), controle 14 dias (média de 1267,16 ± 280,6mm²), tratado 14 dias (média de 1323,8 ± 297,05mm²) após lesão; a quantidade de astrócitos, que também se mostrou sem diferença estatística entre grupo controle 7 dias (média de 16,6±4,67 células/campo), tratado 7 (média de 21,07±1,87 células/campo) e controle 14 (média de 17,46±0,80 células/campo), tratado 14 (média de 18,51±2,60 células/campo) dias após lesão; e a expressão de controitin degradado, que qualitativamente foi mais expresso nos ratos tratados 7 e 14 dias após lesão. Comportamentalmente, no teste do cilindro, animais tratados tiveram índice de assimetria menor já em 7 dias após lesão, com diferença significativa entre os grupos. No teste da escada horizontal, os animais tratados tiveram menor diferença intragrupo que os controles. Em 7 dias após lesão, já estavam com o mesmo desempenho funcional que seu pré-cirúrgico. Os dados comportamentais demonstram que a ChABC foi eficaz na melhora do desempenho funcional de maneira precoce, o que significa que a degradação das PGSC abre uma janela plástica na lesão isquêmica cortical, sem influenciar no tamanho da lesão e quantidade de astrócitos na cicatriz glial, porém com melhora do desempenho funcional de maneira precoce. Novos estudos devem ser realizados, associando a ChABC a terapêuticas adjuvantes no tratamento de lesões isquêmicas experimentais.

Minociclina atenua os prejuízos motores em ratos submetidos à isquemia focal no córtex motor e expostos cronicamente ao etanol da adolescência à fase adulta

Segundo a Organização Mundial da Saúde, o consumo de álcool no mundo tornou-se um problema de saúde pública. Neste contexto, o Brasil figura na 63ª posição no mundo em consumo de álcool per capita para pessoas com 15 anos ou mais de idade. Além de seus efeitos sócio-econômicos, o etanol constitui um importante fator de risco na ocorrência de isquemias cerebrais. O consumo exacerbado desta droga colabora para o mau prognóstico, assim como para o possível tratamento de morbidades relacionadas ao acidente vascular cerebral. O objetivo deste estudo foi avaliar alterações neuromotoras após bloqueio da ativação micróglial com minociclina em ratos submetidos à isquemia focal no córtex motor, quando tratadas cronicamente com etanol da adolescência a fase adulta. Ratos receberam durante 55 dias, por gavagem, etanol (6,5 g/kg/dia, 22,5 p/v). No término destes 55 dias os animais foram submetidos à microinjeções do peptídeo vasoconstritor endotelina-1 (40 pmol), para indução de lesão isquêmica focal córtex motor. Os animais isquemiados foram tratados com minociclina recebendo duas doses diárias de 50 mg/kg nos primeiros dois dias, e mais cinco aplicações diárias únicas de 25 mg/kg, por via intraperitoneal, até o sétimo dia pós-indução isquêmica. Os testes comportamentais realizados foram campo aberto, plano inclinado e rota-rod. Os resultados demonstraram que os animais isquemiados e os expostos ao etanol e isquemiados apresentaram déficits motores em todos os testes comportamentais. Entretanto, o tratamento com minociclina foi capaz de reverte-los, possibilitando melhor desempenho em todos os testes aplicados. Os resultados sugerem que a minociclina foi capaz de reverter os danos motores ocasionados pelo acidente vascular cerebral, mesmo em presença do etanol. O exato mecanismo envolvido neste processo necessita ser investigado em pesquisas futuras.

Caracterização de motor aeronaútico utilizando misturas de gasolina de aviação e etanol: aspectos fluidodinâmicos, termodinâmicos e ecológicos

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Single early prenatal lipopolysaccharide exposure impairs striatal monoamines and maternal care in female rats

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

Proposta de uma metodologia de rebobinamento para converter motor de indução trifásico em monofásico

This paper proposes the conversion of a three-phase induction motor into single phase through rewinding its stator. It presents a methodology to calculate this rewinding process considering the constructive parameters of the, such as number of slots and number of poles, for instance. The operating principles of DC motors are highlighted to introduce the logic involved in the calculation of lap and wave windings. The construction of the stator three-phase induction motor generally uses the lap winding, which is also used in single phase to perform the conversion. The rewinding process is widely used for reconstruction of industrial and residential electric motors that have suffered damage or present flaws with use. Therefore, many three-phase electric motors that are discarded or disposed of could be recovered by the method described in this work for a purpose that contributes to energy efficiency or simply saving resources in single-phase uses

Controle motor em pacientes com doença de Parkinson: terapia do espelho, foco de atenção e tarefa dupla

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

A method to investigate the shrinkage stress developed by resin-composites bonded to a single flat surface

Objectives. To purpose a method for predicting the shrinkage stress development in the adhesive layer of resin-composite cylinders that shrink bonded to a single flat surface, by measuring the deflection of a glass coverslip caused by the shrinkage of the bonded cylinders. The correlation between the volume of the bonded resin-composite and the stress-peak was also investigated. Methods. A glass coverslip deflection caused by the shrinkage of a bonded resin-composite cylinder (diameter: d = 8 mm, 4 mm, or 2 mm, height: h = 4 mm, 2 mm, 1 mm, or 0.5 mm) was measured, and the same set-up was simulated by finite element analysis (3D-FEA). Stresses generated in the adhesive layer were plotted versus two geometric variables of the resin-composite cylinder (C-Factor and volume) to verify the existence of correlations between them and stresses. Results. The FEA models were validated. A significant correlation (p < 0.01, Pearson's test) between the stress-peak and the coverslip deflection when the resin-composites were grouped by diameter was found for diameters of 2 and 4 mm. The stress-peak of the whole set of data showed a logarithmic correlation with the bonded resin-composite volume (p < 0.001, Pearson's test), but did not correlate with the C-Factor. Significance. The described method should be considered for standardizing the stress generated by the shrinkage of resin-composite blocks bonded to a single flat surface. (C) 2012 Academy of Dental Materials. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Analgesic effects of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation of the motor cortex in neuropathic pain: Influence of theta burst stimulation priming

Background Conventional protocols of high-frequency repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) delivered to M1 can produce analgesia. Theta burst stimulation (TBS), a novel rTMS paradigm, is thought to produce greater changes in M1 excitability than conventional protocols. After a preliminary experiment showing no analgesic effect of continuous or intermittent TBS trains (cTBS or iTBS) delivered to M1 as single procedures, we used TBS to prime a subsequent session of conventional 10?Hz-rTMS. Methods In 14 patients with chronic refractory neuropathic pain, navigated rTMS was targeted over M1 hand region, contralateral to painful side. Analgesic effects were daily assessed on a visual analogue scale for the week after each 10?Hz-rTMS session, preceded or not by TBS priming. In an additional experiment, the effects on cortical excitability parameters provided by single- and paired-pulse TMS paradigms were studied. Results Pain level was reduced after any type of rTMS procedure compared to baseline, but iTBS priming produced greater analgesia than the other protocols. Regarding motor cortex excitability changes, the analgesic effects were associated with an increase in intracortical inhibition, whatever the type of stimulation, primed or non-primed. Conclusions The present results show that the analgesic effects of conventional 10?Hz-rTMS delivered to M1 can be enhanced by TBS priming, at least using iTBS. Interestingly, the application of cTBS and iTBS did not produce opposite modulations, unlike previously reported in other systems. It remains to be determined whether the interest of TBS priming is to generate a simple additive effect or a more specific process of cortical plasticity.

Comparison between the C5 or C6-Cz electrode assembly and C3 or C4-Cz assembly for transcranial electric motor activation of muscular response of the contralateral facial nerve

We used an assembly of electrodes C3 and C4-Cz in order to activate the motor cortical area of the corticobulbar tract to elucidate the motor-evoked potential of the contralateral mentalis muscle. We compared this setup to that of an assembly with electrodes C5 or C6-Cz using a train of electrical pulses and a single electrical pulse. This analysis was made in 23 consecutive patients who underwent several varied surgeries and were prospectively operated on at Santa Paula Hospital between January and June 2011. The results showed that the assembly with C5 or C6-Cz produced a multisynaptic motor-evoked potential in the contralateral mentalis muscle in 86.9 % of the patients, whereas 82.6 % of patients stimulated at points C3 or C4-Cz presented the same response. However, both assemblies showed similar behavior with the use of a single electrical pulse for peripheral contralateral nerve stimulation. We concluded that the C5 or C6-Cz assembly was similar to C3 or C4-Cz in obtaining a multisynaptic response in the contralateral mentalis muscle, although it required less intensive stimulation than the C3 or C4- Cz assembly.

Effect of Nintendo Wii (TM)-based motor and cognitive training on activities of daily living in patients with Parkinson's disease: A randomised clinical trial

Objectives To investigate the effect of Nintendo Wii (TM)-based motor cognitive training versus balance exercise therapy on activities of daily living in patients with Parkinson's disease. Design Parallel, prospective, single-blind, randomised clinical trial. Setting Brazilian Parkinson Association. Participants Thirty-two patients with Parkinson's disease (Hoehn and Yahr stages 1 and 2). Interventions Fourteen training sessions consisting of 30 minutes of stretching, strengthening and axial mobility exercises, plus 30 minutes of balance training. The control group performed balance exercises without feedback or cognitive stimulation, and the experimental group performed 10 Wii Fit (TM) games. Main outcome measure Section II of the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS-II). Randomisation Participants were randomised into a control group (n = 16) and an experimental group (n = 16) through blinded drawing of names. Statistical analysis Repeated-measures analysis of variance (RM-ANOVA). Results Both groups showed improvement in the UPDRS-II with assessment effect (RM-ANOVA P < 0.001, observed power = 0.999). There was no difference between the control group and the experimental group before training {8.9 [standard deviation (SD) 2.9] vs 10.1 (SD 3.8)}, after training [7.6 (SD 2.9) vs 8.1 (SD 3.5)] or 60 days after training [8.1 (SD 3.2) vs 8.3 (SD 3.6)]. The mean difference of the whole group between before training and after training was -0.9 (SD 2.3, 95% confidence interval -1.7 to -0.6). Conclusion Patients with Parkinson's disease showed improved performance in activities of daily living after 14 sessions of balance training, with no additional advantages associated with the Wii-based motor and cognitive training. Registered on http://www.clinicaltrials.gov (identifier: NCT01580787). (C) 2012 Chartered Society of Physiotherapy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Influence of cueing on the preparation and execution of untrained and trained complex motor responses

This study investigated the influence of cueing on the performance of untrained and trained complex motor responses. Healthy adults responded to a visual target by performing four sequential movements (complex response) or a single movement (simple response) of their middle finger. A visual cue preceded the target by an interval of 300, 1000, or 2000 ms. In Experiment 1, the complex and simple responses were not previously trained. During the testing session, the complex response pattern varied on a trial-by-trial basis following the indication provided by the visual cue. In Experiment 2, the complex response and the simple response were extensively trained beforehand. During the testing session, the trained complex response pattern was performed in all trials. The latency of the untrained and trained complex responses decreased from the short to the medium and long cue-target intervals. The latency of the complex response was longer than that of the simple response, except in the case of the trained responses and the long cue-target interval. These results suggest that the preparation of untrained complex responses cannot be completed in advance, this being possible, however, for trained complex responses when enough time is available. The duration of the 1st submovement, 1st pause and 2nd submovement of the untrained and the trained complex responses increased from the short to the long cue-target interval, suggesting that there is an increase of online programming of the response possibly related to the degree of certainty about the moment of target appearance.

Language and Embodiment: sensory-motor and linguistic-social experience. Evidence on sentence comprehension

In this work I address the study of language comprehension in an “embodied” framework. Firstly I show behavioral evidence supporting the idea that language modulates the motor system in a specific way, both at a proximal level (sensibility to the effectors) and at the distal level (sensibility to the goal of the action in which the single motor acts are inserted). I will present two studies in which the method is basically the same: we manipulated the linguistic stimuli (the kind of sentence: hand action vs. foot action vs. mouth action) and the effector by which participants had to respond (hand vs. foot vs. mouth; dominant hand vs. non-dominant hand). Response times analyses showed a specific modulation depending on the kind of sentence: participants were facilitated in the task execution (sentence sensibility judgment) when the effector they had to use to respond was the same to which the sentences referred. Namely, during language comprehension a pre-activation of the motor system seems to take place. This activation is analogous (even if less intense) to the one detectable when we practically execute the action described by the sentence. Beyond this effector specific modulation, we also found an effect of the goal suggested by the sentence. That is, the hand effector was pre-activated not only by hand-action-related sentences, but also by sentences describing mouth actions, consistently with the fact that to execute an action on an object with the mouth we firstly have to bring it to the mouth with the hand. After reviewing the evidence on simulation specificity directly referring to the body (for instance, the kind of the effector activated by the language), I focus on the specific properties of the object to which the words refer, particularly on the weight. In this case the hypothesis to test was if both lifting movement perception and lifting movement execution are modulated by language comprehension. We used behavioral and kinematics methods, and we manipulated the linguistic stimuli (the kind of sentence: the lifting of heavy objects vs. the lifting of light objects). To study the movement perception we measured the correlations between the weight of the objects lifted by an actor (heavy objects vs. light objects) and the esteems provided by the participants. To study the movement execution we measured kinematics parameters variance (velocity, acceleration, time to the first peak of velocity) during the actual lifting of objects (heavy objects vs. light objects). Both kinds of measures revealed that language had a specific effect on the motor system, both at a perceptive and at a motoric level. Finally, I address the issue of the abstract words. Different studies in the “embodied” framework tried to explain the meaning of abstract words The limit of these works is that they account only for subsets of phenomena, so results are difficult to generalize. We tried to circumvent this problem by contrasting transitive verbs (abstract and concrete) and nouns (abstract and concrete) in different combinations. The behavioral study was conducted both with German and Italian participants, as the two languages are syntactically different. We found that response times were faster for both the compatible pairs (concrete verb + concrete noun; abstract verb + abstract noun) than for the mixed ones. Interestingly, for the mixed combinations analyses showed a modulation due to the specific language (German vs. Italian): when the concrete word precedes the abstract one responses were faster, regardless of the word grammatical class. Results are discussed in the framework of current views on abstract words. They highlight the important role of developmental and social aspects of language use, and confirm theories assigning a crucial role to both sensorimotor and linguistic experience for abstract words.