Portugal is one of the few European Union countries that experience the "coexistence" of a coexistence legal framework with a regular coexistence practice. Since 2005, Bt maize crops have been grown in different regions—either in small or large farms—in compliance with a law that envisages coexistence procedures for either individual farmers or groups of farmers that agree to establish the so called "production zones." The monitoring of Bt maize crops is annually run and reported by the Ministry of Agriculture. Here we report on the first quinquennium of coexistence in Portugal, bearing down on regional distribution and evolution, farm sizes, coexistence measures, GM farmers' profile and their assessment of Bt crops and coexistence rules, and Bt maize destination. Opportunities and constraints are also pointed out.
Raman spectroscopy has been used as a local probe to characterize the structural evolution of magnetron-sputtered decorative zirconium oxynitride ZrOxNy films which result from an increase of reactive gas flow in the deposition The lines shapes, the frequency position and widths of the Raman bands show a systematic change as a function of the reactive gas flow (a mixture of both oxygen and nitrogen). The as-deposited zirconium nitride film presents a Raman spectrum with the typical broadened bands, due to the disorder induced by N vacancies. The recorded Raman spectrum of the zirconium oxide film is typical of the monoclinic phase of ZrO2, which is shown also by X-ray diffraction. Raman spectra of zirconium oxynitride thin films present changes, which are found to be closely related with the oxygen content in films and the subsequent structural changes. ; FCT institution by the project nº POCTI/CTM/38086/2001 co-financed by European community fund FEDER ; European Union through the NMP3-CT-2003 505948 project ...
Platelet-derived products (PDPs) have gained popularity, mainly due to their high concentrations of bioactive molecules such as growth factors and cytokines, which play important roles in tissue healing and regeneration. PDPs are obtained through minimally invasive procedures and their therapeutic effect has been widely recognized. In veterinary medicine, however, the lack of standard protocols to generate PDPs is a major hurdle for assessing the clinical relevance of PDP-based therapies and for their widespread usage. The aim of this review is to analyze the technical and scientific specificities of PDPs in terms of preparation methodologies, classification categorization, nomenclature, and biological proprieties to advance their future biotechnological potential in veterinary contexts. ; This work was supported by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia, from Portugal SFRH/BD/118871/2016 PhD grant. The authors acknowledge the financial support from the European Union Framework Program for Research and Innovation HORIZON 2020, under the FOOD4CELLS project (PTDC/CTM-BIO/4706/2014 - POCI-01-0145-FEDER ...
Applications of coloured thin films can be found on the production of high-quality consumer products, such as eyeglass frames, wristwatch casings and wristbands. These components should possess scratch and corrosion resistant surfaces through the desired lifetime. Recently, metal oxynitrides, MeNxOy (Me = early transition metal) were proposed for decorative applications. In these materials, variations on the amount of oxygen allow the film properties to be tailored, originating a wide range of colours. Additionally, these materials should also fulfil the wear and corrosion requirements above referred. In the present work the corrosion behaviour of single layered zirconium oxynitride, ZrNxOy films, immersed in artificial sweat solutions, is described. Films were produced by rf reactive magnetron sputtering at a constant substrate temperature of 300 ºC, from a pure Zr target. The main processing variable was the flow rate of reactive. The corrosion resistance was evaluated by potentiodynamic polarisation tests and Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) at different immersion times, at room temperature. The corrosion resistance of the films is strongly affected by the O/N ratio. A slight tendency to improving the corrosion resistance of the films was found with the increasing in the atomic fraction of oxygen. Nevertheless, pitting was found in all samples. However, the amount of pits seems to be strongly dependent not only on the composition of the film, but also on the processing-induced defects distribution. ; European Union, FCT- Portugal and European community ...
Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted routine hospital services globally. This study estimated the total number of adult elective operations that would be cancelled worldwide during the 12 weeks of peak disruption due to COVID-19. Methods: A global expert response study was conducted to elicit projections for the proportion of elective surgery that would be cancelled or postponed during the 12 weeks of peak disruption. A Bayesian β-regression model was used to estimate 12-week cancellation rates for 190 countries. Elective surgical case-mix data, stratified by specialty and indication (surgery for cancer versus benign disease), were determined. This case mix was applied to country-level surgical volumes. The 12-week cancellation rates were then applied to these figures to calculate the total number of cancelled operations. Results: The best estimate was that 28 404 603 operations would be cancelled or postponed during the peak 12 weeks of disruption due to COVID-19 (2 367 050 operations per week). Most would be operations for benign disease (90·2 per cent, 25 638 922 of 28 404 603). The overall 12-week cancellation rate would be 72·3 per cent. Globally, 81·7 per cent of operations for benign conditions (25 638 922 of 31 378 062), 37·7 per cent of cancer operations (2 324 070 of 6 162 311) and 25·4 per cent of elective caesarean sections (441 611 of 1 735 483) would be cancelled or postponed. If countries increased their normal surgical volume by 20 per cent after the pandemic, it would take a median of 45 weeks to clear the backlog of operations resulting from COVID-19 disruption. Conclusion: A very large number of operations will be cancelled or postponed owing to disruption caused by COVID-19. Governments should mitigate against this major burden on patients by developing recovery plans and implementing strategies to restore surgical activity safely.