Repositório RCAAP

Background: Ocular abnormalities have been known to occur in hereditary amyloidotic polyneuropathy since the 1950s. While vitreous opacities and scalloped pupils were described early it has become evident that every component of the eye from the conjunctiva to the retinal vasculature can be involved. Reports from the major centres in Japan, Portugal and Sweden, which primarily treat patients with ATTRV30M, have indicated that with the increased longevity seen in patients treated with liver transplantation the frequency of the more severe eye findings, notably vitreous opacities and subsequent glaucoma, are being detected more frequently. Methods: In an attempt to confirm that the experience was similar in a broader range of locales we performed a survey of ten treatment centres in eight countries to determine the frequency of severe ocular abnormalities (vitreous opacities and glaucoma) in 804 patients with V30M disease and whether there was any relationship to treatment with liver transplantation or the transthyretin stabilizer tafamidis. Results: The data indicate that the frequency of these abnormalities increases with increasing duration of disease. In patients broadly matched for duration of disease the frequency was higher in subjects who had undergone liver transplantation than in those who were untreated. Conclusions: Retrospective surveys are subject to a number of potential biases. In this case, the major potential confounders were defining the time of disease onset and physician bias in choice of therapy, particularly regarding the choice of patients and the time in their course when they should undergo liver transplantation, and when and whether they should receive tafamidis. Nonetheless it appears that the incidence of severe ocular abnormalities in V30M subjects from centres around the world is similar to those found in centres in the areas endemic for this variant protein. The incidence increased with duration of disease regardless of therapy with the highest frequencies seen in patients more than ten years after diagnosis who had undergone liver transplantation.

Background: Cellular metabolism generates reactive oxygen species. The oxidation and deamination of the deoxynucleoside triphosphate (dNTP) pool results in the formation of non-canonical, toxic dNTPs that can cause mutations, genome instability, and cell death. House-cleaning or sanitation enzymes that break down and detoxify non-canonical nucleotides play major protective roles in nucleotide metabolism and constitute key drug targets for cancer and various pathogens. We hypothesized that owing to their protective roles in nucleotide metabolism, these house-cleaning enzymes are key drug targets in the malaria parasite. Methods: Using the rodent malaria parasite Plasmodium berghei we evaluate here, by gene targeting, a group of conserved proteins with a putative function in the detoxification of non-canonical nucleotides as potential antimalarial drug targets: they are inosine triphosphate pyrophosphatase (ITPase), deoxyuridine triphosphate pyrophosphatase (dUTPase) and two NuDiX hydroxylases, the diadenosine tetraphosphate (Ap4A) hydrolase and the nucleoside triphosphate hydrolase (NDH). Results: While all four proteins are expressed constitutively across the intraerythrocytic developmental cycle, neither ITPase nor NDH are required for parasite viability. dutpase and ap4ah null mutants, on the other hand, are not viable suggesting an essential function for these proteins for the malaria parasite. Conclusions: Plasmodium dUTPase and Ap4A could be drug targets in the malaria parasite.

Animal models have for long been pivotal for parasitology research. Over the last few years, techniques such as intravital, optoacoustic and magnetic resonance imaging, optical projection tomography, and selective plane illumination microscopy developed promising potential for gaining insights into host-pathogen interactions by allowing different visualization forms in vivo and ex vivo. Advances including increased resolution, penetration depth, and acquisition speed, together with more complex image analysis methods, facilitate tackling biological problems previously impossible to study and/or quantify. Here we discuss advances and challenges in the in vivo imaging toolbox, which hold promising potential for the field of parasitology.

The aim of this paper is the study of queer zines produced in Madrid in the 1990’s. There were two pioneer groups in queer activism in Spain, La Radical Gai formed by gay men and LSD, formed by lesbians. La radical Gai published six numbers of their zine De un plumazo, plus two dossiers (one about HIV and the other one about a homophobic attack). LSD was created one year later than La Radical Gai; they published four numbers of Non-Grata. Both groups share ideology, but had different aims and agenda because of their specific gender experience: the main theme for gay men was HIV, whereas lesbians mainly focused on visibility. Albeit the groups did not denominate themselves as queer when they were formed (1991 La Radical Gai, 1993 LSD), they were the first to coin this term in the Spanish context (Solá, 2012, p. 267). La Radical Gai named their zine Queerzine in 1993 and LSD use this term in their first zine published in 1994, where they already defined themselves as queer lesbians. This paper will analyze these zines as historical documents, which help us to understand the characteristics and history of the zine production in Spain; as well as, the introduction of Queer Theory in the context of Madrid in the 1990›s. The zines were not only important for the academic group of Queer Theory but also for the activism movement of that period. Produced by university students, some of which continued their careers in academia, these zines promoted and boasted the introduction of Queer Theory in the University.

Diabetes is a chronic metabolic disease characterised by high blood glucose levels. It is a major burden on the national healthcare system as it brings serious problems associated with it over time, such as heart, eye, kidney, nerve and blood vessel problems, and can increase the consumption of healthcare resources. Diabetes greatly disrupts the lives of individuals being associated with poorer quality of life and increased early mortality. Therefore, it is important to characterise the Portuguese diabetic population as well as the comorbidities that most often accompany diabetes. (Organization, 2000). This study is part of a project proposed by EpiDoC Unit at Nova Medical School, where a prospective cohort study entitled Epidemiology in chronic diseases (EpiDoC) was developed in 2011. To this end, this study was designed to be representative of the Portuguese adult population. EpiDoC is a prospective closed cohort study, including a nationally representative sample of adults (older than 18 years) who were not institutionalised and lived in private homes in Mainland Portugal and Islands (Ac¸ores and Madeira). The main objective of this project was to characterise the diabetic population in Portuguese adults using the EpiDoC cohort. Data collected at the three follow-up waves were analysed to assess the impact of diabetes on the loss of quality of life and on the consumption of medical resources, namely the occurrence of hospitalisations and the number of medical appointments. The specific objectives were as follows: • To characterise the population regarding self-reported diabetes among Portuguese adults, taking into account the geographical distribution, socio-demographic characteristics and comorbidities associated with the disease. To this end, a broad exploratory analysis was conducted. • To assess the impact of diabetes on quality of life - measured by the EuroQol Five Dimensional Questionnaire score - at each data collection wave, as well as in a longitudinal perspective, in order to assess the evolution of this measure over time. To answer this question, the Tobit regression model was used. • To assess the impact of diabetes on the occurrence of hospital admissions and the number of medical appointments through longitudinal generalized linear models for binary data and counts, respectively. By the analysis of the prevalences, and analysing the responses of individuals in the first wave, it is concluded that there are more diabetic women than men, yet this difference is not significant. Furthermore, there is a higher prevalence of diabetics of Caucasian ethnicity, aged 66 to 75 years and married. Regarding NUTS II, there is a higher proportion of diabetics in the Norte region. Regarding the level of education, there is a higher proportion of diabetics whose schooling varies between 1 and 4 years. However, age may be considered a confounding factor, since there is a higher probability of low levels of education being associated with individuals with a more advanced age. The fact that most diabetics were retired corroborates the idea of age being a confounding factor. With regard to lifestyle habits, we concluded that most diabetics drink alcohol, do not smoke and do exercise. As expected, most diabetics have a Body Mass Index (BMI) corresponding to the obesity category. Finally, high blood pressure proved to be the most prevalent disease in diabetics. Regarding the quality of life models, it decreases with the presence of diabetes. As regards the occurrence of hospital admissions, a first analysis showed that only 14.5% of diabetic individuals had been hospitalized. Through the analysis of the model, concluded that the chance of an individual being hospitalized increases in diabetic patients. With regard to the number of consultations, it was found that diabetes causes the expected number of medical appointments to increase.

Aim: To explore the clinical presentation, course, treatment and impact of early treatment in patients with remethylation disorders from the European Network and Registry for Homocystinurias and Methylation Defects (E-HOD) international web-based registry. Results: This review comprises 238 patients (cobalamin C defect n = 161; methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase deficiency n = 50; cobalamin G defect n = 11; cobalamin E defect n = 10; cobalamin D defect n = 5; and cobalamin J defect n = 1) from 47 centres for whom the E-HOD registry includes, as a minimum, data on medical history and enrolment visit. The duration of observation was 127 patient years. In 181 clinically diagnosed patients, the median age at presentation was 30 days (range 1 day to 42 years) and the median age at diagnosis was 3.7 months (range 3 days to 56 years). Seventy-five percent of pre-clinically diagnosed patients with cobalamin C disease became symptomatic within the first 15 days of life. Total homocysteine (tHcy), amino acids and urinary methylmalonic acid (MMA) were the most frequently assessed disease markers; confirmatory diagnostics were mainly molecular genetic studies. Remethylation disorders are multisystem diseases dominated by neurological and eye disease and failure to thrive. In this cohort, mortality, thromboembolic, psychiatric and renal disease were rarer than reported elsewhere. Early treatment correlates with lower overall morbidity but is less effective in preventing eye disease and cognitive impairment. The wide variation in treatment hampers the evaluation of particular therapeutic modalities. Conclusion: Treatment improves the clinical course of remethylation disorders and reduces morbidity, especially if started early, but neurocognitive and eye symptoms are less responsive. Current treatment is highly variable. This study has the inevitable limitations of a retrospective, registry-based design.

A bubonic plague epidemic broke out in the Portuguese city of Oporto in June 1899. Six months later, when it had come to an end, 132 deaths along 320 patients had been recorded. Although it was a city with industrial activity and the precursor of several technological innovations, the hygienic and sanitary conditions of the population of Oporto at that time left a lot to be desired. These features certainly made it easier for the plague to spread, which was detected by unusual deaths in those residing in dilapidated and dirty houses by the river Douro. Ricardo Jorge (1858-1939), the municipal doctor at the time, did not hesitate in stating that the outbreak showed clinical, epidemiological and technological signs of bubonic plague. Civil authorities and the press played down the event for more than a month. Finally, by order of the Government, a wide cordon sanitaire was established around the city, to prevent the spread of the epidemic to the rest of the country. As this resolution was not welcomed by the population, traders, and medical associations, the Government was forced to remove the city siege. Ricardo Jorge, who discovered the cause of the disease and was the main individual promoting the sanitary measures carried out, decided to abandon Oporto and settle in Lisbon after being unfairly misunderstood and subject to persecution.

Fundamento: Plasmodium falciparum (P.f.) cresce a uma taxa variável entre indivíduos, resultando em diferentes parasitemias, cargas parasitárias e graus de gravidade da doença. Além da imunidade, outros fatores parecem influenciar a taxa de crescimento do parasita e o prognóstico da doença, como o grupo sanguíneo ou as hemoglobinopatias, embora os mecanismos ainda não estejam esclarecidos. As culturas in vitro são uma ferramenta essencial para estudar o P.f. e investigar melhores intervenções. É fundamental entender como estas variações afetam o crescimento do parasita em cultura e quais os fatores envolvidos. Objetivos: Este trabalho tem como objetivo investigar possíveis diferenças no crescimento de P.f. em indivíduos não imunes à malária num sistema de cultura in vitro e estudar possíveis associações para as variações observadas. Métodos: Realizaram-se culturas in vitro de P.f. com sangue de 69 indivíduos não imunes à malária. Numa segunda fase, 24 voluntários foram novamente chamados para dar outra amostra de sangue para repetir culturas de P.f. e realizar uma avaliação analítica. Em 14 voluntários, a suplementação a cultura com soro bovino foi substituída por soro humano. Resultados: A média da razão do crescimento do P.f. após 96 horas foi de 10.0, com uma grande variabilidade entre indivíduos (intervalo:3.0–19.3, DP:3.8). Três grupos foram criados. O grupo de “baixo crescimento” é definido por uma razão 1DP abaixo da média (n=12, média:4.7, SD:1.2, intervalo:3.0–6.1). O grupo de “elevado crescimento” é definido por uma razão 1DP acima da média (n=13, média:16.0, DP:1.8, intervalo:13.8–19.3). Os dados sugerem que os indivíduos que apresentam menor crescimento do P.f. estão ligados a países onde a malária é endémica (p=0.03). Além disso, um menor crescimento parece estar relacionado à anemia (p=0.01), apontando para algum problema nos eritrócitos, embora este estudo não tenha permitido encontrar o mecanismo subjacente. A suplementação com soro humano não alterou este padrão de crescimento. Além dos níveis de hemoglobina (p=0.03), nenhum outro parâmetro analítico apresentou diferença significativa.Conclusão: Existem indivíduos cujo sangue permite um crescimento do P.f. consistentemente alto ou baixo. A grande variabilidade do crescimento não é influenciada pelo soro, sugerindo que os eritrócitos parecem ser responsáveis por este padrão. Esta ideia é reforçada pelo facto de que indivíduos com uma história clínica de anemia ou níveis de hemoglobina baixos apresentam menores taxas de crescimento. Assim, a variabilidade no crescimento do parasita pode ser explicada por pequenas variações genéticas ao nível da hemoglobina.

O entretenimento esteve sempre presente nas atividades humanas, satisfazendo necessidades e desempenhando um papel na vida dos indivíduos e das comunidades. Em particular, os filmes e os jogos têm um forte impacto emocional sobre nós; os primeiros com o seu rico conteúdo multimédia e a própria história e os segundos tendem a desafiar-nos e a cativar-nos a enfrentar desafios e, espera-se, alcançar experiências e resultados gratificantes. Nesta dissertação apresentamos uma aplicação web desenvolvida no laboratório de investigação LASIGE (DI-FCUL), concebida e desenvolvida para aceder a filmes com base no impacto emocional, com o foco na anotação emocional de filmes, utilizando diferentes representações emocionais e elementos de gamificação no sentido de incentivar mais os utilizadores nestas tarefas, para além das suas motivações intrínsecas. Estas anotações, com abordagens de Machine Learning, podem ajudar a enriquecer a classificação emocional dos filmes e o seu impacto nos utilizadores, ajudando mais tarde a encontrar filmes baseados nesse impacto. Podem também ser guardadas como notas pessoais, num diário (Personal Journal), onde os utilizadores registam os filmes que mais apreciam, e que podem rever e até mesmo comparar ao longo da sua jornada. Apresentam-se também os dois momentos de avaliação com grupos de participantes, permitindo avaliar e aprender sobre a utilidade, usabilidade e a experiência do utilizador com a aplicação, identificando as características e direções mais promissoras para os futuros melhoramentos e desenvolvimentos.

GalNAc-glycopeptides derived from mucin MUC1 are an important class of tumor-associated antigens. α- O-glycosylation forces the peptide to adopt an extended conformation in solution, which is far from the structure observed in complexes with a model anti-MUC1 antibody. Herein, we propose a new strategy for designing potent antigen mimics based on modulating peptide/carbohydrate interactions by means of O → S/Se replacement at the glycosidic linkage. These minimal chemical modifications bring about two key structural changes to the glycopeptide. They increase the carbohydrate-peptide distance and change the orientation and dynamics of the glycosidic linkage. As a result, the peptide acquires a preorganized and optimal structure suited for antibody binding. Accordingly, these new glycopeptides display improved binding toward a representative anti-MUC1 antibody relative to the native antigens. To prove the potential of these glycopeptides as tumor-associated MUC1 antigen mimics, the derivative bearing the S-glycosidic linkage was conjugated to gold nanoparticles and tested as an immunogenic formulation in mice without any adjuvant, which resulted in a significant humoral immune response. Importantly, the mice antisera recognize cancer cells in biopsies of breast cancer patients with high selectivity. This finding demonstrates that the antibodies elicited against the mimetic antigen indeed recognize the naturally occurring antigen in its physiological context. Clinically, the exploitation of tumor-associated antigen mimics may contribute to the development of cancer vaccines and to the improvement of cancer diagnosis based on anti-MUC1 antibodies. The methodology presented here is of general interest for applications because it may be extended to modulate the affinity of biologically relevant glycopeptides toward their receptors.

Introdução: A reprogramação metabólica consiste na adaptação do fenótipo metabólico das células tumorais às condições do microambiente. Para que possam sobreviver e proliferar, estas células utilizam uma grande variedade de substratos para produzir biomassa e ATP. A reprogramação metabólica é, portanto, um hallmark do cancro. As células tumorais utilizam preferencialmente a glicólise, mesmo em aerobiose, embora esta via lhes permita produzir substancialmente menos ATP (efeito de Warburg). Adicionalmente, nas células tumorais há aumento da taxa de glutaminólise, bem como reprogramação do metabolismo lipídico. Por permitir às células tumorais sobreviver a microambientes adversos, a reprogramação metabólica contribui para a mestastização. Objetivos: Procurámos rever a importância clínica da metabolómica tumoral, bem como avaliar a reprogramação metabólica que ocorre in vitro na linha celular de cancro da mama triplo negativo MDA-MB-231, quando expostas a diferentes concentrações de glicose, glutamina e LDL-colesterol; comparar a reprogramação metabólica que ocorre em células MDA-MB-231 in vivo, em tumores da mama primários e metástases pulmonares, em ratinhos NSG sujeitos a dietas normais, dietas enriquecidas em colesterol e em dietas enriquecidas com colesterol com bloqueio do recetor LDL. Métodos/Resultados: Por PCR quantitativo avaliou-se a expressão dos genes de enzimas chave da fosforilação oxidativa (ND1), glicólise (G6PD, PKM2, LDHA), síntese de novo de ácidos gordos (FASN), transportadores lipídicos (LDLr e CD36) e glutaminólise (GLS2 e IDH2). As células MDA-MB-231 in vitro são dependentes de glicose e glutamina, mesmo quando estão disponíveis outros substratos. In vivo, dietas enriquecidas em colesterol induzem proliferação dos tumores primários da mama após bloqueio do LDLr. As metástases pulmonares sobre expressam transportadores lipídicos comparadas com tumores primários em ambas as dietas. Conclusão: As células MDAMB- 231 apresentam plasticidade metabólica in vivo e in vitro. Dietas ricas em colesterol conferem vantagem às células de cancro da mama, contribuindo para o potencial metastático pulmonar e consistindo num eventual alvo terapêutico.

Coastal marine habitats provide important environmental and socio-economic services, and adjacent coastal areas are very attractive to human populations. Like other coastal marine habitats, rocky reefs are heavily impacted by anthropogenic activity. As these are considered important breeding, nursery and feeding areas for several marine species, their protection is imperative. To improve conservation methods, it is necessary to understand the structure and processes of rocky reef communities. Trophic relationships are one of the ways in which species are connected, with food webs representing the flow of matter and energy from producers to consumers and from prey to predators. Stable isotope analysis (δ13C and δ15N) was used to characterize the food web of the rocky reef of Arrábida Marine Protected Area. The results showed a relatively short food web, most likely due to high abundances of juveniles with consumers with diverse diets and feeding strategies, exploiting different sources of organic matter, of both benthic (macroalgae and benthic POM) and pelagic origin (phytoplankton and pelagic POM). However, the benthic pathway was more important with more than half of the diet of most secondary and tertiary consumers following this route and thus, suggesting a bottom-up control, and hinting at the importance held by macroalgae and benthic production in this ecosystem. There was also a high incidence of omnivores in all trophic groups, which could contribute to the similar trophic redundancy and trophic evenness found between groups. Even so, primary consumers showed greater trophic richness related to basal resources.

Approximately 400 000 children are diagnosed with cancer every year, with the most common types of childhood cancers being leukemia, lymphoma, brain and solid tumors. Moreover, 10-40% of children with solid tumors present lung metastases at the time of diagnosis. Whole lung irradiation (WLI) is a treatment option for pediatric patients with lung metastases that develop from solid tumors like Ewing’s sarcoma (ES), rhabdomyosarcoma, and Wilms’ tumor (WT). However, during treatment delivery, intra and inter-fraction anatomical changes might occur and can greatly affect treatment outcome. These changes can either cause underdosages of the target volume, or overdosage of surrounding organs at risk (OARs). Since growing lung tissue is more sensitive to radiation, avoiding the irradiation of OARs while maintaining target coverage is of utmost importance. Thus, there is the need to ensure that a treatment plan is robust, which is accomplished if the planned and delivery dose distributions agree even in the presence of uncertainties. To evaluate how anatomical changes affect the treatment outcome when delivering WLI to pediatric patients, this thesis comprises a study of robustness of photon dose distributions against intra and inter-fraction anatomical changes. The present study includes treatment plans of 21 pediatric patients that received WLI at University Medical Center Utrecht. The robustness evaluation was performed against intra and inter-fraction anatomical changes. Intra-fraction changes were evaluated by recalculating the original plan on the two extreme breathing phases – maximum inhalation and maximum exhalation. Conversely, inter-fraction changes were evaluated by calculating the fractional dose on the daily cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) images acquired before treatment and accumulating the resulting dose distributions. The recalculated plans were then compared to the original dose distribution. Overall results of the study demonstrated no clinically relevant differences in terms of mean internal target volume (ITV) coverage of the lungs. However, hot spot values differed significantly for three patients. The differences observed for the V107% were due to diaphragm position shifts (two patients) and electron density (ED) changes within the lung ITV (one patient). Coverage and hot spots of metastases presented clinically relevant differences when considering the extreme breathing phases, as well as the registered-CTs. This was due to differences in ED within the metastases and position variations in relation to surrounding structures (like the heart or ribs). However, these changes were observed for the PTV only, while ITV coverage remained around 100% on all plans. OAR dose values were robust against intra and inter-fraction anatomical changes, with no clinically relevant differences to report. In conclusion, the recalculated WLI plans are considered robust against intra and inter-fraction anatomical changes when taking into consideration average results. However, some clinically relevant differences were identified per patient, which require further attention and improvement in future treatment plans.

Disaster communication guidelines emphasize that journalists should be aware of past major disasters and draw lessons from the coverage of those events. The press is an important source for the evolution of historical disaster and risk research paradigms over time. This study explored the top 10 damaging hydrogeomorphological events in Portugal selected from the disaster database, which includes events that caused human damages (fatalities, injured, missing, evacuated, and displaced) reported over a period of 151 years (1865–2015) by the Portuguese newspaper Diário de Notícias (DN). News analysis was guided by the news protocol. The analysis of the news published in DN enabled us to identify textual marks that present interconnections in the journalistic coverage and produce discursive standards for these disasters. The textual marks were associated with the hazard and risk paradigms. The discursive standards of DN did not clearly reflect the ruptures in the hazard paradigms. As a rule, the journalistic reports contributed to the naturalization of disasters and the gap in public understanding of risks, by presenting an approach focused on relief actions—ignoring social issues, vulnerability, and population resilience—reducing the discourse of preparedness for future disasters.

Retail gentrification is a rising field of research within the wider field of gentrification studies. In this paper we use the old neighbourhood of Marvila in Lisbon as a case study. The information collected from the fieldwork demonstrates the depth of transformations occurring in the commercial fabric of Marvila, which is having a detrimental effect on old stores and the local population. Moreover, it reveals that the current process was triggered by a group of independent investors, whose success is placing them at risk of being displaced. These findings reinforce the existent body of literature on the subject of retail gentrification.

Este trabalho tem como principais objetivos fazer uma análise do desempenho energético de um edifício de serviços, e depois, analisar como torná-lo autossuficiente, ou (se a anterior não for possível) como torná-lo quase autossuficiente, através da integração de sistemas de produção de energia de fonte renovável. As análises devem ser feitas com o recurso a um programa de simulação energética de edifícios. O edifício deste caso de estudo é para ser usado como alojamento que albergue até 30 pessoas construído com materiais com poucos impactos ambientais. Localiza-se em Atalaia de Cima, Sintra em pleno meio rural. É constituído por 4 pisos. Possui um refeitório, uma cozinha, dormitórios (alguns parcialmente enterrados), e uma sala para ser usada para aulas/reuniões. Primeiro foi desenhado o modelo geométrico em Sketchup com a extensão Euclide, versão 0.9.3. De seguida foi simulado com o programa EnergyPlus®, versão 8.7.0 para o período de um ano, e feita uma análise. Mais tarde foi analisado com HOMER Pro® a integração de sistemas de produção renovável: sistemas com painéis fotovoltaicos (PV), e sistemas com turbinas eólicas. Para estimar o custo atual líquido que seria necessário considerou-se que o tempo de vida do projeto é 25 anos. Os resultados mostraram que é melhor a combinação de sistemas eólicos e de PV mas que é impossível só assim tornar Deep retreat autossuficiente. A fração renovável local obtida no melhor cenário, com um tempo de retorno do investimento de cerca de 7 anos, foi 83.7%. Em todos os cenários com turbinas e PV obtidos, a potência instalada de turbinas foi pelo menos 5 vezes superior ao de PV. Salienta-se que Portugal é em geral um país solarengo, e é especialmente ventoso na região deste caso de estudo. Com baterias o software não encontrou soluções devido aos custos destas.

The dataset includes six yearly time series of six Heatwave (HW) aspects/metrics (or statistical summaries) calculated from the E-OBS dataset (v19eHOM, available in https://www.ecad.eu/download/ensembles/downloadversion19.0eHOM.php) following the Excess Heat Factor (EHF) methodology implemented in the ClimPACT tool, in compliance with the guidelines established by the Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices (ET-SCI). These aspects correspond to annual summaries of HW frequency, duration and intensity, considering solely the events occurring during the extended summer season (from June to September). Input Daily Maximum (TX) and Minimum (TN) near-surface air temperature data were retrieved from a European gridded dataset (E-OBS) – the ensemble homogenized version ‘19.0eHOM’, at 0.1° × 0.1° spatial resolution, covering the European region, and retrieved from the EU-FP6 project UERRA (http://www.uerra.eu) and the Copernicus Climate Change Service. The E-OBS dataset is based on station observations, provided by the European Climate Assessment & Dataset. The here-presented HW aspects/summaries outputs of the ClimPACT tool correspond to the gridded annual statistical summaries of HW – these are detected based on the positive Excess Heat Factor (EHF) days, an HW index based on the human health response to heat extremes. The summaries include: (i) annual Number of Heatwaves (HWN); (ii) annual Heatwave Days Frequency (HWF); (iii) annual Maximum Heatwave Duration (HWD); (iv) annual Mean Heatwave Magnitude (HWM); and (v) annual Maximum Heatwave Amplitude (HWA). In addition, the annual maximum Heatwave Severity (HWS) was calculated, by dividing HWA by the 85th percentile of the positive EHF days. These annual time series can be used in HW-related studies focusing on the European region, particularly those focusing on climatology, trends, and impacts on human health.

The Lisbon metropolitan area (LMA, central-west of Portugal) has been severely affected by different geohazards (flooding episodes, landslides, subsidence, and earthquakes) that have generated considerable damage to properties and infrastructures, in the order of millions of euros per year. This study is focused on the analysis of subsidence, as related to urban and industrial activity. Utilizing the A-DInSAR dataset and applying active deformation areas (ADA) processing at the regional scale has allowed us to perform a detailed analysis of subsidence phenomena in the LMA. The dataset consisted of 48 ascending and 61 descending SAR IW-SLC images acquired by the Sentinel-1 A satellite between January 2018 and April 2020. The line-of-sight (LOS), mean deformation velocity (VLOS) maps (mm year−1), and deformation time series (mm) were obtained via the Geohazard Exploitation Platform service of the European Space Agency. The maximum VLOS detected, with ascending and descending datasets, were −38.0 and −32.2 mm year−1, respectively. ADA processing over the LMA allowed for 592 ascending and 560 descending ADAs to be extracted and delimited. From the VLOS measured in both trajectories, a vertical velocity with a maximum value of −32.4 mm year−1 was estimated. The analyzed subsidence was associated to four ascending and three descending ADAs and characterized by maximum VLOS of −25.5 and −25.2 mm year−1. The maximum vertical velocity associated with urban subsidence was −32.4 mm year−1. This subsidence is mainly linked to the compaction of the alluvial and anthropic deposits in the areas where urban and industrial sectors are located. The results of this work have allowed to: (1) detect and assess, from a quantitative point of view, the subsidence phenomena in populated and industrial areas of LMA; (2) establish the relationships between the subsidence phenomena and geological and hydrological characteristics.

My research project studies feminist and queer zines inside academia during the last decades of the Twentieth Century and the beginning of Twenty-first Century in Spain and Portugal. When I started the research some of the conflicts and contradictions were immediately revealed. The necessity of definition of my study object, the process of recollecting zines, the legitimacy of building-up an investigation like this inside the academia... all of these raise controversial questions that the research needs to address. Thus, it was imperative to think about the approach and how to address the methodology. One of the most urgent is to reflect on the process of institutionalization of counter-hegemonic knowledges, with all the inherent dangers, including the deactivating of political strategies that are specific to movements.

Emigration has been a structural feature of the Portuguese society. Recognising that diasporas are increasingly considered agents of change, particularly in situations of economic or political crisis, Portugal has sought to strengthen economic, social and political ties with Portuguese citizens and their descendants living abroad. Building on the concept of critical juncture, this chapter explores the drivers of change of Portuguese diaspora policies, since the establishment of the democratic regime, aiming to assess the relative impact of the 2008 economic crisis on those policies and in affecting diaspora mobilisation and engagement with homeland. Our analysis focuses on the economic and political relationships, combining secondary data on remittances and the electoral participation rate of Portuguese emigrants, in the national elections, with a survey of emigrants who had left Portugal after 2000. Our findings indicate that with the economic crisis and the resulting great emigration wave, the economic and business approach of the diaspora-engagement policies gained relevance. This, however, appeared to have had limited impact on the volume of emigrants’ remittances while the level of political mobilisation of the Portuguese diaspora has remained relatively weak. Yet it is important to highlight the change in the electoral law in 2018 which broadened the electoral weight of the diaspora.