RCAAP Repository

The present Doctoral Thesis, which is based on the concept of reading as a dialogical-discursive act, with responsible and responsive understandings, considering the relationship between the Dialogical Theory of Language (Bakhtin and the Circle) and Educommunication, consists of an action research carried out in a 2nd grade public high school class, in Campina Grande - PB. The research sustains the thesis that educomunicative activities, by following a dialogical-discursive perspective, allow the formation of critical-responsive readers, readers who build, in their media readings, senses from the perception of the verboideological nature of language. In this sense, the question which guided the present research was: what was the educational impact of political journalism readings, in the context of High School, for the construction of critical-responsive readers? In order to answer such question, the objectives were organized in: General - to analyze the perception of their points of view as well as their reading constructions concerning some political journalism texts related to the 2014 Elections for the Presidency of Brazil as well as for the Government of the State of Paraíba; and Specifics - to elaborate a DialogicalDiscursive pedagogical Didactic Plan for political media readings, based on the Dialogical Theory of Language and Educommunication; to describe and to analyze the impact of such readings on the formation of the students' political consciousness, as well as their evaluations regarding their participation in the political media project: do you do?; and to identify both the challenges and advances for the teacherresearch formation concerning this educomunicative intervention. As to the methodological procedures, the action research occurred from September up to November, 2014. The participating group was composed by 16 students, and the 12 face-to-face meetings were carried out weekly, with two hours class each. As to the research results, the analysis regarding the students’ readings allowed us to describe the educommunicative intervention impact concerning reading formation. In these terms, we point out an advance in the sense that the students, in their readings, perceived points of view and, from this perception, they could build their own points of view, and, this way, develop readings that enabled the presence of valuations, dialogical relations and critical positions. Such readings, with language marks, inscribed the students in discursive interaction processes. Among such marks, we can point out some declarative verbal expressions such as "I agree", "I believe", "we can see" – and comparisons among the different media communication vehicles concerning political parties ideological bias. The (non-final) considerations indicate how productive it is to invest in teaching methodologies when based on educommunication learning ecosystems, oriented by formative needs for reading practices aimed at exercising dialogical understanding, responsibly and responsively, in different discursive communication fields, among them, that one regarding to political journalism.

The present work articulates a debate between the mediation of conflicts and contemporary democracy, with the object of investigation the theoretical foundations of mediation in contemporary democracy. Thus, it is intended to answer the following problem: To what extent is it possible to identify in Hans Kelsen's Theory of Democracy a theoretical basis for the mediation of conflicts in contemporary democracy? For this, it is presented as a working hypothesis: The mediation procedure allows the production of an autonomous norm in interpersonal conflicts, similar to the one performed by the majority method for social macroconflicts, based on the assumptions of Hans Kelsen's Theory of Democracy. The research consists of an eminently theoretical study, with the use of the deductive method, with the finality to base the mediation of conflicts in the contemporaneity, from the assumptions of the Theory of Democracy of Kelsen. Throughout the paper the concepts of conflict and contemporary democracy are discussed, as well as the main theoretical approaches on conflict mediation, based on the analysis of social (Latin American and Anglo-Saxon) and theoretical-practical models of regulation (satisfactory mediation, circular-narrative, transformative and transforming). A comparative study on the development of conflict mediation in Brazil and Italy is also carried out by analyzing the normative regulations and types of mediation in both countries.

The current paper has the objective to analyze the residual tension profile on the welded joints of the API 5L X65 steel, on the transversal and longitudinal directions, identifying the critical points close to the root face and the weld face. For this study two wending processes were used in the specimens: For the root pass it was used the Shield Metal Arc Welding (SMAW) process. For the hot passes, the filling passes and the cover pass it was used was the Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW) process. After the obtainment of the specimens the residual tensions were analyzed by the X-Ray diffraction method. It was observed for the transversal direction an inversion of the p residual tensions profile, furthermore, the same was observed for the longitudinal direction. On the root pass there was a predominant tractive profile for the transversal direction with tensions up to 280 Mpa, those were reverted to compressive tensions on the order of 165 Mp. For the longitudinal direction the traction tensions of 400 Mpa were inverted in compression tension on the order of 125 Mpa. The tension profile generated near the face of the weld did not suffer from tractive to compressive inversion. The critical points are mainly located by a distance between 4 to 8 mm from the central fusion line.

Resistance Welding is a process that allows a high productivity, does not use addition material and presents an excellent quality in welded joints. Due to its characteristics, it is widely used in the automobile industry. With the use of high performance steels and structural adhesives in the union of the plates, a greater challenge arises in the parameterization of the weld to guarantee the absence of expulsion (welding splash), maintaining the quality of the welded joint. This work aims for the characterization of brazed welds and to optimize the reduction of weld spatter, which affect the safety and quality of the process. On the first part is detailed the formation of welding nucleus, splashes and associated parameters such as: time, current, force, resistance and materials are presented. Since welding time is a variable that directly affects the productivity in the industry and the material is a project imposition, this work analyzes the variables current and energy to evaluate the limits of formation of the expulsions in welded joints without the use of structural adhesives and with their use. In order to evaluate the parameters, visual analysis and energy results of the process for the welded plates were used to determine a better configuration, keeping the process free of expulsions and guaranteeing the necessary mechanical resistance for welded joints. The results showed that there is a parameterization capable of reducing the amount of welding expulsion and that the structural adhesives influence directly the parameterization of the points in order to avoid the formation of welding splash.

This work addressed problems of location and allocation of call centers with probabilistic demands. It was proposed to use a probabilistic optimization model proposed by Beraldi, Bruni and Conforti (2004), in which randomness is identified in the demand process assuming that the variables involved had a Poisson distribution. In this work, we also admit probabilistic demands, but with the distribution of poisson inflated zeros (ZIP), with such distribution we obtain a new redistribution that favors sectors with greater demand. The localization and allocation model is an integer linear programming model, where the probabilistic part is replaced by its respective deterministic equivalents, which were obtained for both distributions. As an application of this methodology, we found the distribution of emergency and emergency services, where calls were collected in 2017 in the city of João Pessoa, from these data, were made adherence test through the comparison statistics of Cramér Von-Mises and Anderson Darling, the distances matrix was obtained through the Google maps Distance API and the implemented model was solved using CPLEX. As a result, there was a difference in the choice of some service centers, as well as in their quantity, reducing this difference with the gradual increase of the distances offered for each scenario.

Ante a realidade de utilização do petróleo e do gás natural como as fontes energéticas mais consumidas no mundo e da importância estratégica que existe quando se é um país exportador dessas fontes, o Brasil, com a descoberta de campos petrolíferos gigantes nas Bacias de Campos e de Santos, aparentemente assumiu um papel diverso daquele que vinha representando até então. Passou de país que ainda importava parte do petróleo necessário à utilização interna para um país autossuficiente em petróleo e exportador deste recurso natural. Para que esta seja uma posição sólida e não meramente ilustrativa, é necessário que este a exploração e produção de petróleo nessas áreas seja viável. Em termos de viabilidade, devem ser analisados os aspectos econômicos, tecnológicos, ambientais e químicos do petróleo. Além disso, vivenciamos em 2010 uma mudança no marco regulatório do petróleo, que não mais utiliza apenas o contrato de concessão, mas também o contrato de partilha de produção, de forma que estamos, hoje, sob a égide de um modelo regulatório misto: os contratos de partilha são utilizados na área do pré-sal e em outras áreas estratégicas, enquanto os contratos de concessão se utilizam naquelas áreas do pré-sal que haviam sido concedidas antes da elaboração da nova lei e nas demais áreas onde haja petróleo no território nacional. Também mereceu menção a questão das fontes alternativas, em especial aquelas que deverão substituir o petróleo enquanto combustível fóssil utilizado em veículos. Atualmente são utilizados, além do petróleo e do gás natural veicular, o biodiesel e o etanol, mas todos eles possuem em comum o fato de liberarem gás carbônico na atmosfera, por isso sugere-se o desenvolvimento da tecnologia do veículo elétrico, que apresenta grandes vantagens em relação aos combustíveis poluentes, mas ainda possui as suas desvantagens, sendo necessários, ainda, a realização de estudos nessa seara.

Adsorption of organic molecules in the clays minerals can lead to the formation of the hybrid materials and/or nanocomposites through different interaction mechanisms, making these materials interesting for several applications. The present work presents two different applications for a montmorillonite clay : as a support for the removal of proteins in the process of wine clarification/stabilization and as a support to obtain new pigments, investigating the structural modifications and emphasizing the interactions between the organic compounds and the surface of the inorganic material. In the first study, the nanocomposites based on the adsorption of a model protein and a polyphenol of interest on the surface of the montmorillonite, in a model hydroalcoholic solution, were investigated. The amount of the organic part was determined by ultraviolet-visible (UV-VIS) and thermal (TG/DTG) analysis. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and transmission electronic microscopy (TEM) analyzes reported on the stacking/exfoliation of the layers in the nanocomposites. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) methods emphasized the formation of a complex between the protein and the polyphenol before adsorption on the claymineral. The motility/stiffness of the organics was determined by time resolved fluorescence spectroscopy. In the second study, pigments were prepared based on the carminic acid and alizarin organic dyes loaded under montmorillonite pillarized with of Al or Tications, at different pH. The stability of the pigments formed was tested under light for 340 h. The pillarization process was investigated by X-ray diffraction, textural analysis, transmission electronic microscopy and nuclear magnetic resonance in the solid state of 27Al. The interactions between the dyes and the inorganic support were highlighted by infrared spectroscopy, 13C and 27Al solid nuclear magnetic resonance and time resolved fluorescence. The spectra confirmed the complexation between the structure of the dyes and the modified clay, through different adsorption sites. Hybrid pigments based on Al-pillared montmorillonite were more stable under light than the Ti-based hybrids. In oil paint formulations, the pigments were shown to be stable even over a long period of irradiation.

The relationship between investment and financing is one of the most explored issues in corporate finance. Literature has shown that financial constraints are linked to firm’s ability to finance and credit rationing is linked to the ability of financial agents on offering credit for companies that request financing. In this context, the aim of this research is to show evidences of the effect of credit rationing, instead of financial constraints, and Life Cycle Stages (LCS) on the investment-cash flow sensitivity of public companies operating in Brazil. For this purpose, the sample included annual accounting information of public companies operating in Brazil, from 2010 to 2016, structured as a balanced panel. The financial information was extracted from the Thomson Reuters® database. Also, additional information was collected from Comissão de Valores Mobiliários (CVM) and Banco Nacional do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (BNDES). On the final sample there is 169 firms, with 1,183 observations. The investment models (original and modified) were estimated using the generalized moments system (GMM-SYS) approach developed by Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998). The finds of this research show that investment-cash flow sensitivity approach by itself, does not explain the behavior of investment decisions of Brazilian companies. This thesis show evidences that investment decisions are more affected by availability of credit than by their cost. This results demonstrate that the variable credit amount are more important than the interest rate in the conduct of the monetary policy. Regarding life cycle, it was identified that the investments of the non-mature firms behave differently in stages, this results which makes it sensitive to the models (original and modified) employed here. Initial results by LCS, and considering all LCSs in the original investment model with and without the inclusion of control variables, showed that only endstage companies have investments that are more investment-cash flow sensitivity and, as expected, mature companies are not reliant on internal resources to invest. However, on the modified investment models (which includes all non-maturity LCS with and without the inclusion of control variables) and for the two LCS classifications (PARK; CHEN, 2006; DICKINSON, 2011) the initial stages (birth and growth) and the final stages (turbulence and decline) were statistically significant and positive. This evidences show that investment decisions of non-mature companies are dependent of internal resources. Finally, the main result of this analysis is that the volume of resources retained determines the investment decisions of the non-mature firms. However, the small number of observations and the impossibility of obtaining the accounting information of private companies were important limiters for the study.

Nowdays we are living the era of globalization, where the vast majority of corporations work with services provided through the internet. In these, no tonly the access, but also the provisioning of physical resources, is done in a distributed way (like clouds). Even the form of development teams became spaced out geographically. Although slowly, implementation activity and deployment strategies begin to follow such trends. To achieve scalability and flexibility in larger aplications a new approach arises, named by Microservices (MS). However, MS architectures are at their inception and are even more a concept than a fully mature design pattern. One of the hardest topics in these approach is how to properly migrate or develop a single microservice, in terms of scope, efficiency and dependability. Inthissense, this work proposes a new architectural model based on high-level architecture pattern of reactive programming to the internal structure of a new microservice. The new model of microservices are internally coordinated by asynchronous queues, which allowed to preserve compatibility with most monolithic components and provide an encapsulation process to enable its continuity. A comparative study between the standard approach and the proposed architecture was carried out in order to measure the impacts of the proposed strategy on key service aspects: dependability, elasticity and performance.

To think of the religious phenomenon from the proposals of Ludwig Feuerbach consists in the solid development of a critique of Christianity and its interference in western culture. The aim of the present research is to analyze the course of Feuerbach 's philosophy towards the reform of philosophy, which establishes the philosophy of the future, here understood as the philosophy of religion. The critical analysis of religions carried out by the philosopher composes the scenario of a new religion philosophy, which approaches the religious phenomenon as one of the elements present in human life; religion is understood as action in the world and must therefore be faithfully referenced to its expression. Investigate religion in its essence constitutes the task of the new philosophy of religion and this is how Feuerbach analyzes it, seeking to understand it from its essential point of view, that is, from the human perspective. His anthropological atheism emerges as a denial of everything that denies man, including christian and absolutist theology, who chose a world thought only as the real world; the criticism of pagan and christian religions made through his atheism forms the basis of his philosophy of the future. The critique of Hegelian thought also insists, in this sense, as a significant part of the new philosophy of religion in affirming the sensible world as a principle both for philosophizing and for religious activities themselves. The problem of religion approached from its essential point of view to make feasible the realization of a project that gives free expression to man as being in the world, thus achieving his emancipation and producing the new philosophy that recognizes all the dimensions of the human as its own contente. For the composition of the research a bibliographical review was developed and the deductive method was used, so that the presentation of the theories is based on works of the philosopher and some commentators. The conclusive applications point to the new form of philosophy proposed by Feuerbach as a philosophy of religion that inaugurates a human perspective of analyzing religions instead of despising corporeality and materiality, part of them as a presupposition for the emancipation of man through reason free, that part of the only rational being and its sensitivity.

In the context of the importance of the relationship between strategy and competencies has awakened repercussions mainly in what concerns the effects of this needed interaction developed by two terms. As a means to deepen this topic, the theoretical body presents a structure that goes from the beginning of history, concepts, types, until the approaches relating to variables, as a way to support all levels of discussions that are routed around the problem. As support to substantiate the central point of this research, it is necessary the application of Zarafian model with its competences and the Miles and Snow Typology with the Adaptive cycle and its strategic applications. From these considerations, the goal of this research is to identify, through a case study, the types of organizational skills that contribute to the formation and implementation of business strategies in the automotive retail sector in the city of Juazeiro do Norte-CE. As regards the methodology, the research is exploratory and descriptive character of qualitative nature (semi-structured interview in audio and using content analysis tool that will serve for assessment of data related to skills) and quantitative (application of a questionnaire). The results obtained indicate the preponderance of strategic positions (Defender-40%; oil-36.36%; 18.79%;-analytical and reactive-4.85%), considering them as a reality of extreme and contrary in comparison to those companies that are successful when adopting oil strategies, analytical, advocate and reactive. In relation to the types of skills, the results presented are favorable (process skills, technical skills, competences on organizations, service skills and social skills), but considering the targeting of these features as possibilities in the formation and implementation of organizational strategies as continued practice in organizational success. Based on this argument, and in possession of inferences addressed by literature, company X will need to adopt the kinds of skills (social, on organizations, techniques, services and processes) and strategic positions (oil, analytical, advocate and reactive) that contribute to the achievement of your goals and promote new achievements ahead the competitive market.

The efficient sequencing of activities in civil construction projects is a determining factor of success. In this line, the Scheduling Problem in Projects with Restrictions of Resources and Multiple Processing Modes (MRCPSP) aims to determine the shortest possible execution time of the activities, given the execution times, the amount of resources needed and the total resources available. Previous research on the subject has led Artigues et al. (2003) to propose a linear programming model for the RCPSP. The objective of this dissertation is to expand the scope of the model found in the literature, through the addition of new disjunctive constraints to treat the MRCPSP. The research is normative empirical for experiments. Computational tests were carried out in instances of the PSPLIB library, and a practical case study. With the obtained results it can be affirmed that the model is able to find viable solutions to the problem, in a computational time acceptable.

Handicraft is traditionally a relevant cultural expression. It is a way to represent folklores, languages and lifestyle. In the face of technological development, this cultural representation brings to the product a new creative value. This research aims to map and catalog the production of handicrafts in the State of Paraíba – Brazil, through interactive infographics. Using digital tools, this work mine national and state databases related to the Handicraft of Paraíba and transform them into infographics through Tableau data software. These infographics will be the basis used for the creation of sites, which in turn will provide information for the dissemination of the Brazilian handicraft through digital media. This information movement is essential to bring investments and new public policies for the maintenance of the sector.

Digital games are multimedia artefacts that conquered players around the world, creating a global industry that moves billions financially. The permanence of a game company at the top of the success depends on the way it renews and make continuous development, as with the Final Fantasy franchise. Created about thirty years ago, the Final Fantasy franchise it has been renewing itself and incorporating the technological innovations, through the redesign process. The objective of this dissertation is to present a study on the redesign process in the different versions of Final Fantasy, from which it is demonstrated how this process is fundamental for the longevity of a digital game. As a methodological procedure, the research was based on a case study in four games of the main series of Final Fantasy of the genre Japanese role-playing game (JRPG) and versions of these games launched for several platforms. Among the results achieved, we can point out the grouping and categorization of redesign processes in digital games, tracing how these changes were made, in which aspects of the game were made and in some cases, why they were made.

This work intends to explore the aesthetic and creative possibilities of Artificial Neural Networks (RNA), more specifically the Google DeepDream algorithm, and its unfolding in the construction of an artificial consciousness, aiming to point out possible paths of dialogue between human cognitions and the artificial cognitions in digital culture. Through computational tools we seek to expand the creative media of artists and professionals in the media industry, concomitantly with the understanding of the emergence of new languages and aesthetics and their applications. The main goal is to explore the aesthetic and imaging potential of the DeepDream algorithm for creating visual representations of trends topics data from Instagram's social networks, Twitter, and Google's search service. As proof of concept, an experimental prototype of web application was created to generate visual representations through this algorithm. It was intended, therefore, to demonstrate the possibility of using the ANN phenomenon as an aesthetic resource for different areas of human knowledge. In this way, our approach presents the possibility of identifying the emergence of an own aesthetic that dialogues with abstract arts, psychodelism, computational arts, artificial intelligences, large volumes of data, as well as the creative economy and its aspects.

Audio Education is a branch of formal training which focuses on professional audio, phonographic production, audio engineering, music technology etc. The literature review demonstrated that, although today's professional training can be considered the main way of entering in the professional field, there have been reports collected since the 1990s demonstrating that employers were concerned about the newly graduated trainees' lack of social skills. This work proposes that the solution for the problem is to invest in professional internship. Despite this tool may provide the student crucial contact to the "real world" of the field, other findings also demonstrated that only 21.42% of Brazilian audio education programs require professional internship in their school curriculum. Because of this, the researcher developed an online platform (E-AUDI / Audio Education at the Industry) to provide the so needed integration between audio education programs, their respective students and companies that produces sound related content. This platform will promote and facilitate communication between the three parts, thus stimulating the practice of professional internship and the consequent development of social working skills among the target students of the research. Indeed, it has been developed in a collaborative manner between the author and four other professionals in the areas of design, arts & medias and computer science. The final result points out that the functionality of the platform also depends on some factors, among them, the study of the causes of the lack of professional internship offering among the audio education programs in Brazil, a better understanding of the profile of the local audio industry, and the development of awareness about the importance of internship among its agents.

This Doctoral thesis consists of three independent essays related to the effects of corporate governance and corporate reputation on tax avoidance of Brazilian companies. This thesis seeks to contribute to the tax avoidance debate based on the argument that Brazilian companies increase tax avoidance by highlighting fiscal risks, even in the presence of Corporate Governance and corporate reputation. Agency theory and Moral License Theory was used as theoretical basis. The first theory explains the agency conflict caused by the search for agent wealth to the detriment of owner wealth, as well as the use of governance as a reduce of this conflict, and the second theory to give an alternative explanation for the fact that some companies with strong corporate reputation to engage in aggressive tax avoidance, increasing the firm's fiscal risk. The First essay assumes that Brazilian private companies are prone to present a higher level of tax avoidance in relation to Brazilian publicly held companies. Regression models were estimated with random effects panel data and fixed effects with LSDV (Least Square Dummy Variables) to analyze the explanatory power of the variable of interest (private or public companies) in relation to the dependent variable (ETR), controlling by economic sectors and organizational life cycle (control variables) of 668 Brazilian firms from 2010 to 2015. The results indicate that: (i) Brazilian privately companies are prone to present lower ETRs in relation to publicly held companies; (ii) The stages of maturity and turbulence of the organizational life cycle are indirectly related to ETR. The Second essay advances in the tax avoidance analysis assuming that corporate reputation is a determinant of tax avoidance in Brazilian publicly held companies. The sample comprises 225 companies with 1,575 observations distributed in a panel data from the period (2010 to 2016). The estimations were made by panel data methods (RE, FE-LSDV, GLS, GLM, GHG and GMM) and resulting that Brazilian publicly held companies with an established corporate reputation increase their tax avoidance. This may indicate that the companies ignore possibility of fiscal risk and reputational damage which may arise, at least up to a certain level of tax aggressiveness. Finally, the Third essay assumes that managerial opportunism is encouraged by executive compensation and is mitigated by the presence of corporate governance and corporate reputation in Brazilian publicly held companies. Using GLS and GMM estimations for the determinants of tax avoidance (measured by BTD, NBTD and ABTD) it can be inferred that: (i) In an individual perspective of view, remuneration does not impact managerial opportunism; (ii) Corporate reputation can reduce managerial opportunism if analyzed individually. However, when considering its interaction with the variable remuneration there is an evidence in favor of incentives to managerial opportunism; (iii) In relation to corporate governance, the results were inconclusive when the governance variable is analyzed individually. However, when considering its interaction with the variable remuneration there is an evidence in favor of incentives to managerial opportunism.

Anadenanthera colubrina (angico) is a medicinal plant, native to caatinga, whose extractive solutions are popularly used to treat infections and inflammations of diseases of the gastric and respiratory tract, being one of the ten medicinal plants, most used in Northeast Brazil. Researchers, evaluating phytochemical studies of extracts of A. colubrina demonstrated the presence of secondary metabolites, such as: alkaloids, steroids, triterpenoids, phenolic compounds and flavonoids such as quercetin, thus the purpose of this work was to propose the validation and covalidation of analytical method for analysis of quercetin by CLAE-DAD, standardization of A. colubrina plant extract (fluid extract, dry extract), optimization of the drying conditions of the extract by spray drying and pre-formulated production with different technological adjuvants and study of their accelerated stability. The validation of the analytical method followed protocols of RDC 899/2003 (ANVISA). The standardization of the fluid extract of the leaves of A. colubrina evaluated the influence of the alcoholic content and the particle size of the vegetal drug in the extractive process, being the extractive efficiency determined as a function of the concentration of the quercetin marker, analyzed by HPLCDAD. The standardization of the nebulized dry extract (ESN) evaluated the influence of air inlet temperature, pump feed flow and adjuvant ratio through factorial design 23 + 1 using as answer the quercetin marker content and process yield. The pre-formulations were produced by physical mixing 1:1, containing dried nebulized extract (ESN) and pregelatinized starch, microcrystalline cellulose 102, maltodextrin and lactose M 200, and then accelerated stability study for 180 days according to official guide (RDC 45/2012). The results demonstrate that the extractive efficiency occurs at the conditions of solvent proportion at 50 and 70% ethanol with quercetin concentration of 122.5 and 124.2 μg / mL respectively. The evaluation of particle sizes in the extractive process has shown that as particle size is reduced, there is an increase in the extractive efficiency of flavonoid quercetin under the conditions evaluated. The analytical method validated by CLAE-DAD demonstrated that the method is specific, linear, sensitive, accurate, excellent recovery, robust and suitable for the intended purpose, according to official guides. The factorial design applied to the production of the dried extract of A. colubrina indicated the optimum drying condition, such as 10% adjuvant ratio, 160ºC inlet temperature and 8mL / min pump flow. The results of the accelerated stability study of A. colubrina pre-formulated dry extract showed that the pre-formulated were stable and follow the zero-order kinetic model of degradation. The study determined the time required for the quercetin content to degrade by 10% in relation to the initial content, and the following times were obtained in decreasing order of stability: starch> microcrystalline cellulose> maltodextrin> lactose and the pre-formulated starch (41 months) and cellulose (15 months) the ones that had better performance. The results obtained in the present study allowed to add new technologies in the production and quality control of products derived from A. colubrina, producing dry extract standardized by spray-drying, with maintenance of the characteristics of its quality.

In this paper, a high power factor rectifier based on boost topology without current control loop is studied. It uses two active switches that operate complementarily, and it is designed to have one inductor in continuous conduction mode, and the other in discontinuous conduction mode. This arrangement produce an input current that follows the grid voltage waveform without the need of a current control loop, achieving high power factor and low total harmonic distortion of the current drawn from the grid. A frequency-modulation control strategy ensures output voltage regulation under load variations. These characteristics make this converter a viable alternative to controlled rectifiers used in power factor correction. In this paper the theoretical analysis, a simplified design example, and the experimental results for a 1-kW prototype are presented. The prototype is designed to have a rms input voltage of 127 V at 60Hz frequency, an output voltage of 400 V, and a nominal switching frequency of 30 kHz.

Faced with the preponderance of technological changes, transformations in the work of the press agents are constants. The old dialogue model based on contact by e-mail or phone calls is losing space for the possibilities brought by digital social platforms. These changes are recognized by the Social Communication Office of the Brazilian Federal Government which created the Orientation Manual for Social Media Activities. This research aims study the case of press agentes from Federal Institute of Pernambuco (IFPE) and the adequacy of its digital social networks, specifically Facebook, with regards of this Orientation Manual. To do so, it performs bibliographic research; normative documents; three interviews with professionals that manage the social digital networks of the Institution; and data analysis of data collected from IFPE’s official social profiles observed in the months of May, June, July and November of 2017, account for 166 publications. As a result, the research presents a diagnosis of IFPE's social networks in the categories of language, information distribution, planning, public dialogue, thematization, visual identity and accessibility, with the application of the Orientation Manual. It also explains the engagement culture of consumers with the advisory services of public bodies. The research involves discussions around the concepts of Public Communication, Post-industrial Journalism, Midiatization, as well as Participation and Connection Cultures. We used the studies of MATOS (2012), FAUSTO NETO (2016); FILHO (2012), RECUERO, BASTO and ZAGO (2015); SHIRKY (2014) and JENKINS (2014), in addition to other authors who also dialogue with the subject studied. We conclude that the professionals follow the main guidelines of the document, despite the limitations of people or/and proper training, that the guidelines in the Manual are most effective and that organizations need to master how to act within digital platforms. For that, it is important to create customized guides and monitor their applicability, suggesting improvements according to the observed performance.