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- Ferreira-Leitão, Viridiana, et al.
(författare)
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An approach to the utilisation of CO2 as impregnating agent in steam pretreatment of sugar cane bagasse and leaves for ethanol production.
- 2010
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Ingår i: Biotechnology for Biofuels. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1754-6834. ; 3:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: The conditions for steam pretreatment of sugar cane bagasse and leaves were studied using CO2 as an impregnating agent. The following conditions were investigated: time (5 to 15 min) and temperature (190 to 220 degrees C). The pretreatment was assessed in terms of glucose and xylose yields after enzymatic hydrolysis and inhibitor formation (furfural and hydroxymethylfurfural) in the pretreatment. Results from pretreatment using SO2 as impregnating agent was used as reference. RESULTS: For sugar cane bagasse, the highest glucose yield (86.6% of theoretical) was obtained after pretreatment at 205 degrees C for 15 min. For sugar cane leaves the highest glucose yield (97.2% of theoretical) was obtained after pretreatment at 220 degrees C for 5 min. The reference pretreatment, using impregnation with SO2 and performed at 190 degrees C for 5 min, resulted in an overall glucose yield of 79.7% and 91.9% for bagasse and leaves, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Comparable pretreatment performance was obtained with CO2 as compared to when SO2 is used, although higher temperature and pressure were needed. The results are encouraging as some characteristics of CO2 are very attractive, such as high availability, low cost, low toxicity, low corrosivity and low occupational risk.
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| 2. |
- Gouveia-Figueira, Sandra, et al.
(författare)
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Antioxidant Capacity, Cytotoxicity and Antimycobacterial Activity of Madeira Archipelago Endemic Helichrysum Dietary and Medicinal Plants
- 2014
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Ingår i: Antioxidants. - : MDPI. - 2076-3921. ; 3:4, s. 713-729
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The potential bioactivity of dietary and medicinal endemic Helichrysum plants from Madeira Archipelago was explored, for the first time, in order to supply new information for the general consumer. In vitro antioxidant properties were investigated using DPPH, ABTS(+), FRAP and beta-Carotene assays, and the total phenolic content (TPC) and total flavonoid content (TFC) were also determined. Although the results generally showed a large variation among the three analyzed plants, the methanolic extracts showed the highest antioxidant capacity. Exception is made for H. devium n-hexane extract that showed good radical scavenger capacity associated to compounds with good reducing properties. In the Artemia salina toxicity assay and antimycobaterial activity, H. devium was the most potent plant with the lowest LD50 at 216.7 ± 10.4 and MIC ≤ 50mug·mL(-1). Chemometric evaluation (Principal Component Analysis-PCA) showed close interdependence between the ABTS, TPC and TFC methods and allowed to group H. devium samples.
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| 3. |
- Isento, João N.G., et al.
(författare)
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Vehicular Delay-Tolerant Networks? A Novel Solution for Vehicular Communications
- 2013
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Ingår i: IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Magazine. - Piscataway, N.J. : IEEE Press. - 1939-1390. ; 5:4, s. 10-19
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Vehicular Delay-Tolerant Networks (VDTNs) is a breakthrough based DTN-based solution to provide vehicular communications under challenging scenarios characterized by long delays and sporadic connections. VDTN uses a store-carry-and-forward paradigm, inspirited from Delay Tolerant Networks, which allows forward bundles to asynchronously reach the destination hop by hop over traveling vehicles equipped with short-range Wi-Fi devices. The proposed VDTN architecture assumes out-of-band signaling with control and data planes separation. VDTNs also assume datagrams aggregation under the network layer in large size packets, called bundles, following an IP over VDTN approach. This paper presents VDTN networks focusing on their layered architecture, bundle aggregation and de-aggregation mechanisms, network protocols, scheduling and dropping policies, fragmentation mechanisms, and the created tools for VDTNs performance evaluation, demonstration, and validation. © 2009-2012 IEEE.
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| 4. |
- Papadopoulos, Nikolaos G, et al.
(författare)
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Research needs in allergy: an EAACI position paper, in collaboration with EFA.
- 2012
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Ingår i: Clinical and translational allergy. - : Wiley. - 2045-7022. ; 2:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- ABSTRACT: In less than half a century, allergy, originally perceived as a rare disease, has become a major public health threat, today affecting the lives of more than 60 million people in Europe, and probably close to one billion worldwide, thereby heavily impacting the budgets of public health systems. More disturbingly, its prevalence and impact are on the rise, a development that has been associated with environmental and lifestyle changes accompanying the continuous process of urbanization and globalization. Therefore, there is an urgent need to prioritize and concert research efforts in the field of allergy, in order to achieve sustainable results on prevention, diagnosis and treatment of this most prevalent chronic disease of the 21st century.The European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI) is the leading professional organization in the field of allergy, promoting excellence in clinical care, education, training and basic and translational research, all with the ultimate goal of improving the health of allergic patients. The European Federation of Allergy and Airways Diseases Patients' Associations (EFA) is a non-profit network of allergy, asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorder (COPD) patients' organizations. In support of their missions, the present EAACI Position Paper, in collaboration with EFA, highlights the most important research needs in the field of allergy to serve as key recommendations for future research funding at the national and European levels.Although allergies may involve almost every organ of the body and an array of diverse external factors act as triggers, there are several common themes that need to be prioritized in research efforts. As in many other chronic diseases, effective prevention, curative treatment and accurate, rapid diagnosis represent major unmet needs. Detailed phenotyping/endotyping stands out as widely required in order to arrange or re-categorize clinical syndromes into more coherent, uniform and treatment-responsive groups. Research efforts to unveil the basic pathophysiologic pathways and mechanisms, thus leading to the comprehension and resolution of the pathophysiologic complexity of allergies will allow for the design of novel patient-oriented diagnostic and treatment protocols. Several allergic diseases require well-controlled epidemiological description and surveillance, using disease registries, pharmacoeconomic evaluation, as well as large biobanks. Additionally, there is a need for extensive studies to bring promising new biotechnological innovations, such as biological agents, vaccines of modified allergen molecules and engineered components for allergy diagnosis, closer to clinical practice. Finally, particular attention should be paid to the difficult-to-manage, precarious and costly severe disease forms and/or exacerbations. Nonetheless, currently arising treatments, mainly in the fields of immunotherapy and biologicals, hold great promise for targeted and causal management of allergic conditions. Active involvement of all stakeholders, including Patient Organizations and policy makers are necessary to achieve the aims emphasized herein.
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