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Bioactive potential of Tripleurospermum inodorum with detailed insight into anti-inflammatory activity through in vitro, in vivo evaluations and network pharmacology
No full textThis study evaluated Tripleurospermum inodorum extract for cytotoxic, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, antimicrobial, and antibiofilm properties, alongside its phenolic profile, predicted pharmacological interactions and in vivo anti-inflammatory properties. The methanolic extract of T. inodorum was rich in apigenin derivatives, including apigenin-O-pentoside (5.234 mg/g) and apigenin-O-acetyl hexoside (4.929 mg/g), as identified using LC-DAD-ESI/MSⁿ. The extract demonstrated potent anti-inflammatory activity (IC₅₀ = 8.4 μg/mL) by inhibiting nitric oxide production in a RAW 264.7 macrophage model, a key mechanism in controlling inflammatory responses. Its cytotoxicity against NCI-H460 lung carcinoma cells (GI₅₀ = 62.9 μg/mL) suggests potential for targeting inflammation-driven carcinogenesis. Antioxidant activity, ranging from 204.4 (FRAP) to 442.2 (ABTS) mmol of gallic acid equivalents per 100 mg dry weight, highlights its role in mitigating oxidative stress—a critical driver of chronic inflammation. The extract also displayed moderate antimicrobial activity (MIC: 3–12 mg/mL) and strong antibiofilm potential (> 70% inhibition in a crystal violet assay), which are essential for managing infection-associated inflammation. Network pharmacology revealed that dominant phenolic compound act as aldose reductase inhibitors, targeting inflammatory pathways linked to metabolic stress. In vivo assessment using a xylene-induced ear edema model revealed a dose-dependent, biphasic anti-inflammatory effect, with lower doses (125 and 250 mg/kg) exhibiting greater efficacy compared to the highest dose (500 mg/kg), suggesting a hormetic response that emphasizes the importance of optimal dosing. These findings indicate that the methanolic extract of T. inodorum possesses a broad spectrum of bioactivities relevant to inflammation control and supports its further development as a source of novel anti-inflammatory therapeutics.This research was funded by Ministry of Science, Technological Development and Innovation of the Republic of Serbia, Grant No 451-03-136/2025-03/200007. FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC): CIMO, UIDB/00690/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/UIDB/00690/2020) and UIDP/00690/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/UIDP/00690/2020); and SusTEC, LA/P/0007/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/LA/P/0007/2020); and national funding by FCT, P.I., through the institutional scientific employment program contract for L. Barros, M.I. Dias, and R. Calhelha contracts
Mental illness risk prediction in high school students using artificial neural network
Full text linkThe sustainable development goals of the United Nations 2030 agenda, goal number 3 – Good health
and well-being- align with student mental health.
Objective: To conduct an artificial neural network (ANN) to predict the students' self-reported mental health
dimensions.
Methods: A cross-sectional and observational study enrolling sociodemographic and health state data from 2050
university students aged (18–30 years). Results: The best algorithm's result was by predicting the students'
depressive state with 97 % accuracy (weighted average = [precision = 0.79 %, recall = 0.79 %, F-1 score 0 0.79
%, cross-validation (73 %)]), while dimensions such overall mental health self-perception (validation accuracy
= 60 %) and lack of interest in performing their activities of daily living [(ADLs), validation accuracy = 67 %],
presented inferior predictions.
Conclusions: The ANN best predicted the university students' depressive state (73 %).We gratefully acknowledge the financial support from The Scientific Board of the University of Porto, Portugal, approved (Identification number: CE18082). We also thank the Public Health Unit of Bragança, a City in the North of Portugal, and the Instituto Politécnico de Bragança (IPB)
Potential impacts of pesticides on the honey bee (Apis mellifera iberiensis) gut microbiota
Full text linkA healthy honey bee gut microbiota has emerged as a promising avenue to protect bees against stressors. Honey bees possess a stable core microbiota, and disruptions to this microbial community (dysbiosis) within a multifactorial stressor system may serve as an
indicator of adverse health conditions. This study investigated the potential impacts of two widely used pesticides, flupyradifurone (FPF) and tau-fluvalinate (TFL), and the solvent acetone on the gut microbiota of worker bees. Using full-length 16S rRNA gene
sequencing (PacBio Sequel II), the microbial communities of exposed and unexposed bees were analyzed through alpha and beta diversity metrics, as well as taxonomic composition. The results revealed distinct microbial patterns across treatments. The acetone group exhibited the highest microbial richness (Chao1), but also greater interindividual variability and signs of dysbiosis, while the TFL group showed reduced diversity and increased dominance of specific taxa. FPF exposed bees maintained a more balanced microbial profile. Taxonomic analysis showed a predominance of Lactobacillus in pesticide-treated groups, while Bartonella, Snodgrassella, and Commensalibacter were reduced under acetone and TFL exposure. Gilliamella and Bifidobacterium responded differently depending on the treatment, suggesting adaptive or opportunistic dynamics. These findings demonstrate that not only pesticides, but also solvents like acetone, can significantly alter the gut microbiota of honey bees. This study highlights the need to re-evaluate the assumed inertness of formulation components in ecotoxicological risk assessments and reinforces the importance of microbiome-based indicators in pollinator health studies. The outcomes contribute to a deeper understanding of pesticide-microbiota interactions and offer insights to support more sustainable and pollinator-friendly agricultural practices.Uma microbiota intestinal saudável das abelhas melíferas tem-se revelado uma via promissora para protegê-las contra fatores de stress. As abelhas possuem uma microbiota central estável, e perturbações nesta comunidade microbiana (disbiose), num
contexto multifatorial de stress, podem servir como indicador de condições adversas de saúde. Este estudo investigou os potenciais impactos de dois pesticidas amplamente utilizados, flupiradifurona (FPF) e tau-fluvalinato (TFL) na microbiota intestinal de
abelhas operárias. Utilizando o sequenciamento do gene 16S rRNA de comprimento total (PacBio Sequel II), as comunidades microbianas de abelhas expostas e não expostas foram analisadas com base em métricas de diversidade alfa e beta, bem como na composição taxonômica. Os resultados revelaram padrões microbianos distintos entre os tratamentos. O grupo tratado com acetona apresentou a maior riqueza microbiana (Chao1), mas também maior variabilidade interindividual e sinais de disbiose, enquanto o grupo tratado com TFL demonstrou uma diversidade reduzida e maior dominância de táxons específicos. As abelhas expostas à FPF mantiveram um perfil microbiano mais equilibrado. A análise taxonómica revelou uma predominância de Lactobacillus nos grupos tratados com pesticidas, enquanto Bartonella, Snodgrassella e Commensalibacter apresentaram uma redução sob exposição a TFL e acetona. Gilliamella e Bifidobacterium responderam de forma variável consoante o tratamento, sugerindo dinâmicas adaptativas ou oportunistas. Estes resultados demonstram que não só os pesticidas, mas também solventes como a acetona, podem alterar significativamente a microbiota intestinal das abelhas. O estudo reforça a necessidade de reavaliar a suposta inércia dos componentes de formulação nas avaliações de risco ecotoxicológico e sublinha a importância de indicadores baseados no microbioma em estudos de saúde de polinizadores. Os dados obtidos contribuem para uma compreensão mais aprofundada das interações entre pesticidas e microbiota e oferecem orientações para práticas agrícolas mais sustentáveis e benéfico aos polinizadores
Bridging innovation strategies and intellectual property: a systematic review-based conceptual framework and a roadmap for future research.
Full text linkUnderstanding the connection between innovation strategies and intellectual property (IP) is crucial for academia, policymakers, and managers. This topic has gained interest from the scientific community. However, the literature is fragmented and dispersed due to increasing knowledge, and earlier literature reviews do not provide a holistic assessment of the existing research on how innovation strategies are connected to IP. This study aims to address this gap by answering the following questions: What is the status of the art on innovation strategies and IP regarding theoretical and methodological approaches, contextual elements, and key research
themes? How can this research be advanced and developed further? To this purpose, we undertake a comprehensive review and synthesis of existing knowledge in this field based on the content analysis of 144 articles indexed in the Web of Science database. Findings indicate that (i) the knowledge-based and resource-based views are the main theoretical foundations, (ii) the empirical-quantitative approach is the main methodology, (iii) the Asian, European, and North American countries are the main geographical scopes explored, and (iv) there are six major research themes addressing innovation strategies, IP protection mechanisms, determinants of innovation strategies and IP, learning and knowledge, interorganizational collaboration, and value creation and appropriation outcomes. Therefore, this study contributes to the literature on innovation and IP strategies by systematically reviewing and analyzing the existing knowledge, proposing an integrative framework highlighting the interconnections among the major research themes, and setting a roadmap for future research.This work is financed by national funds through FCT - Fundação para
a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I. P., under the project “UIDB/04630/2020”
and DOI identifier 10.54499/UIDP/04630/2020
Old and new climate change adaptation strategies by Montesinho mountain pastoralists, Portugal
Full text linkMountain pastoralists are among the communities most affected by climate change, rendering empowerment of mountain communities and supportive policies essential
Intentions of teaching-learning practices in students after Intensive training in complex learning in health
Full text linkComplexity theory investigates complex systems made up of parts that mutually interact in a non-linear way, producing unpredictable results. Inspired by this theoretical approach, ECOLAH - Embracing a
Complexity-Orientated Learning Approach in Health is an Erasmus+ project (https://ecolah.eu/about/) whose mission is to develop a better understanding of how the complex societal challenge of building a
healthy society can be (better) influenced and co-directed by Higher Education. The ECOLAH project team considered a real-life ecosystem/community involved in complex issues as a starting point for learning. In order to promote a collective and collaborative learning process that takes into account all stakeholders. To this end, four courses were developed to enable students to navigate complexity in the context of complexity-orientated ecosystems in health: (1) Complex Adaptive Systems Applied to Health (CAS) which aims to sensitise students to the patterns of interaction between health actors and between them and the environment, promoting an integrated and systemic understanding; (2) Futures and epistemic literacy in Health (EFL) focuses on developing the capacity to anticipate, i.e.., that health students develop the ability to anticipate the future by preparing for ignorance; (3) Becoming in complexity (BIC) enables students to train critical thinking skills, encouraging self-evaluation and evaluation of the work of others, promoting an integrated understanding; (4) Offering Holding and facilitating environment (HFE) prepares students for a flow of relationships, boundary-crossing and ethics, as well as promoting (collective) sense-making, empathy and intuitive reasoning. These four integrated courses aim to provide training for higher education health students as a holistic learning journey based on a complexity-orientated learning approach. This study aims to evaluate the intentions of students’ teaching-learning practices after the intensive training of the ECOALH course. This is a qualitative study on the results of the five-day ECOALH intensive training held in April 2024, with a total of 46 students and 15 teachers from five European universities in four different countries: The Netherlands, Finland, Portugal and Romania. The training was designed as an experience of immersion in complexity through various workshops and activities organized around the four courses. On the last day of training, students were invited to reflect and write about their intentions anonymously in the learning process, on post-its, in 6 dimensions: doing/thinking/care - more/less. A content analysis of the post-its was carried out to build word clouds using the wordclouds software. As the main results, the students mentioned stress, procrastination, excessive use of technology and unhealthy habits as aspects to do/think/care less about.
They also mentioned wanting to reduce negative thoughts, focus on their own goals, control anxiety and emphasize emphaty problem-solving. Aspects to do less of are continuous learning, prioritizing health, getting out of their comfort zone, improving professionally and maintaining a balance between personal and professional life and being informed about global issues. They also value a balanced lifestyle, relevant education, health prevention and making a positive impact through empathy and collaboration. In this sense, students seek a balance between the demands of modern life and their own well-being, while aiming for meaningful personal growth and positive contributions to society.This work was supported by national funds through FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC): CIMO, UIDB/00690/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/UIDB/00690/2020) and UIDP/00690/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/UIDP/00690/2020) and SusTEC, LA/P/0007/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/LA/P/0007/2020) as well by Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union: Project “ECOLAH – Embracing a Complexity-Orientated Learning Approach in Health” (2021-1-NL01-KA220-HED-000031188
Contributions to accelerating a numerical simulation of free flow parallel to a porous plane
No full textFlow models over flat p orous surfaces have applications in natural processes, such as material, food, chemical processing, or mountain mudflow simulations. The development
of simplified a nalytical or numerical models can predict characteristics such as velocity, pressure, deviation length, and even temperature of such flows for geophysical and engineering purposes. In this context, there is considerable interest in theoretical and experimental models. Mathematical models to represent such phenomena for fluid mechanics have continuously been developed and implemented. Given this, we propose a mathematical and simulation model to describe a free-flowing flow pa rallel toa
porous material and its transition zone. The objective of the application is to analyze the influence o f t he p orous matrix on the flow u nder d ifferent m atrix p roperties. W e i mplement a Computational Fluid Dynamics scheme using the Finite Volume Method to simulate and calculate the numerical solutions for case studies. However, computational applications of this type demand high performance, requiring parallel execution techniques. Due to this, it is necessary to modify the sequential version of the code. So, we propose a methodology describing the steps required to adapt and improve the code. This approach decreases 5.3% the execution time of the sequential version of the code. Next,
we adopt OpenMP for parallel versions and instantiate parallel code flows and executions on multi-core. We get a speedup of 10.4 by using 12 threads. The paper provides simulations that offer the correct understanding, modeling, and construction of abrupt transitions between free flow a nd porous media. The process presented here could expand to the simulations of other porous media problems. Furthermore, customized simulations require little processing time, thanks to parallel processing.This work was partially funded by Brazilian CNPq: 10/2023 Universal (Project No 407827/2023-4) and FAPERGS: 07/2021 PqG (Project N o 21/2551-0002055-5), and Portuguese national funds through FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC): CeDRI, UIDB/05757/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/UIDB/05757/2020) and UIDP/05757/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/UIDP/05757/2020); and SusTEC, LA/P/0007/2020 (DOI: 10.54499/LA/P/0007/2020
Risco de Disfagia e Índice de Massa Corporal: Um Estudo em Contexto Institucional
Full text linkEm Portugal, a esperança média de vida tem aumentado, conduzindo a um acentuado envelhecimento populacional e consequentemente, a uma maior procura pelos serviços de saúde. Este envelhecimento está frequentemente associado a alterações fisiológicas, nas quais a disfagia e a desnutrição coexistem, comprometendo a qualidade de vida na população idosa. Objetivos: Avaliar o risco de disfagia em Indivíduos Institucionalizados e a sua relação com o Índice de Massa Corporal. Metodologia: Realizou-se um estudo de carácter observacional, transversal e quantitativo em Estruturas Residenciais Para Pessoas Idosas, recorrendo-se a uma amostra de 67 indivíduos, obtida através da técnica de amostragem não probabilística. Para a recolha de dados utilizou-se um questionário que incluía a caracterização antropométrica, e o Eating Assessment Total-10, para avaliação de risco de disfagia. Resultados: Verificou-se que 70,1% dos indivíduos eram do sexo feminino com uma idade média de 81,22 ± 9,31 anos, identificando-se um risco de disfagia em 49,3% dos participantes. Ainda se verificou uma correlação significativa entre o Índice de Massa Corporal e risco de disfagia no sexo feminino (r = 0,989; p-value< 0,001), assim como uma correlação da idade com o risco de disfagia no sexo feminino (r = 0,431; p-value< 0,001), sem significância no sexo masculino. Conclusão: A pesquisa destaca a importância de novos estudos que considerem uma abordagem mais abrangente, contemplando fatores como comorbilidades e impacto emocional. Essas investigações são fundamentais para a compreensão das necessidades deste grupo populacional, contribuindo para o desenvolvimento de estratégias mais eficazes de prevenção, diagnóstico precoce e tratamento da disfagia.In Portugal, average life expectancy has increased, leading to a marked ageing of the population and, consequently, a greater demand for health services. This ageing is often associated with physiological changes, in which dysphagia and malnutrition coexist, compromising quality of life in the elderly population. Objectives: To assess the risk of dysphagia in institutionalized individuals and its relationship with body mass index. Methodology: An observational, cross-sectional, and quantitative study was carried out in Residential Facilities for the Elderly, using a sample of 67 individuals, obtained through the non-probabilistic sampling technique. A questionnaire was used to collect data, including anthropometric characterization and the Eating Assessment Total-10 to assess the risk of dysphagia. Results: 70.1% of the subjects were female with an average age of 81.22 ±9.31 years, and 49.3% of the participants were at risk of dysphagia. There was also a significant correlation between Body Mass Index and the risk of dysphagia in females (r = 0.989; p-value< 0.001), as well as a correlation between age and the risk of dysphagia in females (r = 0.431; p-value< 0.001), with no significance in males. Conclusion: The research highlights the importance of new studies that consider a more comprehensive approach, considering factors such as comorbidities and emotional impact. These investigations are fundamental to understanding the needs of this population group, contributing to the development of more effective strategies for the prevention, early diagnosis, and treatment of dysphagia
Comunicação eficaz entre cuidadores formais e idosos: barreiras e estratégias
Full text linkA comunicação eficaz entre cuidadores
formais e idosos é essencial no
atendimento de qualidade. Este estudo,
transversal, exploratório e descritivo,
investigou a perceção das barreiras e uso
estratégias de comunicação
percecionadas e usadas por
cuidadores formais de idosos em
Residências Senior do Norte de Portugal.
Foi aplicado um questionário
estruturado, com perguntas fechadas,
abordando as principais barreiras na
comunicação e aspetos sobre
comunicação eficaz. Foram realizadas
entrevistas semiestruturadas a
participantes selecionados de forma
intencional, para identificar dificuldades
quotidianas e estratégias de
comunicação mais utilizada
Impact of a six-week training program on physical fitness and performance of young tennis players: a cluster analysis approach
Full text linkThis study aimed to classify young tennis players into sub-groups (clusters) based on their performance and physical fitness determinants and to analyze their cluster assignment change over six weeks of intervention. A sample of young athletes aged 10–14 years was used, and players were classified according to their International Tennis Number (ITN) and various physical fitness metrics after a six-week specific training program. Clusters were also analyzed for cluster assignment changes across pre-test and post-test interventions. The results showed that the performance variables in all clusters improved at the end of the intervention. Specifically, ITN scores improved by an average of 15% (p < 0.05), the 5-m sprint times improved by 8.5% on average (p < 0.01), and the T-drill agility test showed a 10% reduction in completion time (p < 0.01). However, key determinants for cluster formation assessment scores differed, meaning that the training resulted in the physical fitness profiles changing over time. Improvement in 5-m sprint and T-drill agility tests showed that the current program was effective in improving movement characteristics that are vital to a tennis player. Movement between clusters was observed, with some players improving their classification while others regressed, highlighting the need for individualized training interventions to optimize player development. Individualized responses to training are common among young athletes, reflecting varying developmental stages. Clustering can help tailor training programs to the specific needs of different groups. In summary, this study highlights the effects of specific training on young tennis players and emphasizes the necessity of considering individual differences in growth and training responses.The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research and/or publication of this article. This study was supported by national funds (FCT\u2013Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology) under the project UIDB/DTP/04045/2020