4,525 research outputs found

    Thymbra capitata (L.) Cav. and Rosmarinus officinalis (L.) Essential Oils: In Vitro Effects and Toxicity on Swine Spermatozoa

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    Essential oils possess a variety of biological properties (i.e., antioxidant, antibacterial, and cytotoxic) that could possibly be applied in reproductive medicine, but their effects on spermatozoa are still partially unknown. The aim of the study was to describe the effects of Thymbra capitata (L.) Cav. and Rosmarinus officinalis (L.) essential oils on the main morpho-functional parameters of swine spermatozoa. Essential oils were preliminary characterized by gas chromatography and added with emulsifiers to facilitate diffusion. Experimental samples were prepared by suspending a fixed number of spermatozoa in 5 mL of medium with 10 different concentrations of essential oil (0.2–2 mg/mL, at intervals of 0.2). After 3 h of incubation, samples were analyzed for pH, viability, objective motility, and acrosome status. Results showed that the effects of the essential oils are concentration-dependent and that R. officinalis is well tolerated up to 0.6 mg/mL. T. capitata impaired the spermatozoa starting from the lowest concentration, with complete spermicidal effect from 0.4 mg/mL. The patterns of damage, confirmed by SEM, were different and quite distinct. As expected, spermatozoa proved to be sensitive to external stimuli and capable of showing different functional patterns, providing interesting insights to the action/toxicity mechanisms. The results of the present work represent the first step towards the systematic characterization of the effects of these compounds on spermatozoa. This kind of studies are necessary to strengthen the idea of future applications of essential oils in the reproductive field due to their antioxidant, antibacterial, or spermicidal properties

    Imagens de Otto Maria Carpeaux: esboço de biografia

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    Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas, Programa de Pós-Graduação em História, Florianópolis, 2015.Este esboço de biografia procura citar algumas imagens de Otto Maria Carpeaux: construções biográficas de naturezas múltiplas, elaboradas em contextos, por atores e sob condições igualmente díspares. Está constituído a partir de uma visão crítica da História, o que permite que ?outras imagens?, fragmentárias e não monumentais, também tenham espaço. Em diálogo com o princípio da montagem, este esboço apresenta-se em duas partes. Na primeira, Imagens possíveis, estão citadas as imagens elaboradas em vida e post mortem acerca do austríaco-brasileiro que nasceu em Viena em 1900, se exilou no Brasil em 1939 e morreu no Rio de Janeiro, em 1978. Na segunda, Montagens possíveis, apresentam-se duas possibilidades de exercício biográfico: pela leitura alegórica do documentário O velho e o Novo (Otto Maria Carpeaux), entendido como instrumento de intervenção no contexto ditatorial brasileiro e de uma reelaboração biográfica concernentes às suas experiências europeias; e pelo Caderno de imagens críticas, registro dos encontros em Carpeaux pelo meio de imagens críticas produzidas a partir da cesura do presente.Abstract : This biographical sketch attempts to quote some images of Otto Maria Carpeaux: various types of biographical constructions, carried out in different contexts by disparate authors under conditions just as distinct. It stems from a critical view of history, allowing for ?other images? fragmented and non-monumental ? to share the space.In dialogue with the montage principle, this sketch has two parts. The first, Possible Images, quotes the images produced during and after the life of the Austrian-Brazilian, who was born in Vienna in 1900, went to Brazil in exile in 1939 and died in Rio de Janeiro in 1978. The second part, Possible Montages, presents two possibilities of a biographical exercise: through the allegorical reading of documentary O Velho e o Novo (Otto Maria Carpeaux), understood as an instrument of intervention in the Brazilian dictatorship context and as a biographical retelling of the author?s European experiences; and through my Scrapbook of Critical Images, a record of the encounters in Carpeaux through critical images produced from the caesura of the present

    Aging models for high capacity LiFePO4 cells

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    This paper deals with the capacity fade of a lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO 4 ) battery for electric and hybrid vehicles. Thanks to low costs of small Li-Ion battery tests, many studies have analyzed life prediction models. The aim of this paper is to verify whether these models can be used to predict battery lifetime of a high capacity Li-Ion battery for full electric and hybrid vehicles, or not. During this study, a test bench has been developed to control a single cell charge and discharge current up to 300A. Finally, different literature aging models have been applied using the data obtained from experimental tests

    D. "Druga zastupati ne sramljaisja", ili: Naš drug i kollega Marija Kristina Bragone. Ee rol' v ital'janskoj i meždunarodnoj skavistike

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    Dopo una breve parte memorialistica sull’inizio dell’amicizia tra l’autrice e Maria Cristina Bragone il saggio traccia le linee del suo percorso scientifico dalla tesi di laurea a quella di dottorato alla monografia su un abbecedario inedito e alla produzione più recente mettendone in luce l’originale metodologia, i significativi risultati e l’eminente ruolo negli studi slavisti internazionaliAfter a brief memoir on the beginning of the friendship between the author and Maria Cristina Bragone, the essay traces the lines of her scientific path from her degree to her doctoral thesis, to her monograph on an unpublished Slavic abecedary and to her most recent production, highlighting her original methodology, the significant results and eminent role in international Slavic studie

    A Software-in-the-Loop Simulation of Vehicle Control Unit Algorithms for a Driverless Railway Vehicle

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    The realization of the first prototype of a vehicle requires several tests of the algorithms implemented on the electronic control unit (ECU). This represents an important step for conventional vehicles, which becomes fundamental when dealing with unmanned vehicles. Since there is no human supervision, most critical tasks are handled by the control unit, which results in higher complexity for the control algorithms. In this work, a software-in-the-loop (SiL) test bench is used to validate the control algorithms of a vehicle control unit (VCU) for a driverless railway vehicle (DLRV). The VCU manages the control of the traction motors, pneumatic braking systems, and range extender, as well as control of the hybrid powertrain configuration to guarantee a high level of availability via the use of redundant systems. The SiL test bench has been developed in a Simulink real-time environment, where the vehicle model is simulated along with its fundamental subsystems. The model communicates with the VCU through a CAN bus protocol in the same way that it will operate with a real vehicle. The proposed method can be used to simulate many mission profiles for the DLRV, which may last several hours each. Moreover, this kind of test bench ensures a high time resolution, which allows one to find solutions for problems which occur with a time scale that is much smaller than the simulation time scale

    A Mathematical Analysis of Maria Valtorta’s Mystical Writings

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    We have studied the very large amount of literary works written by the Italian mystic Maria Valtorta to assess similarities and differences in her writings, because she claims that most of them are due to mystical visions. We have used mathematical and statistical tools developed for specifically studying deep linguistic aspects of texts. The general trend indicates that the literary works explicitly attributable to Maria Valtorta differ significantly from her other literary works, which she claims are attributable to the alleged characters Jesus and Mary. Mathematically, they seem to have been written by different authors. The comparison with the Italian literature is very striking. A single author, namely Maria Valtorta, seems to be able to write texts so diverse as to cover the entire mathematical range (suitably defined) of the Italian literature spanning seven centuries
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