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Publications

2016

Predicting and characterizing indoor temperatures in residential buildings: Results from a monitoring campaign in Northern Portugal

Authors
Magalhães, SMC; Leal, VMS; Horta, IM;

Publication
Energy and Buildings

Abstract
Empirical data for residential indoor temperature and its determinants have important implications for policymakers in terms of the assessment of thermal comfort, health of occupants and the use for supporting energy demand models. With the purpose of advancing this knowledge, the indoor temperatures of 141 households in the Northern Portugal were measured at a half-hourly basis during the winter of 2013-2014. The observed mean winter daily indoor temperature at the occupied period was 14.9 °C for the bedrooms and 16.6°C for the living rooms. The results show that indoor temperatures are significantly below the comfort levels generally accepted, which could be an indication of future potential rebound effects. Results also reinforce the idea that 'cold homes' during winter season are a reality even in the southern European countries. Models for predicting the daily mean bedroom and living room temperature were developed using an enhanced linear regression with panel-corrected standard errors. The results showed that climatic conditions, and especially building characteristics, affect significantly the bedroom and living room's indoor temperatures.

2016

Changes in ST, QT and RR ECG intervals during acute stress in firefighters: a pilot study

Authors
Paiva, JS; Rodrigues, S; Silva Cunha, JPS;

Publication
2016 38TH ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE IEEE ENGINEERING IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY SOCIETY (EMBC)

Abstract
Firefighting is a stressful occupation. The monitoring of psychophysiological measures in those professionals can be a way to prevent and early detect cardiac diseases and other stress-related problems. The current study aimed to assess morphological changes in the ECG signal induced by acute stress. A laboratory protocol was conducted among 6 firefighters, including a laboratory stress-inducer task - the Trier Social Stress Task (TSST) - and a 2-choice reaction time task (CRTT) that was performed before (CRTT1) and after (CRTT2) the stress condition. ECG signals were continuously acquired using the VitalJacket (R), a wearable t-shirt that acts as a medical certified ECG monitor. Results showed that ECG morphological features such as QT and ST intervals are able to differentiate stressful from non stressful events in first responders. Group mean Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) for stress assessment significantly increased after the stress task (TSST), relatively to the end of CRTT2 (after TSST: 4.67 +/- 1.63; after CRTT2: 3.17 +/- 0.75), a change that was accompanied by a significant increase in group mean QT and ST segments corrected for heart rate during TSST. These encouraging results will be followed by larger studies in order to explore those measures and its physiological impact under realistic environments in a higher scalability.

2016

Typed Connector Families

Authors
Proença, J; Clarke, D;

Publication
FORMAL ASPECTS OF COMPONENT SOFTWARE

Abstract
Typed models of connector/component composition specify interfaces describing ports of components and connectors. Typing ensures that these ports are plugged together appropriately, so that data can flow out of each output port and into an input port. These interfaces typically consider the direction of data flow and the type of values flowing. Components, connectors, and systems are often parameterised in such a way that the parameters affect the interfaces. Typing such connector families is challenging. This paper takes a first step towards addressing this problem by presenting a calculus of connector families with integer and boolean parameters. The calculus is based on monoidal categories, with a dependent type system that describes the parameterised interfaces of these connectors. As an example, we demonstrate how to define n-ary Reo connectors in the calculus. The paper focusses on the structure of connectors-well-connectedness-and less on their behaviour, making it easily applicable to a wide range of coordination and component-based models. A type-checking algorithm based on constraints is used to analyse connector families, supported by a proof-of-concept implementation.

2016

Expression Atlas update - an integrated database of gene and protein expression in humans, animals and plants

Authors
Petryszak, R; Keays, M; Tang, YA; Fonseca, NA; Barrera, E; Burdett, T; Füllgrabe, A; Pomer Fuentes, AM; Jupp, S; Koskinen, S; Mannion, O; Huerta, L; Megy, K; Snow, C; Williams, E; Barzine, M; Hastings, E; Weisser, H; Wright, JC; Jaiswal, P; Huber, W; Choudhary, J; Parkinson, HE; Brazma, A;

Publication
Nucleic Acids Res.

Abstract
Expression Atlas (http://www.ebi.ac.uk/gxa) provides information about gene and protein expression in animal and plant samples of different cell types, organism parts, developmental stages, diseases and other conditions. It consists of selected microarray and RNA-sequencing studies from Array Express, which have been manually curated, annotated with ontology terms, checked for high quality and processed using standardised analysis methods. Since the last update, Atlas has grown sevenfold (1572 studies as of August 2015), and incorporates baseline expression profiles of tissues from Human Protein Atlas, GTEx and FANTOM5, and of cancer cell lines from ENCODE, CCLE and Genentech projects. Plant studies constitute a quarter of Atlas data. For genes of interest, the user can view baseline expression in tissues, and differential expression for biologically meaningful pairwise comparisons-estimated using consistent methodology across all of Atlas. Our first proteomics study in human tissues is now displayed alongside transcriptomics data in the same tissues. Novel analyses and visualisations include: 'enrichment' in each differential comparison of GO terms, Reactome, Plant Reactome pathways and InterPro domains; hierarchical clustering (by baseline expression) of most variable genes and experimental conditions; and, for a given gene-condition, distribution of baseline expression across biological replicates.

2016

Spare Parts Inventory Management Using Quantitative and Qualitative Classification

Authors
Oliveira, F; Vaz, CB;

Publication
Lecture Notes in Management and Industrial Engineering - Engineering Systems and Networks

Abstract

2016

Interdisciplinary Team Work Applying working methods to a math project

Authors
Abreu, S; Caldeira, A; Costa, AR; Gomes, T; Roque, LAC;

Publication
2016 2ND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE PORTUGUESE SOCIETY FOR ENGINEERING EDUCATION (CISPEE)

Abstract
In this work, we describe an interdisciplinary teaching experiment involving three subjects of the scientific area of Mathematics and a fourth one in the area of Management. Using only one project, the students developed skills, in an integrated way, in the fields of the subjects involved. The structure of the project is described in detail. It is shown how the knowledge obtained in the different subjects is needed and how it connects together to answer the proposed challenges. We report the progress of the students' work, the main difficulties and the skills developed during this process. We conclude with a reflection on the main problems and gains that may arise in projects of this kind.

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