Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Western science, today, is science that has been instituted and comes in the first place, with characteristics such as objectivity, measurement and Cartesianism. This study brings to light, in a way, an old debate about what science is. And, behind that backdrop, reveals itself the central question: what reasons have led some doctors, immersed in the biomedical rationality and, consequently, in the Western scientific rationality, to look at other rationalities of health, getting to choose to work with at least one of them, the floral medicine, main theme of this study. Just this, a medicine based on other rationality of health, on other scientific rationality and, therefore, another understanding of individual, disease, health, treatment and cure. While the Western medical science focuses its gaze on diseases, organs and injuries and it is still slow, floral medicine - which is one of the complementary medicines is starting to look at the individuals and their relation with themselves and their surroundings to think about healing and illness, it looks at the person in all his relations to make his diagnosis and treatment, without fragmenting the individual and his body. Through content analysis of Bardin (2010), held with eight interviews with doctors who also work with floral medicine in the city of Porto Alegre, six categories were observed, which indicate the differences of the rationalities and the influences of each one in their work and also the reasons for the choice of floral medicine as a tool in the treatment of sick individuals, or better, of individuals with some physical, mental or emotional imbalance. The categories are: 1. What is illness? 2. What is healing? 3. What is health? 4. How does Western science work; 5. How does floral medicine work; 6. The path from biomedicine to floral medicine. These categories indicate the way of thinking of doctors during their life history and their professional history, what has influenced them and even led them up to work with floral therapy. Some of them already had in their lives factors and concepts that were the pillars to whet their curiosity about other forms of care with patients that complemented what they learned with medicine. Other doctors, fully immersed in the Western medical and scientific rationality, were caught by surprise by the effects of floral in their lives or in the lives of people nearby, which made them rethink their actions as doctors. All, however, when in contact with floral medicine, claimed to have noticed in this the possibility of helping their patients and themselves in the art of curing human suffering, thereby obtaining results that were and are interesting or even amazing. Maybe this surprise is not only because of the results, but because of the approximation that the study of floral made possible between these doctors and their patients, and thus between these doctors and the art of healing, making them even more curing agents of individuals and not just of illness or injuries. / A ciência ocidental, hoje, é a ciência instituída que vem em primeiro lugar, com características como a objetividade, mensuração e o cartesianismo. Este trabalho vem trazer à luz, de certa forma, uma discussão antiga sobre o que é ciência. E, por trás desse pano de fundo, desvela-se a questão central: quais motivos levaram alguns médicos, imersos na racionalidade biomédica e, consequentemente, na racionalidade científica ocidental, a olhar outras racionalidades da saúde, chegando a escolher trabalhar com pelo menos uma delas, a medicina floral, tema central deste estudo. Justo esta, uma medicina embasada em outra racionalidade de saúde, em outra racionalidade científica e, com isso, outra compreensão de sujeito, de doenças, de saúde, de tratamento e de cura. Enquanto a ciência médica ocidental foca seu olhar nas doenças, órgãos e lesões e ainda está a passos lentos, começando a olhar para os sujeitos e sua relação consigo mesmo e com o seu entorno para pensar a cura e a doença, a medicina floral que é uma das medicinas complementares olha o sujeito em todas as suas relações para realizar seu diagnóstico e seu tratamento, sem fragmentar o indivíduo e seu corpo. Através da análise de conteúdo de Bardin (2010), realizada com as oito entrevistas feitas com médicos que também atuam com medicina floral no município de Porto Alegre-RS, foram observadas seis categorias, as quais indicam as diferenças das racionalidades e as influências de cada uma em seus trabalhos e, ainda, os motivos pela escolha da medicina floral como mais uma ferramenta de trabalho no tratamento dos sujeitos doentes, ou melhor, com algum desequilíbrio físico, mental ou emocional. As categorias são: 1. O que é doença?; 2. O que é cura?; 3. O que é saúde?; 4. Como é a medicina ocidental; 5. Como é a medicina floral; 6. Caminho da biomedicina ao floral. Estas categorias indicam a forma de pensar dos médicos durante sua história de vida e sua história profissional, o que os influenciou e até os levou a trabalhar com terapia floral. Alguns deles já possuíam em sua vida fatores e concepções que foram os pilares para aguçar sua curiosidade em relação a outras formas de cuidado com os pacientes, que complementassem o que aprenderam com a medicina. Outros médicos, totalmente imersos na racionalidade científica e médica ocidental, foram pegos de surpresa pelos efeitos do floral em suas vidas ou na vida de pessoas próximas, o que os fez repensar sobre seu agir médico. Todos, no entanto, ao entrar em contato com a medicina floral, disseram ter percebido nesta a possibilidade de ajudar seus pacientes e a si mesmos na arte de curar o sofrimento humano, obtendo assim resultados que foram e são interessantes ou mesmo surpreendentes. Talvez essa surpresa não seja apenas pelos resultados, mas pela maior aproximação que o estudo dos florais possibilitou entre esses médicos e seus pacientes, e, assim, entre esses médicos e a arte de curar, tornando-os, ainda mais, agentes de cura de sujeitos, e não apenas de doenças ou lesões.

Alongside the complementary and alternative medicine movements, a new concept is emerging: integrative medicine. Though more and more authors have begun to use this term, they use it to refer to widely varying concepts of health care. This study begins with a theoretical look at integration and continues with an examination of current integrative efforts. These general discussions are followed by the presentation of the situation in Sweden, and at the Vidarklinik in particular. Finally the study turns to an empirical study investigating the communication between the Vidarklinik and the outside biomedical system. The research suggests a much more comprehensive picture of integrative medicine than those put forward by most authors and finds that to create and maintain an integrative system, all the levels of health care must be actively engaged in the system and the entire spectrum of care must be coordinated for the patient. Attempts at integration are found in diverse local efforts, which are all limited by lack of cooperation between different levels of health care. The study of communication at the Vidarklinik in Sweden illustrates that communication is crucial between all levels of health care in order for even relatively localised efforts in integration, and further that various factors limit whom various individuals and groups can communicate with, while in-person dialogue mitigates some of these factors.

Este trabalho apresenta novos métodos para análise de formas tridimensionais dentro do contexto de visão computacional, destacando-se o uso das transformadas wavelets 1D, 2D e 3D, as quais proporcionam uma análise multi-escala das formas estudadas. As formas analisadas se dividem em três tipos diferentes, dependendo da sua representação matemática: f(t)=(x(t),y(t),z(t)), f(x,y)=z e f(x,y,z)=w. Cada tipo de forma é analisado por um método melhor adaptado. Primeiramente, tais formas passam por uma rotina de pré-processamento e, em seguida, pela caracterização por meio da aplicação das transformadas wavelet 1D, 2D e 3D para as respectivas formas. Esta aplicação nos permite extrair características que sejam invariantes à rotação e translação, levando em consideração alguns conceitos matemáticos da geometria diferencial. Destaca-se também neste trabalho a não obrigatoriedade de parametrização das formas. Os resultados obtidos a partir de formas extraídas de imagens médicas e dados biológicos, que justificam este trabalho, são apresentados. / This work presents new methods for three-dimensional shape analysis in the context of computational vision, being emphasized the use of 1D, 2D and 3D wavelet transforms, which provide a multiscale analysis of the studied shapes. The analyzed shapes are divided in three different types depending on their representation: f(t)=(x(t),y(t),z(t)), f(x,y)=z and f(x,y,z)=w. Each type of shape is analyzed by a more suitable method. Firstly, such shapes undergo a pre-processing procedure followed by the characterization using the 1D, 2D or 3D wavelet transform, depending on its representation. This application allows to extract features that are rotation- and translation-invariant, based on some mathematical concepts of differential geometry. In this work, we emphasize that it is not necessary to use the parameterized version of the 2D and 3D shapes. The experimental results obtained from shapes extracted from medical and biological images, that corroborate the introduced methods, are presented.

A utilização de nanopartículas magnéticas em biomedicina e biotecnologia vem recebendo elevado destaque nos últimos anos, graças à versatilidade de aplicações como reparo de tecidos, diagnósticos, ressonância magnética por imagem, tratamento contra o câncer, separação celular, transporte controlado de drogas, entre outras. Atualmente, as nanopartículas com potencialidade de aplicação em biomedicina se restringem aos óxidos magnéticos de ferro, os quais apresentam comportamento superparamagnético a temperatura ambiente e magnetização da ordem de 300 emu/cm3. Entretanto, há necessidade inerente da funcionalização da superfície para possibilitar aplicações biomédicas tornando as nanopartículas biocompatíveis e/ou biosseletivas. Essa funcionalização adicional é obtida geralmente introduzindo camadas de materiais diamagnético e/ou paramagnéticos na superfície das NP, as quais baixam a eficiência das propriedades magnéticas exigindo o desenvolvimento de núcleos com elevado valor de magnetização de saturação. Desta forma, nesse trabalho foram sintetizadas nanopartículas magnéticas metálicas de FePt recobertas com óxido de ferro obtidas via processo poliol modificado combinado com a metodologia de crescimento mediado por sementes. Os núcleos magnéticos como-sintetizados foram recobertos com uma camada de sílica, seguido pelo recozimento em atmosfera redutora para elevar o valor da magnetização de saturação. Em seguida, sobre a superfície de sílica foram ancoradas moléculas luminescentes de rodamina B com o auxílio de moléculas de APTES atuando como grupo sililante e as NP resultantes foram novamente recobertas com uma fina camada de sílica. Os resultados permitem concluir que foi obtido um sistema bifuncional combinando em uma única nanopartícula a possibilidade de sensoriamento óptico e magnético, além de possuir sua magnetização de saturação intensificada cerca de 10 vezes em relação aos óxidos metálicos (64 emu/g), manter o caráter superparamagnético e possuir superfície biocompatível com possibilidades de funcionalizações adicionais, com grande potencial para aplicações em biomedicina. / In recent years, the magnetic nanoparticles uses in many biomedical and biotechnological areas have received great attention due to their several applications possibilities such as: tissue repair, diagnostics, magnetic resonance imaging, cancer treatment, cell separation, and controlled drug delivery, among others. Today, the potential magnetic nanoparticles applications are limited to magnetic iron oxides uses, which exhibit superparamagnetic behavior at room temperature and low saturation magnetization around 300 emu/cm3. However, for biomedical applications, the nanoparticle surface must be properly functionalized in order to confer biocompatibility and biosselectivity. These additional functionalizations are generally obtained by paramagnetic and/or diamagnetic materials incorporations onto the nanoparticle surface leading a dramatic decreasing in the already low saturation magnetization. In this context, the development of new magnetic nuclei with high magnetizations values is required. Thus, in this work iron oxide-coated metallic FePt magnetic nanoparticles were synthesized by using the modified polyol process combined with the seed mediated growth method. The magnetic as-synthesized nuclei were coated with a thin silica shell followed by thermal annealing under reducing atmosphere in order to increase the saturations magnetization of this material. After that, onto the silica-coated magnetic nanoparticles surface luminescent dye Rhodamine B molecules were supported using the APTES as intermediate sililant molecules. Then, the functionalized nanoparticles were coated again with an outer layer. In conclusion, according to the obtained results, a bifunctional system combining the optical and magnetic sensing in the same nanoparticle was reported. The obtained nanoparticles present superparamagnetic behavior and high saturation magnetization around 10 times higher (~64 emu/g) compared with the iron oxide nanoparticles synthesized at the same conditions. In addition, the luminomagnetic nanoparticle surface is biocompatible allowing additional future functionalizations with high potential to biomedical applications.

The main point of this study was to research on how the description of biomedicine was described and valued in educational material for upper secondary school.  To assist this research, this study took the help from two theorist, Francis Fukuyama and Bart Simon. These two individual had vast differences in how they view biomedicine and its relationship with the perspective of what defines a human. Therefore it was essential that these two individuals were included to assist and aid the research, by pointing out their different argument on why biomedicine had different interpretations. The study showed that a majority of the educational materials had an open and reflective questionnaire about biomedicine and it was often built around letting the pupils think and analyze about different ethical events regarding biomedicine. Another point that also showed up was that a minority of the educational material, didn´t even mention biomedicine and instead decided to point out other part of ethics that did not include biomedicine of any sorts. While other educational material often compared biomedicine to older form of science like the race biology from the beginning of the 20th century or bringing up the argument of  crossing the line between man and God and what our roles in the world is. These educational material had a more critical view to biomedicine and had more argument that pointed out negative attributes then they did with the positive. A noteworthy point that also came out from this study, was that the majority of educational material had similar attributes and arguments that Bart Simons mention in his theories. Meanwhile those educational material that had more of a critical viewpoint toward biomedicine, followed those argument that Francis Fukuyama had discussed in his theory. The conclusion of this research showed that most of these educational material had different form of influence in their way of describing biomedicine but most had reflective and open questionnaire when regarding the description of biomedicine.

L'émergence d’un nouveau système nanoparticulé dans le domaine biomédical, les matériaux hybride poreux du type MOF (pour Metal Organic Framework), a récemment attiré beaucoup d'attention en raison de leur grande versatilité structurale et chimique. En particulaire, le trimésate de fer(III) mésoporeux (MIL-100; MIL pour Matériau de l'Institut Lavoisier) a démontré des capacités remarquables de stockage de médicaments avec leur libération contrôlée dans des conditions physiologiques, ainsi que des propriétés en imagerie très intéressantes.Néanmoins, avant toute bioapplication, il estnécessaire d’étudier leur toxicité et leur profile de biodistribution, lesquels sont fortement affectés par plusieurs facteurs (composition, dégradabilité, chimie de surface, etc.). Ainsi, l’objectif principal de ce travail de thèse porte sur l'évaluation de la biocompatibilité de MOFs nanométriques et leur passage de barrières physiologiquespar différentes voiesd'administration (en particulier, par voie intraveineuse, orale et cutanée) en fonction de leurs propriétés physico-chimiques. / The recent emergence of nanometric porous metal-organic frameworks (nanoMOFs) in the biomedical field has recently attracted a great deal of attention owing to their large porosity and versatile composition. Particularly attractive is the mesoporous iron(III) trimesate (MIL-100; MIL stands for Material of Institute Lavoisier), which has shown exceptional loading of challenging drugs, together with their controlled release under physiological conditions and interesting imaging properties. Nevertheless, prior to any bioapplication, it is crucial investigate its toxicity and biodistribution profile, which are strongly affected by multiple factors (e.g. composition, degradability, surface engineering, etc.). Thus, the aim of this PhD work focuses on the evaluation of the nanoMOF biocompatibility and their physiological barrier crossing from different administration routes (specifically intravenous, oral and cutaneous) as a function of their physicochemical properties.

Diese Arbeit befasst sich mit der automatisierten Analyse der Ausrichtungen von Neuronenfasern in Mikroskopiebildern des menschlichen Gehirns. Für eine solche Analyse wurden vom Paul-Flechsig-Institut für Hirnforschung Leipzig (PFI) Fluoreszenzbilddaten zur Verfügung gestellt. Um für diese Daten Faserausrichtungen zu ermitteln, werden drei Schritte durchgeführt: Neuronenfasern werden hervorgehoben, bzw. freigestellt, es werden Orientierungen zu diesen zugeordnet und die hierdurch ermittelten Ergebnisse werden visualisiert. Es werden für jeden dieser Schritte mehrere Verfahren der klassischen Bildverarbeitung vorgestellt und die Auswirkung verschiedener Parameter auf deren Ergebnisse untersucht. Betrachtet werden Verfahren zur Kontrasterhöhung, Gauß-Filter, auf Hessematrizen basierende Filter, Berechnung von Phasenübereinstimmung und eine Wavelet-Transformation. Alle während dieser Arbeit vorgenommenen Implementierungen stehen als Python-Skripte auf GitHub (https://github.com/saphyll/fiber-orientation) zur Verfügung.:Einleitung 1. Grundlagen 1.1 Datengrundlage 1.2 Architektur 1.3 Grundlagen der Bildverarbeitung 1.3.1 Histogramme 1.3.2 Konvolution 1.3.3 Gaußkernel 1.3.4 Hessematrix und Eigenvektoren 1.4.5 Fourier-Transformation 2. Faseranalyse in 2D 2.1 Hervorhebung von Fasern 2.1.1 Histogram Equalization 2.1.2 Gauß-Filter 2.1.3 Hessematrix-basierte Filter 2.1.4 Phase Congruency 2.1.5 Isotropic Undecimated Wavelet Transform 2.2 Analyse und Visualisierung von Faserrichtungen 2.2.1 Richtungshistogramme 2.2.2 Kacheln 2.2.3 Direkte Ergebnisbilder 3. Zusammenfassung und Ausblick / This thesis covers the automated analysis of fiber orientations in microscopic images of the human brain in regard to data provided by the Paul Flechsig Institute of Brain Research Leipzig (PFI). For the retrieval of information about fiber orientations, three steps are used: An enhancement of fiber visibility and definition, an assignment of orientations to those fibers and a visualisation of fibers and their orientations. Multiple methods from classical image processing are presented for each of these steps and are evaluated according to the available data. These methods include contrast enhancement, gaussian filters, hessian filters, calculation of phase congruency and a wavelet transformation. All implementations resulting from this thesis are available as Python scripts on GitHub (https://github.com/saphyll/fiber-orientation).:Einleitung 1. Grundlagen 1.1 Datengrundlage 1.2 Architektur 1.3 Grundlagen der Bildverarbeitung 1.3.1 Histogramme 1.3.2 Konvolution 1.3.3 Gaußkernel 1.3.4 Hessematrix und Eigenvektoren 1.4.5 Fourier-Transformation 2. Faseranalyse in 2D 2.1 Hervorhebung von Fasern 2.1.1 Histogram Equalization 2.1.2 Gauß-Filter 2.1.3 Hessematrix-basierte Filter 2.1.4 Phase Congruency 2.1.5 Isotropic Undecimated Wavelet Transform 2.2 Analyse und Visualisierung von Faserrichtungen 2.2.1 Richtungshistogramme 2.2.2 Kacheln 2.2.3 Direkte Ergebnisbilder 3. Zusammenfassung und Ausblick

The majority of South African citizens experience inadequate healthcare due to underfunding, mismanagement, staff shortages, and infrastructure problems. Before a healthcare system was created, the sick turned to traditional herbal healers for care. South Africa’s Zulu healers possess specialized knowledge of local plants and medicine thought to have physical and spiritual healing properties. The country’s increasing reliance on Western biomedicine has created a current concern from indigenous medicine conservationists regarding the future of this kind of knowledge. In order to assess the effects of Western medicine on traditional healing practices, I collected data on the various uses of traditional medicine, the frequency in which it is used relative to Western medicine, and how it is maintained in the community. The data identified the various uses and potential problems of Western medicine and Zulu traditional herbal practice in helping the community. The traditional herbal healers revealed close connections between the informational, spiritual, physical, and cultural components of the practice that characterize its livelihood and practice for generations to come. This information allows for a greater understanding of how culture and medicinal knowledge can be entwined together and the positive or negative effects of biomedicine interacting with traditional medicine to help solve sicknesses in not only South Africa, but potentially in our global community.

This dissertation examines the politics of representation in biotechnosciences. Through web representations, I examine three emerging endeavors that propose to create large-scale human population genomic databases to study complex, common diseases and conditions. These projects were initiated in different nations (US, UK, and Iceland), created under different institutional configurations, and are at various stages of development. The websites, which are media technologies do not simply reflect and promote these endeavors. Rather, they help shape these database projects in which the science is uncertain and the technologies not yet built. Thus, they are constitutive technologies that affect the construction of these database projects. More needs to be done to explore how to interpret the 'virtual' realm and how it relates to the 'real' world and specific situations. By bringing hypertextuality into the analysis, I explore how knowledges, practices, and subjectivities are created. By adapting the methods of a number of science and technology (STS) authors, I develop a more dynamic lens in which to investigate web representations and 'emerging' biomedical projects. My concern however, is not only in what represents what, but how representations are constructed. The power of the latter derives from its invisibility. In re-conceptualizing representation and new media technologies, I show that these sites are techno-social spaces for creating knowledge, specific ways of seeing, and practicing biomedicine today. The narrowing time/space between generating data, releasing information, and incorporating publics into their endeavors raises crucial issues as to how biomedicine is represented and how broader audiences are engaged. In the dominant discourses, these projects are all situated within biomedical, (post)genomic, and information revolutions. Here, they hang on the technological object, the database, with the ability to contain what we are coming to understand as life/genetic/bio information. Through the moves of both treating these databases as part of a complex system and investigating them through a lens of representation, I begin to include potential participants and broader audiences into the analysis. Informatic bodies, populations, and subjects are co-created at, by, and through these sites as the developing database projects and information are (re)presented. / Ph. D.

Si l’alternative est de nos jours et dans nos sociétés occidentales un concept de plus en plus en vogue, son caractère lui, en demeure pas moins ambigu. En effet, et alors même que nombre de pratiques dites alternatives émergent de part et d’autre de la société, en faire allusion dans certains domaines équivaut à s’affliger soi-même d’une étiquette sur laquelle serait inscrite « New-Age » en caractère gras. Pourtant, son caractère loin d’évoquer cette seule dimension, semble par ailleurs être conséquente d un déséquilibre de plus en plus prégnant au sein même des prérogatives de l’État. Ce mémoire tente donc de rendre compte de ce phénomène tout en investiguant les répercussions de cette asymétrie sur l’intégration de pratiques médicales alternatives au Québec. Ceci dans l’intention non seulement d’explorer davantage la nature de la relation entre médecine alternative et biomédecine, mais aussi afin de poser un nouveau regard sur son expansion. Un regard, lequel permettrait potentiellement de poser les jalons nécessaires à un espace de conciliation entre les médecines, lequel découlerait alors d’un nouvel équilibre au cœur des prérogatives mêmes de l’État. / If the alternative is to our days and in our western societies a concept more and more in vogue, its character remains ambiguous. In effect, and even that number of practices called “alternatives” emerge on both sides of the society, in referring to in some areas is equivalent to plague itself-even a label on which would be marked “New-Age” in bold. Yet, its character far from referring to this single dimension, seems also be consistent to a more and more significant unbalance within the prerogatives of the State. This dissertation therefore attempts to account for this phenomenon while inquiry into the repercussions of this asymmetry on the integration of alternative medical practices in Quebec. This with the intention not only to further explore the nature of the relationship between alternative medicine and biomedicine, but also in order to install a new look on its expansion. A look, which would potentially lay the groundwork necessary to a space of conciliation between the medicines and which would lead to a new balance in the heart of the prerogatives of the State.