The aim of this study is to compare the effects of the instructions based on cognitive bridging and cognitive conflict approaches and gender on 9th grade students&lsquo / conceptual understanding of force and motion, self-efficacy, and epistemological beliefs. The study was conducted with a sample of 206 students in two different schools. The instructional method (traditional, cognitive conflict, and cognitive bridging) and students&lsquo / gender were used as independent variables in a 3x2 factorial design. Within this design, three treatment groups were constructed, one was control group with no researcher intervention and the other two were used as experimental groups. In one of the experimental groups, students received cognitive bridging instruction and students in the other group received cognitive conflict instruction. Pretests and posttests were administered to assess students&lsquo / conceptual understanding of force and motion, self-efficacy, and epistemological beliefs. Multivariate Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA) was used to explore the main effects of teaching methods and gender, and possible interactions between them. The results showed that teaching method had a significant effect on students&lsquo / conceptual understanding of force and motion in favor of experimental groups. Nevertheless, no significant difference was detected between the effects of cognitive conflict and cognitive bridging. There was no significant difference between male and female students either on the dependent variables of conceptual understandings of force and motion, self-efficacy, and epistemological beliefs. Finally, the present study couldn&lsquo / t capture any significant interaction between teaching method and gender on the combined dependent variables.

Transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) or prion diseases are a class of fatal brain disorders better known as Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease (CJD) in humans, bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle, scrapie in sheep, and chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk. The infectious agent responsible for these diseases is a misfolded prion protein capable of catalyzing a conformational change in normal cellular prion proteins (PrPC) into aberrant disease-causing structural isoforms (PrPSc). Although the etiological agent for TSEs has clearly been defined as PrPSc, there are important gaps in our understanding of how these proteins target and invade brain tissue. It remains to be established how ingested PrPSc ultimately reach the brain and also to understand why these tissues are particularly targeted, notwithstanding that several other tissues highly express prion proteins. Certain viruses, retroviruses in particular, efficiently hijack host proteins and can carry these proteins with them when they are released from a cell. Several lines of evidence have shown that prions and retroviruses can interact and associate at various stages of the retroviral replication cycle. Of special interest is that most retroviruses can cross the blood-brain barrier and could therefore deliver host-derived proteins to neuronal cells. In view of these observations, this thesis investigates whether retroviruses can act as vectors to capture prions from an infected cell and deliver them to a susceptible target cell. In this work, I have cloned human and mouse prion cDNAs from PBMCs and the murine cell line NIH 3T3. Either a FLAG epitope tag or the eGFP reporter protein cDNA was inserted into a region of the prion cDNA that is predicted to be amenable to such genetic insertions without affecting protein folding or expression. I then confirmed using both fluorescent and confocal microscopy and that the recombinant proteins had a similar cell distribution to the endogenous prion protein. Using Western blot analysis, I then showed that endogenous and overexpressed prion proteins can be detected in co-transfected cells producing HIV and murine leukemia virus (MLV) retroviral particles. Finally, I went on to show that prions are also present at high levels in HIV and MLV retroviral particles released from these cells. This work constitutes the first step in determining whether retroviruses can act as vectors for prion dissemination. Establishing a strong and clear association between retroviruses, pathogenic prions and prion disease would provide the rationale for preventive measures to be taken directly against retroviruses in order to protect humans and animals that have been newly exposed to PrPSc-infected products or those who are genetically predisposed to develop prion diseases. Anti-retroviral drugs could also be potentially used to delay disease progression and reduce prion transmission in human and animal tissues. The availability of such a treatment would constitute a significant advancement because there is currently no cure or treatment for prion diseases.

Inom vård av personer med demenssjukdom är vårdarens bekräftelse av personens värdighet och välbefinnande grundläggande. Bekräftelsens effekt avgörs av vad och hur vårdaren väljer att bekräfta. Då den inte är anpassad riskerar personens värdighet och välbefinnande att reduceras, skadas eller gå förlorad. Syfte: Syftet med studien var att beskriva vårdpersonals föreställningar om att bekräfta värdighet och välbefinnande hos personer med demenssjukdom. Vårdarens synsätt och antagande om personen med demenssjukdom, om att vårda samt innebörd av värdighet och välbefinnande antogs ha en betydande roll för vårdarens val att bekräfta. Metod: Tio informanter intervjuades kring sina uppfattningar av att bekräfta värdighet och välbefinnande hos personer med demenssjukdom. Analysen genomfördes utifrån fenomenografisk metod i fyra steg där informanternas uppfattningar presenterades i ett utfallsrum av beskrivningskategorier med underkategorier. Resultat: Resultatet visade att bekräftelse uppkommer i ett samspel av faktorer, vilka kan påverka bekräftelsen både positivt och negativt. Vårdarnas bekräftelse skedde med utgångspunkt i vårdarens föreställningar via sekundära värden, mot övergripande värden, i en kontext av omgivningsfaktorer och utifrån ett kommunikativt feedbacksystem. Vårdarna hade såväl underlättande som hindrande förställningar vilka kopplades till tid och organisatoriska förutsättningar, till vårdtagarens förmågor, kommunikation och uttryck. Reflektion och klinisk implikation: Studien ger kunskap om hur vårdpersonal tänker kring värdighet och välbefinnande.  Skillnader i vårdens utförande kan förstås utifrån ett livsvärldsperspektiv och kan användas som underlag för utbildning, handledning och reflektion. / In caring for people with dementia confirmation of dignity and wellbeing is essential. How and in what way the nurse chooses to confirm determines the effect on the confirmation itself. If not individually adjusted to the person with dementia there’s a risk of dignity and wellbeing being reduced, damaged or lost. Aim: The aim of the study was to describe nurses’ personal beliefs and constructs on confirming dignity and wellbeing in people suffering from dementia. The nurses views on the person with dementia, personal beliefs on caring and on the meaning of dignity and wellbeing was predicted to have a significant role on the way he or she confirms the person. Method: Ten informants were interviewed on their personal experiences on confirming dignity and wellbeing. The narrations were analysed using a phenomenographic methodology in four different steps. The informants’ experiences were presented in an outcome space consisting sets of categories and subcategories of description. Result: Confirmation takes place within an interplay of factors with the potentiality to effect in a positively or negatively way. The nurses’ confirmation took place on the basis of their personal beliefs and constructs through secondary values, towards overall values, within a context of external factors and from a communicative system of feedback. The nurses had both enabling and hindering personal beliefs and constructs which were linked to time and organisational factors and to cognitive and physical abilities, communication and expression of the patient. Reflections and clinical implications: The study brings knowledge on nurses’ personal beliefs and constructs on confirming dignity and wellbeing. The differences in nursing among the nurses can be further viewed and understood from a life-world perspective and contribute to nursing education, supervision and reflection.

Nuclear receptors (NRs) are important transcription factors involved in the regulation of a variety of physiological processes such as embryonic development, cell differentiation and homeostasis (for review, see Mangelsdorf et al., 1995 TenBaum and Baniahrned, 1997). In contrast to membrane bound receptors, they bind small lipophilic ligands and function in the nucleus as ligand-modulated transcription factors. The ligands for nuclear receptors include steroids (glucocorticoids, progestins, mineralocorticoids, androgens and estrogens), vitamin D3, retinoids, thyroid hormone, prostaglandins, farnesoids etc. Several other nuclear receptors are classified as orphan receptors for which no ligand has yet been identified. More than 300 nuclear receptors have now been identified and together these proteins comprise the single largest family of metazoan transcription factors, the nuclear receptor superfamily. Recently, a unified nomenclature has been evolved (nuclear receptor nomenclature committee, 1999), a summary of which is presented in Table 1.

Visual modeling concept of integrated constructs (essence) of mathematical objects in teacher training of humanistic area is presented as technology of education in problem solving. The main goal of innovative approach is student’s activity in mathematics on generating of concrete essence manifestations on concepts, methods, theorems, algorithms, procedures and so on. Such student’s activity should be: · Success in an area of actual interests and person’s experience and reached by perception; · Have high level of variability in visual modeling; · Success in domain of reflection process stimulation. Similar creative behavior of persons is typical for actors, dancing, and figure skating and so on. Now we show that such technology will be fruitful for teacher training in mathematics for humanistic specialties.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. Communication, 2005. / Title from first page of PDF document. Document formatted into pages; contains [1], v, 71 p. : ill. Includes bibliographical references (p. 62-67).

Background: In today’s fast-moving society organizational changes have become absolutely essential for long-lasting success. A great challenge is to create the internal support for change projects among the employees in order to avoid failure. The underlying problem to this study focuses on the perception towards change under the aspect of a new generation which more and more represents today's workforce.  Research Question: Are there relations between distinct characteristics of Generation Y and their attitude towards change and does this result in new approaches for practical implementations? Purpose:         The purpose of this study is to scrutinize typical characteristics of Generation Y and find out if they influence their attitude (“Readiness for change”, “Commitment to change”, “Openness to change” and “Cynicism about change”) towards change projects. This enhances existing knowledge about the attitude towards change and how this interrelates with specific characteristics. The authors aim is to find out which characteristics can be identified as beneficial for change and how that can be useful for collocating successful change project teams.  Method:          A qualitative research method with an abductive approach was used in this study. The authors were conducting two phases of qualitative interviews. The first interview phase composed of eight respondents with distinct expertise in change projects and the second phase composed of nine (three respondents each from Generation Y, Generation X and Baby Boomers) interviews. The respondents had no specific knowledge in the field of change but experience in working with Generation Y which assisted to expose their specific characteristics. Theoretical Framework:   The underlying theories consist of employees’ general attitude towards organizational change as well as the distinct characteristics of Generation Y. For a more practice-oriented evaluation of the implementation of organizational change, the theory about change project teams is presented as well.   Findings:       The study revealed that members of Generation Y are well equipped with a set of distinct characteristics that positively influence their attitude towards organizational change. Characteristics like “Informationalization”, “High level of education”, “High level of flexibility”, “Critical Thinking” and “Globality” were evaluated as having positive effects on their “Openness to Change”, “Readiness for Change”, “Commitment to Change”, and “Cynicism about Change”. Furthermore, those findings enhance existing selection processes when it comes to the collocation of change projects teams.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-12-17T15:18:10Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 MariaAGD.pdf: 3831855 bytes, checksum: 0abe0a10e359f22bab7ed834fa8e296a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-02-26 / Sugarcane is one of the most important products of the world and Brazil is responsible for 25 % of the world production. One problem of this culture at northeast of Brazil is the early flowering. In our laboratory, it has been made before four subtractive libraries using early and late flowering genotypes in order to identify messages related to the flowering process. In this work, two cDNAs were chosen to make in silico analysis and overexpression constructs. Another approach to understand the flowering process in sugarcane was to use proteomic tools. First, the protocol for protein extraction using apical meristem was set up. After that, these proteins were separated on two bidimensional gels. It was possible to observe some difference for some regions of these gels as well as some proteins that can be found in all conditions. The next step, spots will be isolated and sequence on MS spectrometry in order to understand this physiological process in sugarcane / A cana-de-a??car ? uma das mais importantes culturas mundiais e atualmente o Brasil representa um dos maiores produtores de cana-de-a??car no ranque mundial. Sabendo-se da import?ncia da cana-de-a??car nos dias atuais, principalmente em rela??o ao biocombust?vel e do problema causado pela flora??o precoce a esta cultura na regi?o Nordeste, foi realizada uma an?lise in silico de dois cDNAs:, 14-3-3 like protein e Protein kinase C inhibitor-like (PKCI), envolvidos no processo de flora??o da cana-de-a??car, utilizando ferramentas gen?micas. Foi escolhido o cDNA PKCI para a constru??o de cassetes de super-express?o de modo a ser caracterizado o papel deste cDNA no processo de flora??o. Outra abordagem utilizada nesse trabalho foi de analisar prote?nas totais de ?pices meristem?ticos de variedades precoce e tardia em g?is uni e bidimensionais. Os resultados mostraram que existem algumas prote?nas que podem ser caracter?sticas de uma das variedades, e em outras foi observado uma express?o diferencial

Submitted by Mario BC (mario@bc.ufrpe.br) on 2016-08-17T13:12:31Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Ana Paula Teixeira Bruno Silva.pdf: 4289257 bytes, checksum: a4020350198fbf89dbea947a71b7890b (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-17T13:12:31Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Ana Paula Teixeira Bruno Silva.pdf: 4289257 bytes, checksum: a4020350198fbf89dbea947a71b7890b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-07-31 / Distance Education is a mode of delivering education that allows new opportunities of access to higher and continuing education. In this context, the supervised curricular stage requires the compulsory presence, according to the legislation. This research presents a methodological proposal based on George Kelly's Theory of Personal Constructs, whose objective is to analyse the contributions of the experience of the Supervised Curricular Stage V, organised and based on Kelly's Experience Cycle (KEC), towards the construction of a reflexive teacher's practice, as well as to relate the conceptions of managers and classroom teachers of stage field schools, about aspects that favor and/or difficult the performance of the graduate students in the school. Participated in the study a representative of the Executive Secretary of Education, six school principals and six classroom teachers from stage field schools, who took part in the first phase. Besides these, nineteen licentiate students from the course of Licentiate in Physics from UFRPE/UAB also participated in the second phase. The methodology used was organised as a KEC, which has five phases, allied to the work of Cooperative Group. The analysis of the results showed the need for integration between the institutions involved in the formation process of the future teacher. The reflective process started by the KEC enabled the evolution of conceptions of licentiate students/trainees, contributing to their learning. / A Educação a Distância (EAD) apresenta-se como uma modalidade de educação que proporciona novas oportunidades de acesso a cursos superiores e formação continuada. Nesse contexto, o Estágio Curricular Supervisionado precisa da obrigatoriedade de momentos presenciais, de acordo com a legislação. Esta pesquisa apresenta uma proposta metodológica, baseada na Teoria dos Construtos Pessoais de George Kelly, que tem como objetivo analisar as contribuições da vivência do Estágio Curricular Supervisionado V, organizado com base no Ciclo da Experiência Kellyana (CEK), para a construção de uma prática docente reflexiva, assim como relacionar as concepções de gestores e professores regentes de escolas campo de estágio, acerca de aspectos que favorecem e/ou dificultam a atuação do licenciando/estagiário na escola. Participaram do estudo um representante da Secretaria Executiva de Educação, seis diretores de escolas e seis professores regentes de escolas campo de estágio, que fizeram parte da primeira etapa. Além desses, dezenove licenciandos do curso de Licenciatura em Física da UFRPE/UAB também participaram na segunda etapa. A metodologia utilizada foi organizada como um CEK, que possui cinco fases, aliado ao trabalho de Grupo Cooperativo. A análise dos resultados revelou a necessidade da integração entre as instituições envolvidas no processo de formação do futuro professor. O processo reflexivo desencadeado pelo CEK possibilitou a evolução das concepções dos licenciandos/estagiários, contribuindo para sua aprendizagem.

Submitted by (lucia.rodrigues@ufrpe.br) on 2016-10-21T12:13:53Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Alceu Domingues Alves.pdf: 2706251 bytes, checksum: b08b282eb347f2211c929e290db2c050 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-10-21T12:13:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Alceu Domingues Alves.pdf: 2706251 bytes, checksum: b08b282eb347f2211c929e290db2c050 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-08-29 / The present work of research proposes to teach the fractal geometry in high school classroom, with approach in the forms the objects natural and build by the man. Despite of the utility of the fractal geometry for description of the natural objects, this geometry is a subject that has been taught poor in the last series of the high school. The objective of the work is: i. to identify as the students conceive the geometric forms of objects and processes of the nature, without previous knowledge of fractal geometry; the procedure methodological is to carry the students for to apply the Euclidian and fractal in the description of the different shape natural an build by the man. Educational software of dynamic geometry will be used to work with the Euclidean and fractal geometry. The object used will be some students the last year of the high school from a public school of the state of Pernambuco. The theory of the Kelly personal constructs were be used in the analysis of the data. / O presente trabalho propõe introduzir o conceito e propriedades da Geometria Fractal no Ensino Médio, com enfoque numa abordagem baseada nas descrições das formas dos objetos construídos pelo homem e pela natureza. A Geometria Fractal é um tema que tem sido explorado de maneira bastante superficial nas séries finais do ensino médio, apesar da sua extrema utilidade na descrição das formas construídas pela natureza. O principal objetivo do trabalho é investigar como os alunos concebem as formas geométricas dos objetos e processos da natureza. A proposta metodológica para a realização da pesquisa consistiu em utilizar objetos construídos pela natureza e pelo homem e levar os alunos a descreverem suas formas a partir da geometria euclidiana (estudada previamente) e da geometria fractal (discutida numa oficina realizada durante a pesquisa). Softwares educacionais de geometria dinâmica foram usados para trabalhar com os alunos as duas geometrias. A amostra trabalhada foi constituída de alunos de uma turma de terceiro ano do ensino médio de uma escola pública da rede oficial de ensino do Estado de Pernambuco. A teoria dos construtos pessoais de George Kelly foi usada para analisar os dados.