Search results for "81"

Safety of Dietary Guanidinoacetic Acid: A Villain of a Good Guy?

2021

Guanidinoacetic acid (GAA) is a natural amino acid derivative that is well-recognized for its central role in the biosynthesis of creatine, an essential compound involved in cellular energy metabolism. GAA (also known as glycocyamine or betacyamine) has been investigated as an energy-boosting dietary supplement in humans for more than 70 years. GAA is suggested to effectively increase low levels of tissue creatine and improve clinical features of cardiometabolic and neurological diseases, with GAA often outcompeting traditional bioenergetics agents in maintaining ATP status during stress. This perhaps happens due to a favorable delivery of GAA through specific membrane transporters (such as…

Predator mimicry, not conspicuousness, explains the efficacy of butterfly eyespots

2015

Large conspicuous eyespots on butterfly wings have been shown to deter predators. This has been traditionally explained by mimicry of vertebrate eyes, but recently the classic eye-mimicry hypothesis has been challenged. It is proposed that the conspicuousness of the eyespot, not mimicry, is what causes aversion due to sensory biases, neophobia or sensory overloads. We conducted an experiment to directly test whether the eye-mimicry or the conspicuousness hypothesis better explain eyespot efficacy. We used great tits ( Parus major ) as model predator, and tested their reaction towards animated images on a computer display. Birds were tested against images of butterflies without eyespots, wi…

Protective coloration of European vipers throughout the predation sequence

2020

Antipredator adaptations in the form of animal coloration are common and often multifunctional. European vipers (genus Vipera) have a characteristic dorsal zigzag pattern, which has been shown to serve as a warning signal to potential predators. At the same time, it has been suggested to decrease detection risk, and to cause a motion dazzle or flicker-fusion effect during movement. We tested these hypotheses by asking whether (1) the zigzag pattern decreases detection risk and (2) the detection is dependent on the base coloration (grey or brown) or the snake's posture (coiled, basking form or S-shaped, active form). Additionally, (3) we measured the fleeing speed of adders, Vipera berus, an…

LES ÉQUIVOQUES DU « CONSTITUTIONNALISME OCTROYÉ » : UN DÉBAT TRANSATLANTIQUE (I)

2015

In Portugal and in its former colonies, the expression "constitucionalismo outorgado » is part of the constitutional vocabulary since the granting of the Charter of 1826. The French inspiration is obvious ; however, no equivalent expression exists in France. This curiosity leads to measure all the ambiguity of the concept of "granted constitutionalism", an improbable oxymoron according to the president of the Portuguese Republic, Teófilo Braga. Is it about a simple political and linguistic claim, a temporary compromise at the end of a frustrated Revolution? Or does it translate a deeper program, to reconcile both sides of the constitutionalism, ancient and modern ?

La costituzione siciliana del 1812 come snodo tra vecchio e nuovo costituzionalismo.

2013

recensione sul libro di CETTINA LAUDANI, L'appello dei siciliani alla Nazione inglese. Costituzione e costituzionalismo in Sicilia, prefazione di Giu…

2012

L'autrice affronta lo studio dell'Appel des Siciliens à la nation anglaise garante de la Constitution, violèe par le roi de Naples, un documento noto agli storici, ma non ancora sufficientemente analizzato. L'appello, pubblicato anonimo nel 1817, in lingua francese e inglese, viene attribuito dall'autrice a Niccolò Palmeri che, nel settembre del 1821 si rivolse al Parlamento inglese con una lettera nella quale manifestò il «proprio rancoroso disappunto verso il Governo inglese per essersi prestato a “far cancellare tutto ciò che si era fatto in Sicilia sotto i suoi auspici» .

Effects of initial performance, gross efficiency and VO_2peak characteristics on subsequent adaptations to endurance training in competitive cyclists

2018

The present study investigated the effects of initial levels of cycling performance, peak oxygen uptake (www.frontiersin.orgO2peak) and gross efficiency (GE) on the subsequent adaptations of these variables and their relationship following high-intensity training (HIT) designed to increase www.frontiersin.orgO2peak in competitive cyclists. Sixty cyclists (www.frontiersin.orgO2peak = 61 ± 6 mL kg-1 min-1) were assigned a 12-week training program consisting of twenty-four supervised high-intensity interval training sessions and ad libitum low intensity training. GE was calculated at 125, 175, and 225 W and performance was determined by mean power during a 40-min time-trial (Power40 min). In a…

Created substrates do not fully mimic natural substrates in restoration: the occurrence of polypores on spruce logs

2014

Many protected areas have been under intensive forest management prior to protection and thus lack natural ecosystem structures and dynamics. Dead wood is a key structure in forests harboring hundreds of threatened species. We investigated the ecological success of dead wood creation as a boreal forest restoration measure. We analysed whether the polypore communities of chain-saw felled and girdled (subsequently fallen) Norway spruce ( (L.) H. Karst.) logs differ from naturally formed spruce logs of similar decay stage and size. The study was conducted in Leivonmäki National Park in central Finland 8 years after the restoration measures. The average number of polypore species was highest o…

The posthumous condition of gossip: Death and its reputational benediction

2017

Gossiping is ubiquitous in social life. In every imaginable corner of society, people from all walks of life are gossiping their living acquaintances. But what happens when the “third party,” i.e., the subject of gossip, is absent par excellence, not only temporarily and spatially, but definitively? Do people continue to gossip their dead acquaintances? What is the fate of gossip after its target dies? These are the questions this paper sets out to address. In doing so, it develops a non-reductionist sequential model of death as a social process in which biological death is only the starting point of the bio-social phenomenon of dying. Building on some classic anthropological theories and c…

El peligro como elemento vertebrador de los delitos contra la seguridad vial

2019

La presente tesis doctoral tiene por objeto el estudio del elemento del peligro como vertebrador de algunos delitos contra la seguridad vial, concretamente los recogidos en los artículos 379 a 382 del Capítulo IV del Título XVII del CP, que es además pieza diferencial de los ilícitos administrativos comprendidos en los artículos 75 y siguientes del RDL 6/2015. Los delitos contra la seguridad vial pueden ser definidos como el conjunto de infracciones, caracterizadas por la creación un riesgo para los bienes jurídicos de una doble tipología, difuso e individual. El primero de los peligros que tratan de conculcar es de lesión a la seguridad vial -anteriormente denominada seguridad del tráfico-…