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Malnutrition among older adults living in Portuguese nursing homes: the PEN-3S study
Teresa Madeira, Catarina Peixoto-Plácido, Nuno Sousa-Santos, Osvaldo Santos, Violeta Alarcão, Beatriz Goulão, Nuno Mendonça, Paulo Jorge Nicola, Agneta Yngve, Asta Bye, Astrid Bergland, Teresa F Amaral, Carla Lopes, João Gorjão Clara
Journal: Public Health Nutrition / Volume 22 / Issue 3 / March 2019
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 October 2018, pp. 486-497
To characterise the nutritional status and to identify malnutrition-associated variables of older adults living in Portuguese nursing homes.
Cross-sectional study. Data on demographic and socio-economic characteristics, self-reported morbidity, eating-related problems, nutritional status, cognitive function, depression symptoms, loneliness feelings and functional status were collected by trained nutritionists through a computer-assisted face-to-face structured interview followed by standardised anthropometric measurements. Logistic regression was used to identify factors associated with being at risk of malnutrition/malnourished.
Portuguese nursing homes.
Nationally representative sample of the Portuguese population aged 65 years or over living in nursing homes.
A total of 1186 individuals (mean age 83·4 years; 72·8 % women) accepted to participate. According to the Mini Nutritional Assessment, 4·8 (95 % CI 3·2, 7·3) % were identified as malnourished and 38·7 (95 % CI 33·5, 44·2) % were at risk of malnutrition. These percentages increased with age and were significantly higher for women. Logistic regression showed (OR; 95 % CI) that older adults reporting no or little appetite (6·5; 2·7, 15·3), those revealing symptoms of depression (2·6; 1·6, 4·2) and those who were more dependent in their daily living activities (4·7; 2·0, 11·1) were also at higher odds of being malnourished or at risk of malnutrition.
Malnutrition and risk of malnutrition are prevalent among nursing home residents in Portugal. It is crucial to routinely screen for nutritional disorders, as well as risk factors such as symptoms of depression and lower functional status, to prevent and treat malnutrition.
Different Glyphosate Susceptibility in Chloris polydactyla Accessions
Arthur A. M. Barroso, Alfredo J. P. Albrecht, Fabricia C. Dos Reis, Henrique F. Placido, Roberto E. Toledo, Leandro P. Albrecht, Ricardo V. Filho
Journal: Weed Technology / Volume 28 / Issue 4 / December 2014
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 January 2017, pp. 587-591
Print publication: December 2014
Glyphosate is now the most widely used herbicide; after years of frequent utilization, resistant weeds were selected, mainly due to widespread adoption of glyphosate-resistant crops and no-tillage sowing system. Increasing difficulty in controlling Chloris polydactyla with glyphosate has been noticed in agricultural areas. Here, the susceptibility level of various C. polydactyla accessions from Brazil is examined. Two whole-plant studies were conducted to confirm the presence and extent of glyphosate susceptibility among accessions, which involved the application of seven glyphosate doses on four accessions. The four accessions showed different glyphosate susceptibilities. The "Matão" accession presented major tolerance for glyphosate compared to "Palotina" accessions. "Jaboticabal" plants showed an intermediary susceptibility. The resistance factor (RF) was 3.76 between the "Matão" and "Palotina" accessions. All biotypes died at 2,880 g ae ha−1 glyphosate.
Complex optical filter prepared by sputter deposition
M. H. Asghar, M. Shoaib, Z. M. Khan, F. Placido, S. Naseem, M. Mehmood
Journal: The European Physical Journal - Applied Physics / Volume 49 / Issue 2 / February 2010
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 January 2010, 20501
Print publication: February 2010
An infrared heat reflecting multilayer thin film filter comprising alternate layers of ZrO2 and SiO2 has been modeled and prepared on a BK7 glass substrate using RF-magnetron sputtering. Initially, the individual films of the used materials have been characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) for structural and surface quality prior to the deposition of multilayer structure. Spectral analysis showed that the filter has an average transmission of greater than 90% in 450 to 700 nm range and less than 2% in 700-1100 nm band fulfilling the design requirements. The XRD study of multilayer structure showed few peaks of ZrO2 along with a solitary peak for SiO2 indicating some crystallinity for ZrO2 layers in the structure. Hardness analysis showed that the initial phase of the indentation is predominantly ductile with gradual transition in behaviour from ductile to brittle with increased penetration. Interface analysis of multilayered structure was carried out by Rutherford back scattering using Tandem 5 MeV ion accelerator, showed that interfaces formed in the multilayer structure are sharp and no substantial evidence of interlayer diffusion or mixing at the interfaces.
Characterization of Ta2O5 thin films prepared by reactive evaporation
M. H. Asghar, F. Placido, S. Naseem
Journal: The European Physical Journal - Applied Physics / Volume 36 / Issue 2 / November 2006
Reactively evaporated thin films of tantalum oxide are prepared on glass substrate, using electron beam heating, for optical applications. Firstly, the deposition was carried out at 0.20 nm/s, with substrate temperature of 200 °C, and oxygen flow rate was varied from 0.0 to 30.0 sccm to study the effect of flow rate on optical constants. The optical constants evaluated by using transmission data of the samples, with curve fitting, show a strong dependence on oxygen flow rate. Oxygen flow rate of 10.0 sccm has been found to give reasonably high index (n:2.11 at $\lambda =500$ nm) and low absorption of the order of 10−3 in most part of the desired spectrum (380–850 nm). However, for oxygen flow rates below 10.0 sccm and above 20.0 sccm the films have exhibited low index and comparatively high absorption. In the next step, deposition rates were varied from 0.10–0.30 nm/s with steps of 0.01, keeping oxygen flow rate and substrate temperature constant at 10.0 sccm and 200 °C respectively, to optimize the film properties. A variation in refractive index and extinction coefficient values is observed with varying deposition rates. An increase in refractive index (n:2.125 at $\lambda =500$ nm) with reduced absorption ("k" of the order of 10−4) is achieved over the entire spectrum for the film deposited at 0.10 nm/s. The film was found to be highly adherent to the substrate as revealed by qualitative adhesive tape peel test. Keeping in view the application of the work, calculation of optical constants was extended up to 1100 nm for the sample deposited at 0.10 nm/s. The results have shown nearly constant optical constant values over the extended range making the film useful over a broad spectral region. AFM studies show that the surface is extremely smooth and compact, giving average and rms roughness values of 5.51 and 7.174 Å respectively, for the studied area of $2.5~\mu \times2.5~\mu$ . XRD and SEM studies carried out for structural analysis show that the film is generally amorphous with a sign that crystalline structure could be achieved at little higher substrate temperatures. The surface of the film is very smooth, free of voids, with the particle size in the range of 17–35 nm, calculated from SEM studies. The film has exhibited compact and dense structure. The work reported in this paper will be useful in tailoring the optical properties of Ta2O5 as per requirement.
Characterization of reactively evaporated TiO2 thin films as high and medium index layers for optical applications
Journal: The European Physical Journal - Applied Physics / Volume 35 / Issue 3 / September 2006
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 July 2006, pp. 177-184
Reactively evaporated TiO2 thin films were deposited on the glass substrate by electron beam heating technique. In the first stage evaporation rates are varied keeping substrate temperature fixed at 200 °C and oxygen flow rate at 9.0 sccm for all the samples. The deposition rates were varied from 0.12–0.20 nm/s with a step of 0.02 to optimize the optical constants for the film in the wavelength band of 380–850 nm as a high index material for multilayer optical coatings and filters. The films prepared at higher deposition rates have shown low refractive index values and comparatively higher extinction coefficients for the given substrate temperature in the desired spectral range. The best optical constants were observed for the sample prepared at 0.12 nm/s (at λ = 550 nm: n: 2.39 and k: of the order of 10−9). However, the variation in refractive index for all the samples was found to be in the range of 2.39–2.21 at 550 nm. In the second stage, films were prepared at a fixed deposition rate of 0.12 nm/s at different substrate temperature (50 °C, 100 °C, 150 °C and 200 °C) to study the optical properties of the films as a function of substrate temperature in order to investigate the potential of TiO2 film application as medium index layer. It was observed that refractive index decreases with decreasing substrate temperature. However, it was not found true for absorption. Instead, at Ts = 50 °C extremely low absorption (of the order of 10−5) has been observed with refractive index of 1.83, which increased sharply for next higher substrate temperature. Variation in absorption characteristics is found with varying substrate temperatures. The result shows that TiO2 films can be used as high and medium index layer in optical coating by varying the deposition parameters during growth. Effectively, one can achieve performance of two materials with only one. This effect could be utilized to produce variable index layers and coatings. Two samples with best high and medium optical constant values, were further investigated using Atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) for surface and structure analysis. The results show that the particle size for the film is very small (10–20 nm), and the surface appears to be very compact, smooth and free of pinholes with roughness in angstrom range, extremely suitable for optical applications in single and multilayer structures.