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Based on a review of the literature on motivation in the labour context, and more precisely on specificities of motivation in the fulfilment of public functions, and on the basis of 11295 answers gathered through the application of a survey by questionnaire, the present article analyses the motivation factors of employees in Central Government in Portugal. The study carried out highlights that variables such as schooling or the career are fundamental in the employees' perceptions on their motivation. ; info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersion

This study explores the effects of EU policy on Block Exemption within the European Automotive industry. The approach taken was to gain exclusive access through industry insiders to four key car manufacturers with operations in the UK but European aspirations, namely, Honda, Audi, Toyota and the now defunct MGRover. The opinions gained from senior management within these companies combined with a study of the European policy and current Supply Chain business thinking presented some compelling findings. Although there are differences between the four companies in their approach to this Block Exemption legislation, there are also some interesting although perhaps unsurprising protectionism views of the established position of these businesses. Certainly one of the key battle lines to be drawn going forward will be with the spare parts and after market where the competition for vital post-sales servicing revenues will intensify over the coming years, perhaps loosening what has been a domain controlled absolutely by the manufacturers. The long term implications and strategy adopted by the manufacturers may yet have the EU reaching for the rulebook again.

The main aim of this essay is to present a set of reflections on Gilberto Freyre, highlighting his ideas on national identity and Latin Americanness. What connections may we establish between his work Casa-Grande & Senzala [The Masters and the Slaves] (1933) and various issues which remain relevant to the current Latin American political debate? First, we locate Freyre's thoughts within the Latin American debate on issues around national identity. We then move on to proposing several theoretical reflections and methodologies that we consider key to the debate on the theme of our work, namely: Gilberto Freyre's political thought and his strategies for Brazil; the author's studies abroad (in the US and in Europe) and the epistemological repercussions in Casa-Grande & Senzala; Freyre's own brand of romantic conservatism and Brazilian politics; and the relations between ethos and pathos in the implicit political pact in Freyre's work. Finally, we provide a summary of Freyre's debate on Americanness (at the onset of the 1940s) and his political agenda for Latin America.

The following article discusses various aspects of the trade of illicit psychoactive substances based on an analysis of reports obtained in semi-structured interviews with perpetrators of these practices and residents in the Greater Vitória region and the city of Piúma, both in the Brazilian state of Espírito Santo. By interviewing individuals condemned for drug trafficking, who found themselves at the time of the interviews serving time in an open scheme after a certain period of imprisonment, it was observed that they tended to return to such behavior for the same reasons that lead any young person to become involved in formal activities for generating income, which were, however, not available to this group. We discuss the disproportionality of the State's current treatment method and the problem of the trade of illicit substances, whose format has also adapted to the COVID-19 pandemic, expanding to encompass the delivery model.

Abstract. The objective of this paper is to define seismic zones in the Azores based on statistical criteria. These seismic zones will likely be used in seismic simulations of occurrences in the Azores Archipelago. The data used in this work cover the time period from 1915 to 2011. The Azores region was divided into 1° × 1° area units, for which the seismicity and the maximum magnitudes of events were calculated. The seismicity, the largest earthquakes recorded and the geological characteristics of the region were used to group these area units because similar seismic zones must delineate areas with homogeneous seismic characteristics. We have identified seven seismic zones. To verify that the defined areas differ statistically, we considered the following dissimilarity measures (variables): time, size and seismic conditions – the number of seismic events with specific characteristics. Statistical tests, particularly goodness-of-fit tests, allowed us to conclude that, considering these three variables, the seven earthquake zones defined here are statistically distinct.

INTRODUCTION: During military service, many household costs for both married and single service personnel are subsidised, and transition can leave veterans unprepared for the financial demands of civilian life. Armed Forces organisations such as Sailor, Soldier, Air Force Association (SSAFA) play a central role in understanding the financial challenges that UK veterans face and provide an insight into the financial hardship experienced by veterans. The aim of this study was to use SSAFA beneficiary data as a proxy to identify the nature of financial benefit, the spatial distribution of financial hardship in the Scottish SSAFA beneficiary community and explore factors that might predict where those recipients are located. METHODS: Using an anonymised data set of Scottish SSAFA financial beneficiaries between 2014 and 2019, this study used a geographical methodology to identify the geospatial distribution of SSAFA benefit recipients and exploratory regression analysis to explore factors to explain where SSAFA beneficiaries are located. RESULTS: Over half of benefit applicants (n=10 735) were concentrated in only 50 postcode districts, showing evidence of a clustered pattern, and modelling demonstrates association with area-level deprivation. The findings highlight strong association between older injured veterans and need for SSAFA beneficiary assistance. CONCLUSION: The findings demonstrate that beneficiaries were statistically clustered into areas of high deprivation, experiencing similar challenges to that of the wider population in these areas. Military service injury or disability was strongly associated with areas of high SSAFA benefit use and in those areas high unemployment was also a significant factor to consider.

Magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) are attractive tools to overcome limitations of current regenerative medicine strategies, demonstrating potential to integrate therapeutic and diagnostic functionalities in highly controlled systems. In traditional tissue engineering (TE) approaches, the MNPs association with stem cells in a three-dimensional (3D) template offers the possibility to achieve a mechano-magnetic responsive system, enabling remote control actuation. Herein, we propose to study the role of MNPs integrated in κ-carrageenan (κC) hydrogels in the cellular response of human adipose-derived stem cells (hASCs) aiming at cartilage TE applications. The results indicated that the concentration of MNPs in the κC hydrogels influences cellular behavior, tuning a positive effect on cell viability, cell content and metabolic activity of hASCs, with the most promising outcomes found in 5% MNP-κC matrices. Although hASCs laden in MNPs-free- and MNPs-κC hydrogels showed similar metabolic and proliferation levels, MNPs κC hydrogels under magnetic actuation evidenced an instructive effect on hASCs, at a gene expression level, towards chondrogenic phenotype even in basic medium cultures. Therefore, the MNPs-based systems developed in this study may contribute to advanced strategies towards cartilage-like engineered substitutes. ; The authors wish to acknowledge the financial support of the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology for the PhD grant(SFRH/BD/64070/2009) and Post-Doc grant (SFRH/BPD/91072/2012). In addition, the research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement n REGPOT-CT2012-316331-POLARIS and under the projects MIT/ECE/0047/2009 and RL3-TECT-NORTE-07-0124-FEDER-000020 co-financed by ON.2 (NSRF), through ...