Maria Pais

• Professor
• University of Lisbon

Phlomis purpurea grows spontaneously in the southern Iberian Peninsula, namely in cork oak (Quercus suber) forests. In a previous transcriptome analysis, we reported on its immunity against Phytophthora cinnamomi. However, little is known about the involvement of secondary metabolites in the P. purpurea defense response. It is known, though, that r...

Educar é uma missão coletiva. Educar para a cidadania é uma missão do Estado. Educar para a ecocidadania é uma responsabilidade comum das gerações presentes, que tem como beneficiários as gerações futuras. Este é o pano de fundo da presente publicação sobre “Ecocidadania e Desenvolvimento Sustentável: diálogo para uma escola cidadã”

Educar é uma missão coletiva. Educar para a cidadania é uma missão do Estado. Educar para a ecocidadania é uma responsabilidade comum das gerações presentes, que tem como beneficiários as gerações futuras. Este é o pano de fundo da presente publicação sobre “Ecocidadania e Desenvolvimento Sustentável: diálogo para uma escola cidadã”

Brassica is one of the most economically important genus of the Brassicaceae family, encompassing several key crops like Brassica napus (cabbage) and broccoli (Brassica oleraceae var. italica). This family is well known for their high content of characteristic secondary metabolites such as glucosinolates (GLS) compounds, recognize for their benefic...

Very early somatic embryogenesis has been recognized as a powerful method to propagate plants in vitro. For some woody species and in particular for some coniferous trees, somatic embryogenesis induction has become a routine procedure. For the majority, the application of this technology presents yet many limitations especially due to the genotype,...

Background Phlomis plants are a source of biological active substances with potential applications in the control of phytopathogens. Phlomis purpurea (Lamiaceae) is autochthonous of southern Iberian Peninsula and Morocco and was found to be resistant to Phytophthora cinnamomi. Phlomis purpurea has revealed antagonistic effect in the rhizosphere of...

An increased knowledge on the real impacts of ectomycorrhizal symbiosis in forest species is needed to optimize forest sustainable productivity and thus to improve forest services and their capacity to act as carbon sinks. In this study, we investigated the response of an oak species to ectomycorrhizae formation using a proteomics approach compleme...

Biological significance: Here, we present for the first time grapevine cultivar-specific adjustments of leaf proteome that allow the discrimination between resistance and susceptibility towards P. viticola (constitutive (0h) and in after inoculation (6, 12 and 24h). We have highlighted that, following inoculation, the major factors differentiating...

Coffee Berry Disease caused by the hemibiotrophic fungus Colletotrichum kahawae (Ck) is a major constraint for Arabica coffee production in Africa and represents a threat for cultivation in America and Asia. Although there are coffee genotypes known to be resistant to Ck, the molecular genetic basis of the resistance is still unknown. With the purp...

Grapes (Vitis species) are economically the most important fruit crop worldwide. These fruits are used as table grapes, raisins, and juices and for wine production. In addition, the consumption of table grapes and wine has numerous nutritional and health benefits for humans because of antioxidant polyphenols such as resveratrol. Vitis germplasm is...

Pyrus communis ‘Rocha’ is an economically important crop very susceptible to the pathogenic fungus Stemphylium vesicarium, the causal agent of brown spot disease. Knowledge on the complexity of mechanisms responsible for resistance to S. vesicarium infection is necessary for definition of strategies to improve defence responses in susceptible culti...

Grapevine downy mildew, caused by the fungus Plasmopara viticola (Berk. & Curt.) Berl. & de Toni was introduced in European vineyards in the 1870s and quickly spread to all major grape-producing regions worldwide. The early events of grapevine resistance to P. viticola were accessed using transcriptomic, metabolomic and proteomics approaches in the...

The European chestnut, an important forest species for the economy of Southern Europe, covers an area of 2,53 million hectares, including 75,000 hectares devoted to fruit production. Castanea sativa is declining due to ink disease caused by Phytophthora cinnamomi. To elucidate chestnut defense mechanisms to ink disease we compared the root transcri...

A B S T R A C T Grapevine downy mildew, caused by the fungus Plasmopara viticola (Berk. & Curt.) Berl. & de Toni was introduced in European vineyards in the 1870s and quickly spread to all major grape-producing regions worldwide. The early events of grapevine resistance to P. viticola were accessed using transcriptomic, metabolomic and proteomics a...

Plasmopara viticola is the pathogen responsible for one of the most important diseases in viticulture. Vitis vinifera cultivars show almost no resistance to this pathogen except some new cultivars like 'Regent', which achieved resistance through introgression. The molecular mechanisms of resistance are still unknown. A cyclophilin cDNA, denoted as...

Le labelle d'Epipactis atropurpurea possède une dépression qui correspond à un nectaire. L'assise nectarifère est formée par les cellules épidermiques de la face supérieure du Labelle. En plus des caractères typiques de cellules sécrétrices, les cellules nectarifères montrent un nombre considérable d'amyloplastes. Le R.E.R. est très abondant.

The secretory trichomes from Artemisia crithmifolia present a biseriate multicellular structure. They originate from a single epidermal cell, belonging to the leaf or to the stem primordia. Histochemical tests reveal the lipophilic character of the secreted material corresponding probably to terpenoids. Young trichome cells possess the normal featu...

Some views about secretion in Orchids are presented, as well as scire ultrastructural and cvtochemical observations concerning retinacles and stigmatic surface. On a cylochemical viewpoint, specificai colorations allowed us to recognize that murines and lipids are present in relinacle cells secretion. Ultrastructural study shows a large number of d...

Nowadays, the dairy industry is continuously looking for new and more efficient clotting enzymes to create innovative products. Cyprosin B is a plant aspartic protease characterized by clotting activity that was previously cloned in Saccharomyces cerevisiae BJ1991 strain. The production of recombinant cyprosin B by a batch and fed-batch culture was...

Ectomycorrhizal symbiosis is essential for the life and health of trees in temperate and boreal forests where it plays a major role in nutrient cycling and in functioning of the forest ecosystem. Trees with ectomycorrhizal root tips are more tolerant to environmental stresses, such as drought, and biotic stresses such as root pathogens. Detailed in...

Background Cork oak (Quercus suber) is one of the rare trees with the ability to produce cork, a material widely used to make wine bottle stoppers, flooring and insulation materials, among many other uses. The molecular mechanisms of cork formation are still poorly understood, in great part due to the difficulty in studying a species with a long li...

The introduction and spread of plant pests and diseases has significant consequences for agriculture, horticulture, forestry, and natural habitats. Opportunities arising from scientific advances must be better used to inform regulation of trade and underpin chemical and alternative controls and breeding of plants resistant to biotic stress.

The ultrastructural study of microsporogenesis in Ophrys lutea revealed that the formation of cytomictic channels in the callose wall was followed by the transfer of organelles and chromatin (cytomixis) through them. The transfer of chromatin was first observed on zygo-pachytene, and throughout the other stages of prophase I. Even though restricted...

Woody plants are particularly difficult to investigate due to high phenolic, resin, and tannin contents and laborious sample preparation. In particular, protein isolation from woody plants for two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-DE) is challenging as secondary metabolites negatively interfere with protein extraction and separation. In this study...

Acute Panmyelosis with myelofibrosis is a rare and aggressive acute myeloid leukemia accounting for 2% of all acute leukemias. Clinically, it is characterized by an acute onset of cytopenias associated with extensive bone marrow fibrosis in the absence of splenomegaly and related morphological changes in the red blood cells such as dacryocytes. The...

Mediterranean ecosystems are characterized by large arid areas where the patchy distribution of trees offers little protection against harsh climate conditions for seedling establishment. Climate change is predicted to result in an increase in these arid regions, with pronounced effects on vegetation. Production of seedlings with developed ectomyco...

Acute Panmyelosis with myelofibrosis is a rare and aggressive acute myeloid leukemia accounting for 2% of all acute leukemias. Clinically, it is characterized by an acute onset of cytopenias associated with extensive bone marrow fibrosis in the absence of splenomegaly and related morphological changes in the red blood cells such as dacryocytes. The...

Coffee production in Africa represents a significant share of the total export revenues and influences the lives of millions of people, yet severe socio-economic repercussions are annually felt in result of the overall losses caused by the coffee berry disease (CBD). This quarantine disease is caused by the fungus Colletotrichum kahawae Waller and...

The pivotal role of cultivated grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.) in many countries economy is compromised by its high susceptibility to Plasmopara viticola, the causal agent of downy mildew disease. Recent research has identified a set of genes related to resistance which may be used to track downy mildew infection. Quantification of the expression of...

Descriptive statistics of reference gene expression in all datasets analysed based on the BestKeeper approach. (PDF)

Comprehensive ranking of the candidate RGs calculated as the arithmetic mean ranking value of each gene using the three applets. Genes were ranked from the most stable (1) to the least stable (8). (XLS)

Test statistics and Ranks given by the Mann-Whitney U test on PR10 , subtilisin and CYP expression, comparing the two normalization strategies followed. (XLSX)

Primer specificity test through dissociation curve analysis collected from StepOne™ software ver. 2.2.2 (Applied Biosystems). UBQ (A), SAND (B), ACT (C), VATP16 (D), PTB2 (E), PsaB (F), SMD3 (G), EF1α (H), 60 S (I), GAPDH (J) and UQCC (K). Non-template control is indicated by a black arrow. (PDF)

Background Grapes (Vitis species) are economically the most important fruit crop worldwide. However, the complexity of molecular and biochemical events that lead to ripening of berries as well as how aroma is developed are not fully understood. Methodology/Principal Findings In an attempt to identify the common mechanisms associated with the onset...

Sketch of the sampling layout. (PPTX)

List of volatiles and polar metabolites analyzed during grape ripening of the three cultivars under study. (XLSX)

List of entire gene set (8696 probesets) and common gene set (2255 probesets) of modulated genes during grape ripening. Information concerning fold change values, annotation and functional category is provided. (XLSX)

Weather conditions from April to September in 2008 season. (XLSX)

Samples of berries at EL 38 stage of development. A Aragonês B Touriga Nacional C Trincadeira. (PPTX)

List of primers used in real time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction. (DOCX)

Kruskal-Wallis and Wilcoxon Rank sum statistics applied to metabolomics data. For selected multiple comparisons the Benjamini & Hochberg correction was elected among other tests that are presented. (XLSX)

Grapevine (Vitis species) is the most economically important fruit crop worldwide. Ripening of non-climacteric fruits such as grapes has been the subject of intense research. Despite this interest, little is known on the role played by polyamines in the onset of ripening of non-climacteric fruits. These growth regulators have been involved in plant...

The identification of active ingredients in crude plant extracts offers great advantages. In this study, nuclear magnetic resonance and chemometrics were used for the screening of in vitro anti-TNFα activity in different berry types. Solid phase extraction was applied and the resulting water, methanol–water (1:1), and methanol fractions were tested...

Grapevines are easily infected by plant pathogens. It was found that resistant grapevines induce a wide range of phenolics upon the pathogen-infection. In this study in order to gain insight into these processes in different time-points the metabolic changes during the interaction of two grapevine cultivars, 'Regent' (resistant) and 'Trincadeira' (...

One of the most remarkable pollination strategy in orchids biology is pollination by sexual deception, in which the modified petal labellum lures pollinators by mimicking the chemical (e.g. sex pheromones), visual (e.g. colour and shape/size) and tactile (e.g. labellum trichomes) cues of the receptive female insect species. The present study aimed...

We report on the screening of different enzymes such as arylamidases, lipases, proteinases, and glucosidases in plant extracts of the Cactaceae family, genus Opuntia, as well as on a newly purified plant proteases from O. ficus-indica fruit extracts. These proteinases showed the maximum activity at pH 5.2 and 55°C and FTC-casein was the best of the...

'Trincadeira' and 'Aragonez' are two of the most important Vitis vinifera L. cultivars used for red wine production in Portugal. Aiming to obtain a reproducible system for plant genetic transformation, the techniques of particle bombardment and transformation mediated by Agrobacterium tumefaciens were tested. In both systems putative transformed em...

Aquest estudi analitza les activitats fisiques que es mostren a l’alumnat de l’educacio secundaria obligatoria a traves de les fotografies dels llibres de text per al desplegament dels continguts de l’area d’Educacio Fisica. La mostra va estar formada per 3.316 imatges publicades en 36 llibres de text de 10 editorials espanyoles. L’analisi de conti...

The oomycete pathogen Plasmopara viticola (Berk. et Curt.) Berl. et de Toni is the causing agent of the destructive downy mildew disease in grapevine. Despite the advances towards elucidation of grapevine resistance mechanisms to downy mildew, increased knowledge of the biological and genetic components of the pathosystem is important to design sui...

Weather conditions from April to September in 2007 and 2008 seasons.

Metabolism of organic acids and phenolic compounds. Relative quantification of tartaric acid, citric acid, acetic acid, cis-coumaroyl derivatives and trans-caftaric acid is based on characteristic chemical shift (δ 4.50, δ 2.93,, δ 1.91, δ 7.02 and δ 6, 38, respectively), and corresponding peak intensity. Expression levels of genes coding for Vitis...

Wilcoxon Rank sum and Kruskal-Wallis statistics applied to metabolomics data.

List of primers used in real time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction.

List of entire modulated gene set. Annotations based on the genome and based on EST-homology are provided. Separate lists of probesets differentially expressed at each year are included. All the information is made available in 6 sheets.

COSY analysis in a sample from 2007 corresponding to EL 35 (véraison). Spectrum is shown in the range of δ 6.0 to δ 8.0 ppm which is enriched in phenolic compounds.

Core set (7130 probesets) and conserved set (3451 probesets) of modulated genes during ripening. Information concerning fold change values, expression profile cluster, annotation, functional category and their distribution within clusters is provided.

Grapes (Vitis vinifera L.) are economically the most important fruit crop worldwide. However, the complexity of molecular and biochemical events that lead to the onset of ripening of nonclimacteric fruits is not fully understood which is further complicated in grapes due to seasonal and cultivar specific variation. The Portuguese wine variety Trinc...

Although metabolomics aims at profiling all the metabolites in organisms, data quality is quite dependent on the pre-analytical methods employed. In order to evaluate current methods, different pre-analytical methods were compared and used for the metabolic profiling of grapevine as a model plant. Five grape cultivars from Portugal in combination w...

Much work has been done on the endemic floras of Madeira and the Canary Islands but little is known about the origin and diversification of endemic plants of the Cape Verde archipelago. In this study we focus on the three endemic species of the genus Echium L. (Boraginaceae) in Cape Verde. Phylogenetic analyses based on nuclear (ITS1, ITS2) and pla...

Este artículo muestra los efectos que produce en las personas mayores la participación en un programa integrado de estimulación cognitivo-motriz denominado �Memoria en Movimiento�. Es una investigación cuasi-experimental en la que participaron 300 personas con una edad de 70,63 ± 7,48. Los instrumentos utilizados fueron: Diario de Campo, Observació...

Two multivariate statistical methods, factor analysis (FA) and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA), were applied to experimental data set to evaluate their usefulness in selecting the adequate expression system and optimal growth parameters for recombinant cyprosin B production. Using FA, the large data set was reduced to two factors representing 7...

1H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) was applied for the metabolic profiling of grapes from three Portuguese cultivars including ‘Trincadeira’, ‘Aragonês’, and ‘Touriga Nacional’, at four developmental stages. Two kinds of extraction methods including deuterated NMR solvent extraction and solid phase extraction (SPE) were used for the metabolomic an...

Hop (Humulus lupulus L.) is an economically important plant species used in beer production and as a health-promoting medicine. Hop internodes develop upon stress treatments organogenic nodules which can be used for genetic transformation and micropropagation. Polyamines are involved in plant development and stress responses. Arginine decarboxylase...

Somatic embryogenesis induction from in vitro cultured stamens and carpels is highly dependent on explants’ inoculation at specific developmental stages. To establish good correlations between measurable morphometric parameters of flowers or flower buds and developmental stages of micro- and macrosporogenesis, this procedure is the easiest way to s...

The optimization of culture medium composition was carried out for improvement the recombinant cyprosin B production, an enzyme with high milk-clotting activity. Response surface methodology (RSM) was applied to evaluate the effect of variables namely glucose, yeast extract (YE) and bactopeptone present in the culture medium, used for recombinant c...