Scientific production in biodiversity: the gender gap continues in Brazilian universities.

Scientometrics enables us to comprehend the interests and trends in scientific knowledge production and dissemination. In this study, we evaluate the effects of gender, academic experience, location of residence, and graduate program score on the quantity of published articles, the number of citations and the H-index of researchers belonging to Brazilian graduate programs in Biodiversity. Variables related to the researchers were measured, and the relevance in explaining scientific production was examined using hierarchical models.

Study for Recycling Water Treatment Membranes and Compnents towards a Circular Economy-Case of Macaronesia Area.

Desalination is an opportunity to get fresh water for irrigation and for drinking. Reverse Osmosis (RO) for sea water desalination is a solution for the high demand for water in Atlantic islands. The most efficient process to get desalinated water is RO; however, it is necessary to study what to do with the RO membranes used at the end of their life.

An Assessment of Renewable Energies in a Seawater Desalination Plant with Reverse Osmosis Membranes.

The purpose of our study was to reduce the carbon footprint of seawater desalination plants that use reverse osmosis membranes by introducing on-site renewable energy sources. By using new-generation membranes with a low energy consumption and considering wind and photovoltaic energy sources, it is possible to greatly reduce the carbon footprint of reverse osmosis plants. The objective of this study was to add a renewable energy supply to a desalination plant that uses reverse osmosis technology.

Optimization of Energy Efficiency, Operation Costs, Carbon Footprint and Ecological Footprint with Reverse Osmosis Membranes in Seawater Desalination Plants.

This article shows the optimization of the reverse osmosis process in seawater desalination plants, taking the example of the Canary Islands, where there are more than 320 units of different sizes, both private and public. The objective is to improve the energy efficiency of the system in order to save on operation costs as well as reduce the carbon and ecological footprints. Reverse osmosis membranes with higher surface area have lower energy consumption, as well as energy recovery systems to recover the brine pressure and introduce it in the system.

Performance Analysis of a Full-Scale Desalination Plant with Reverse Osmosis Membranes for Irrigation.

Reverse osmosis (RO) is the most widely used technology for seawater desalination purposes. The long-term operating data of full-scale plants is key to analyse their performance under real conditions. The studied seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) desalination plant had a production capacity of 5000 m/d for irrigation purposes.

Design and Implementation of an Electrical Characterization System for Membrane Capacitive Deionization Units for the Water Treatment.

The desalination of seawater is one of the most established techniques in the world. In the middle of the 20th century this was achieved using water evaporation systems, later with reverse osmosis membranes and nowadays with the possibility of capacitive deionization membranes. Capacitive deionization and membrane capacitive deionization are an emerging technology that make it possible to obtain drinking water with an efficiency of 95%.

Study of the Ecological Footprint and Carbon Footprint in a Reverse Osmosis Sea Water Desalination Plant.

The water situation in the Canary Islands has been a historical problem that has been sought to be solved in various ways. After years of work, efforts have focused on desalination of seawater to provide safe water mainly to citizens, agriculture, and tourism. Due to the high demand in the Islands, the Canary Islands was a pioneering place in the world in desalination issues, allowing the improvement of the techniques and materials used.

Increasing literate and illiterate women's met need for contraception via empowerment: a quasi-experiment in rural India.

Background: Virtually all the evidence on the relationship between women's empowerment and use of contraception comes from cross-sectional studies that have emphasized macrosocial factors.This analysis tested whether literate and illiterate women are empowered by an intervention designed to provide information addressing technical and gender concerns and expand contraceptive choice, and evaluated the effects of women's decision-making power on contraceptive behavior.

Methods: The data came from a three-year quasi-experiment conducted in two comparable, yet not equivalent, rural blocks in Jharkhand, India.

Predicting contraceptive use from an egalitarian model of women's overall household power vis-à-vis conventional power models and third variables.

Research on gender power in contraceptive use has focused on whether women have an active role in household decision-making (the participation model) or on the extent of their control of domestic decisions (the control model); it has also addressed the joint effects of power, age, education and work. Findings published in this journal (Woldemicael, 2009) suggest a third power model according to which wives make joint decisions with their husbands on important domestic areas and autonomous decisions on secondary matters (the egalitarian model). In analyses of Demographic and Health Survey data sets from 46 countries, the egalitarian model explained contraceptive use better than the control and participation models in 19 out of 20 countries outside sub-Saharan Africa; its superiority was less overwhelming in this sub-continent.

Assessing the effect of introducing a new method into family planning programs in India, Peru, and Rwanda.

Background: Introducing a new method into family planning programs requires careful attention to ensure it meets an actual need and has a positive effect on program goals. The Standard Days Method® is a fertility awareness-based method of family planning that is being introduced into family planning programs in countries around the world. It is different from other methods offered by programs, and may bring new couples into family planning, and increase contraceptive prevalence.

The role of need for contraception in the evaluation of interventions to improve access to family-planning methods.

A nonrandomized experiment carried out in Jharkhand, India, shows how the effects of interventions designed to improve access to family-planning methods can be erroneously regarded as trivial when contraceptive use is utilized as dependent variable, ignoring women's need for contraception. Significant effects of the intervention were observed on met need (i.e.

Provider selection of evidence-based contraception guidelines in service provision: a study in India, Peru, and Rwanda.

Providers underutilize evidence-based practice guidelines as they prescribe contraceptives. To discern biases in guideline utilization by 172 providers of three countries, this study used observations from simulated clients trained to choose oral contraceptives. Providers implemented less than one third of the guideline set, but they addressed, more frequently than other guidelines, items categorized as essential by expert opinion (p < .

Four criteria to evaluate providers' service-delivery response to new contraceptive introduction.

This article presents an evaluation framework developed to assess the first-level effects of introducing the Standard Days Method (SDM) in Peru Ministry of Health clinics. Four questions are asked: 1) To what extent do providers routinely achieve SDM service delivery standards? 2) Is the time invested in SDM delivery consistent with program norms? 3) How does SDM delivery compare with delivery of established methods? and 4) How does SDM introduction affect delivery of established methods? A study at 62 clinics demonstrated the framework's usefulness. The Standard Days Method introduction had positive overall effects on the quality of care but provider training needed adjustments.

Challenging the courtesy bias interpretation of favorable clients' perceptions of family planning delivery.

Favorable client perceptions of provider's interpersonal behavior in contraceptive delivery, documented in clinic exit questionnaires, appear to contradict results from qualitative evaluations and are attributed to clients' courtesy bias. In this study, trained simulated clients requested services from Ministry of Health providers in three countries. Providers excelled in courteousness/respect in Peru and Rwanda; in India, providers were less courteous and respectful when the simulated clients chose the pill.

Quality of delivery of the Standard Days Method as compared with contraceptive pills in Rwanda.

Background And Methodology: Replicating a Peruvian study, this research introduced the Standard Days Method (SDM) into Rwanda Ministry of Health clinics and evaluated client counselling on the new method against that given for contraceptive pills. Providers received technical reinforcement concerning established methods in addition to SDM training. To evaluate their quality of care, simulated clients implemented a service test in visits to 20 clinics.

Training x Trainee Interactions in a family planning intervention.

This study investigated the effects of introducing a family planning counseling model at clinics of Peru's Ministry of Health. Providers trained in the model presented greater quality of care and longer counseling sessions than did controls. The main effects, however, were misleading.

Providers' compliance with the balanced counseling strategy in Guatemala.

The balanced counseling strategy developed in Peru improved family planning care and clients' knowledge of their contraceptive method choice, but few providers adopted it. To expand its use, an algorithm was introduced and training, job aids, and reinforcement were supplied to Ministry of Health providers, most of whom were paraprofessionals, from two areas (40 clinics) in Guatemala. Mystery clients made pretest and post-test visits to these clinics and to providers from a nonequivalent control group (40 clinics).