News from Latin America

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 16-Jun-2025 10:11 ET (16-Jun-2025 14:11 GMT/UTC)

9-Sep-2020

Urbanization and agriculture are land uses that most affect Brazil's rivers

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A literature review by researchers affiliated with universities in Brazil and the United States produces the first ever nationwide survey of land use impacts on water quality, showing how a lack of planning may affect the availability of a natural resource that is already becoming scarce.

Journal

Journal of Environmental Management

Funder

São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Brazil). Geochronologic research at the MIT Isotope Lab

3-Sep-2020

Study identifies how infection by Zika virus during pregnancy can affect the fetal brain

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The study by more than 30 Brazilian scientists investigated tens of thousands of genomic, transcriptomic and proteomic variables, discovering several alterations caused by the vírus.

Journal

Science Signaling

Funder

São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Brazil). Geochronologic research at the MIT Isotope Lab

2-Sep-2020

A disk of gas would explain mysterious light changes observed in Sagittarius constellation

Universidad de Concepción
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The enigmatic variations of light in a binary system, located in Sagittarius constellation, could be explained by the presence of a variable gas disk around a hot star that revolves around a cooler star. These are the conclusions published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics and which brought by researchers from Chile, Serbia and Poland.

2-Sep-2020

Brazilian researcher proposes universal mechanism for ejection of matter by black holes

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The process occurs in active-core nuclei. A molecular gas cloud that accumulates in the central region is blown away by radiation from the black hole's accretion disk, forming a huge expanding hot bubble, whose radius can reach 300 light years.

Journal

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

Funder

São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Brazil). Geochronologic research at the MIT Isotope Lab

1-Sep-2020

Fish invasions follow Panama and Suez canal expansions

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Following recent canal expansions, marine fish are entering the Panama and Suez Canal waterways. Researchers are concerned that they may invade new habitat on the other side, causing unforeseen environmental or economic disasters.

Journal

Nature Ecology & Evolution

Funder

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute

31-Aug-2020

Eating your vegetables is easier said than done

The Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The landmark EAT-Lancet report on food in the Anthropocene sets ambitious targets. Putting it into action, however, will require policymakers to make sustainable food systems a top-level priority. A new article charts a path forward.

Journal

Nature Food

Funder

CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health

31-Aug-2020

Consortium of Brazilian researchers completes sequencing of native stingless bee's genome

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Frieseomelitta varia is a docile species of economic interest as a pollinator. Its workers are sterile, and some of its genetic sequences are identical to those found in other eusocial bees, pointing to the conservation of ancestral traits.

Journal

BMC Genomics

Funder

São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Brazil). Geochronologic research at the MIT Isotope Lab

28-Aug-2020

Fossil trees on Peru's Central Andean Plateau tell a tale of dramatic environmental change

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The anatomy of plant fossils including an enormous tree that grew 10 million years ago in the now arid, high-elevation Central Andean Plateau calls current paleoclimate models into question, suggesting that the area was more humid than models predict.

Journal

Science Advances

Funder

Harold E. Moore Jr. Memorial and Endowment Fund, Greg D. and Jennifer Walston Johnson, 1923 Fund, Fulbright-Colciencias Doctoral Fund, National Geographic Society, Cornell University, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Anders Foundation

27-Aug-2020

Growing demand for zero-deforestation cacao might not help Colombian forests

The Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Cacao in Colombia is not a major driver of deforestation - yet. But increased demand could imperil forests in the future. New research shows cacao stakeholders have to overcome barriers to reach markets that value zero-deforestation, complicating one of Colombia's post-conflict strategies.

Journal

Applied Geography

Funder

International Climate Initiative, World Resources Institute

24-Aug-2020

Researchers develop flat lens a thousand times thinner than a human hair

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The lens can be used to produce high-resolution images with a wide field of view. It can serve as a camera lens in smartphones and can be used in other devices that depend on sensors (high resolution wide angle selfie obtained using metalens

Funder

São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Brazil). Geochronologic research at the MIT Isotope Lab