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News from Latin America

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 27-Oct-2026 10:17 ET (27-Oct-2026 14:17 GMT/UTC)

Combining cassava flour in the bread dough might assure access to food in the future

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Business Announcement

With the perspective of climate change affecting wheat crops on a global scale, scientists from Brazil and Denmark test techniques to develop bread comprised by three-tenths of cassava while preserving its standard features. The purpose of the project is to improve cassava flour baking properties through the use of enzymes.

Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP

Pollutant emitted by forest fire causes DNA damage and lung cell death

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

Scientists performed tests with particles from forest and crop fires in the Amazon. Not only did they induce inflammation, oxidative stress and genetic damage in human lung cells, but they also drove one-third of the cultured cells to death.

Journal: Scientific Reports
Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP

B3 vitamin component fights carcinogen action in human cells, says research

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

Brazilian scientists investigate tumoral development caused by benzo[a]pyrene, a hydrocarbon present in cigarette smoke, automotive exhaust, burnt wood fumes and barbecued meat. Culture of human lung cells was exposed to the agent for a week; the preventive role of nicotinamide riboside halted the damaging effects derived from alterations in genetic expression and cell metabolism.

Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP

Nicotinic receptor could be target for treatment of lung inflammation

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Book Announcement

Tests using mice employed an experimental drug that stimulates a specific type of nicotinic receptor in immune cells; researchers attested the reversion of the inflammation condition. The results of the drug were surprising, given the fact that it simulates acetylcholine, a bronchoconstrictor neurotransmitter inhibited by asthma and DPOC's best-known treatments

Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP

Solid or liquid? Researcher proposes a new definition of glass

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

The glass is a non-equilibrium, non-crystalline state of matter that appears solid on a short time scale but relaxes toward the liquid state, proposes Brazilian scientist. The inspiration for the new definition occurred to him after giving the Turner Memorial Lecture at the Society of Glass Technology (SGT) Centenary Conference, in Sheffield (UK).

Journal: Journal of Non-Crystalline Solids
Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP)

Cocaine use during adolescence is even more harmful than during adulthood

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

Brazilian scientists found that addicts who began using cocaine before and after the age of 18 showed differences in sustained attention and working memory, among other brain functions. The research, made under controlled drug abstinence condition, measured cocaine's impact on more than a hundred drug users' cognition, and recommended multidisciplinary treatment for patients with an accentuated cognitive deficit.

Journal: Addictive Behaviors
Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP

Tropical tree roots represent an underappreciated carbon pool

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Estimates of the carbon stored by tropical forests rarely take tree roots into consideration. Smithsonian scientists report that almost 30 percent of the total biomass of tropical trees may be in the roots.

Journal: PLOS One
Funder: Hoch family, Panama´s Office of National Science and Technology, SENACYT, Mr. Frank Levinson, Panama Canal Authority, Mr. Stanley Motta, Agua Salud Foundation

New clues on the historical origin of the vaccine used to eradicate smallpox

Publicase International
Peer-Reviewed Publication

For centuries, researchers assumed that the active ingredient in the vaccine providing immunity against smallpox was the cowpox virus but a study just published in the New England Journal of Medicine indicates otherwise.

Journal: New England Journal of Medicine
Funder: German Ministry of Health

Artificial intelligence comes to the real estate market

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
Business Announcement

A Brazilian company develops recommender engine that personalizes online search by suggesting items aligned with customers' interests, similar to the approach used by streaming services. The innovation aims at increasing the efficiency of online search tools for real estate purchasing - prototype tests point for a 25% rise in sales conversion rate.

Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP

New Zika serotypes may emerge, researcher warns

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

The virus is mutating very fast in Brazilian patients. Appearance of new serotypes could hinder development of vaccines and efficacy of diagnostic tests, according to a member of one of the leading group of scientists on Zika-related investigations

Funder: Sao Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP