Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5,6,7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8,9,10,11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases.13,14,15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may eliminate pieces of the Amazon's biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological communities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple organism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region's vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most neglected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lost

A cidade de São Paulo e a era dos melhoramentos materiaes: Obras públicas e arquitetura vistas por meio de fotografias de autoria de Militão Augusto de Azevedo, datadas do período 1862-1863

The first photographs of São Paulo, taken by Militão Augusto de Azevedo between\ud 1862 and 1863, are always cited as documentary evidence of the citys backwardness,\ud deterioration, and lethargy in the mid 19th century. However, our view is that things were\ud quite different, based on a reading of prime sources dating back to that period. In fact, the\ud architecture and urban spaces of São Paulo already showed clear signs of modernization\ud between the years 1850 and 1860, as depicted in Azevedos photographs, which belong\ud to the collection of Paulista Museum and also of the Iconography and Museums Division of\ud the São Paulo Heritage Department

Perante a Pneumônica: a epidemia e as respostas das autoridades de saúde pública e dos agentes políticos em Portugal (1918-1919) Tackling the Flu: the epidemic and the responses from the public health officers and the political agents in Portugal (1918-1919)

A epidemia de gripe pneumónica ocorreu em Portugal num momento em que o país que enfrentava enormes dificuldades de natureza económica, política e sanitária. Chega a um país rural e pobre, envolvido na Grande Guerra de 1914-18, e que se debate com a carência de géneros e a carestia de vida, e com uma fortíssima crise social e política. Apesar de o país estar habituado a sucessivas epidemias, o carácter imprevisto e violento da pneumónica (estima-se que tenha provocado quase 140 mil mortos num país com cerca de 6 milhões de habitantes) fez com que a resposta dos agentes políticos e sanitários fosse marcada por factores ligados à conjuntura (crise económica, social e política) e de tipo estrutural (condições higiénicas e sanitárias deficientes, falta de meios em capital económico, de médicos e de medicamentos, impotência do conhecimento médico para debelar a epidemia).<br>The Spanish influenza epidemic occurred in Portugal when this country faced enormous economic, political and sanitary problems. The country was poor, living mainly from agriculture and was involved in the First World War. There were food shortages, a high cost of living, as well as a strong social and political crisis. Although people were used to deal with successive epidemic diseases, the sudden and violent character of the Spanish influenza took everybody by surprise. According to some estimation it killed about 140 thousand in a 6 million person's countryThe answer of the political and sanitary agents was marked by contextual factors (the economic, social and political crisis) as well as by structural ones (very poor hygienic and sanitary conditions, lack of financial resources, of doctors and medicines, impotence of medical knowledge in dealing with the pandemic)

Characterisation of microbial attack on archaeological bone

As part of an EU funded project to investigate the factors influencing bone preservation in the archaeological record, more than 250 bones from 41 archaeological sites in five countries spanning four climatic regions were studied for diagenetic alteration. Sites were selected to cover a range of environmental conditions and archaeological contexts. Microscopic and physical (mercury intrusion porosimetry) analyses of these bones revealed that the majority (68%) had suffered microbial attack. Furthermore, significant differences were found between animal and human bone in both the state of preservation and the type of microbial attack present. These differences in preservation might result from differences in early taphonomy of the bones. © 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved