Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time, and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space. While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes, vast areas of the tropics remain understudied. In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity, but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases. To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications 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, 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

Políticas públicas "na colônia": incidência, significados e implicações para a agricultura familiar na fronteira noroeste, RS

O presente trabalho aborda a incidência das políticas públicas na agricultura familiar na região Fronteira Noroeste do Rio Grande do Sul. A partir de uma abordagem sistêmica e privilegiando o ponto de vista das famílias agricultoras, busca-se desvelar a incidência das políticas públicas “na colônia”, tal como é denominado o “meio rural” pelos agricultores familiares da região. Visando contribuir para a compreensão das políticas públicas no desenvolvimento rural, essa pesquisa teve como objetivo identificar e analisar o conjunto de políticas acessadas pela agricultura familiar na região Fronteira Noroeste do Rio Grande do Sul, considerando o entendimento de agricultores familiares acerca destas e sua interferência em seus sistemas sociais e produtivos. Partindo-se da abordagem de estudo da evolução e diferenciação de sistemas agrários, procedeu-se com as seguintes etapas de operacionalização metodológica: 1) reconstituição da história da agricultura na região; 2) entrevistas com informantes-chave e elaboração de uma tipologia da agricultura familiar; 3) visitas em Unidades de Produção Agrícola (UPAs) e entrevistas com famílias agricultoras; 4) tabulação de dados e análise dos resultados. Foram identificados cinco sistemas agrários na história da região, sendo eles: 1) Sistema Agrário Indígena; 2) Sistema Agrário Jesuítico-Guarani; 3) Sistema Agrário Caboclo; 4) Sistema Agrário Colonial; 5) Sistema Agrário Moderno Agroindustrial. Para a caracterização socioeconômica da agricultura familiar na região Fronteira Noroeste, classificou-se as UPAs em 9 tipos a partir de seus sistemas de produção, os quais foram denominados de: 1) Tipo Leite; 2) Tipo Leite+Fumo; 3) Tipo Leite+Grãos; 4) Tipo Leite+Suínos; 5) Tipo Grãos; 6) Tipo Suínos+Grãos; 7) Tipo Gado de Corte; 8) Tipo Pesca Artesanal; 9) Tipo Hortifruti. . Identificou-se 49 políticas públicas (nas diferentes esferas e níveis) incidentes nas UPAs da agricultura familiar pesquisadas, as quais foram classificadas em oito eixos de incidência: 1) acesso à terra; 2) habitação e eletrificação rural; 3) saúde no rural; 4) educação do campo e formação profissional; 5) sociossistencial; 6) ambiental; 7) produção agrícola e agroindustrial; 8) comercialização. Em média, foi identificada a incidência de 11 políticas públicas por UPA no período de 19 anos considerado (2000 a 2018), sendo que a UPA em que incidiu o maior número de políticas públicas contou com 17 políticas incidentes e na UPA com o menor número de políticas públicas, houve a incidência de apenas 2 políticas. Destacaram-se, pela importância, a linha de crédito do Pronaf Mais Alimentos, o Programa Nacional de Habitação Rural (PNHR) e o Programa Nacional de Crédito Fundiário (PNCF). Constatou-se uma desigual incidência de políticas públicas e diferentes necessidades apontadas pelas famílias em cada um dos tipos de UPAs identificados. Os resultados das entrevistas também apontaram para a necessidade de políticas de garantia de preço, acesso à mercados diferenciados para agricultura familiar, modernização da infraestrutura produtiva, acesso à terra e reconhecimento da pluriatividade na agricultura familiar. Destaca-se a importância de considerar a influência do conjunto de políticas incidentes na agricultura familiar, tanto para a construção de políticas de desenvolvimento rural, quanto na análise, diagnóstico e planejamento de UPAs.The current study addresses the public policies incidence on family farming in the Northwest Frontier region of Rio Grande do Sul. Based on a systemic approach and privileging the farming families' point of view, we sought to reveal the impact of public policies “in the colony”, as the “rural area” is called by family farmers in the region. Aiming to contribute to the understanding of public policies in rural development, this research had as objective to identify the set of policies accessed by family farming in the Northwest Frontier region of Rio Grande do Sul, considering the family farmers understanding about it and their interference in their social and productive systems. Based on the approach of studying the evolution and differentiation of agrarian systems, the following steps of methodological operationalization were carried out: 1) reconstitution of the agriculture's history of the region; 2) interviews with key informants and the elaboration of a family farming typology; 3) visits to Agricultural Production Units and interviews with farming families; 4) data tabulation and results analysis. Five agrarian systems have been identified in the history of the region, namely: 1) Indigenous Agrarian System; 2) Jesuit-Guarani Agrarian System; 3) Caboclo Agrarian System; 4) Colonial Agrarian System; 5) Agroindustrial Modern Agrarian System. For the socioeconomic characterization of family farming in the Fronteira Noroeste region, UPAs were classified into 9 types based on their production systems, which were called: 1) Milk type; 2) Milk + Smoke yype; 3) Milk + Grain type; 4) Milk + Pigs type ; 5) Grain type; 6) Pigs + Grains type; 7) Beef Cattle type; 8) Artisanal fishing type; 9) Vegetable type. 49 public policies were identified (at different levels and levels) in the family farming UPAs surveyed, which were classified into eight areas of incidence: 1) land access; 2) housing and rural electrification; 3) rural health; 4) Countryside education and professional training; 5) socioassistance; 6) environmental; 7) agricultural and agro-industrial production; 8) commercialization. On average, the incidence of 11 public policies per UPA were identified, in a period of 19-year period (2000 to 2018), wherein the UPA with the highest number of public policies accessed 17 policies and the UPA with the lowest number of public policies accessed only two policies. Due to their importance, The Pronaf Mais Alimentos credit line, the National Rural Housing Program (PNHR) and the National Land Credit Program (PNCF) stood out. An unequal incidence of public policies was observed and different needs were pointed out by families in each of the types of UPAs identified. The interviews results also pointed to the need for price guarantee policies, access to differentiated markets for family farming, modernization of the productive infrastructure, access to land and recognition of the pluriactivity in family farming. The importance of considering the influence of the set of policies on family farming is highlighted, both for the construction of rural development policies and for the analysis, diagnosis and planning of UPAs

Cerebral amyloid angiopathy burden associated with leukoaraiosis: A positron emission tomography/magnetic resonance imaging study

Objective We hypothesized that vascular amyloid contributes to chronic brain ischemia, therefore amyloid burden measured by Pittsburgh compound B retention on positron emission tomography (PiB PET) would correlate with the extent of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) white matter hyperintensities (WMH; or leukoaraiosis) in patients with high vascular amyloid deposition (cerebral amyloid angiopathy [CAA]) but not in patients with high parenchymal amyloid deposition (Alzheimer disease [AD]; mild cognitive impairment [MCI]) or in healthy elderly (HE) subjects. Methods Forty-two nondemented CAA patients, 50 HE subjects, and 43 AD/MCI patients had brain MRI and PiB PET. Multivariate linear regression was used to assess the independent association between PiB retention and white matter disease volume, controlling for age, gender, apolipoprotein E genotype, and vascular risk factors within each group. Results CAA patients were younger than HE and AD subjects (68 +/- 10 vs 73.3 +/- 7 and 74 +/- 7.4, p < 0.01) but had higher amounts of WMH (median = 21 vs 3.2 and 10.8 ml, respectively, p < 0.05 for both comparisons). Global PiB retention and WMH showed strong correlation (rho = 0.52, p < 0.001) in the CAA group but not in HE or AD. These associations did not change in the multivariate models. Lobar microbleed count, another marker of CAA severity, also remained as an independent predictor of WMH volume. Interpretation Our results indicate that amyloid burden in CAA subjects (with primarily vascular amyloid) but not AD subjects (with primarily parenchymal amyloid) independently correlates with WMH volume. These findings support the idea that vascular amyloid burden directly contributes to chronic cerebral ischemia and highlights the possible utility of amyloid imaging as a marker of CAA severity. Ann Neurol 2013;73:529-536Paroxysmal Cerebral Disorder