Tips to stay on top of what happens in Brazilian science
How to measure soil health?
solo?
The 5th episode of the series How to Measter Soil Health, promoted by initiative 4 PER 1000 “Soil Carbon Science Webinar Series is now available on Youtube.
In this episode, the researcher of Soil Health Institute, Cristine Morgan, presents a selected set of economic and responsive indicators for soil health assessment.
In turn, the researcher of Embrapa Cerrados, Iêda de Carvalho, shares information from large -scale soil health assessments in Brazil, focusing on the role of soil enzymes.
Link to access
What does society think about Brazilian science?
Knowing how society thinks and consumes topics related to Science and Technology (C&T) is a factor of great importance for researchers, educators, communicators, journalists and managers involved with the development and implementation of public policies. This is because science and technology are part of important political and social debates, such as mechanisms that help and accelerate the country’s development. The research of public perception of science and technology in Brazil arose from the need to map Brazilians’ understanding and raise up -to -date data on interest, information, attitudes and knowledge related to C&T in Brazil.
Based on the results, it is possible to improve actions of scientific popularization and science education, as well as contribute to the formulation of public policies aimed at this theme. In the 2023 edition, we seek, as well as in previous editions, to produce data that allow comparison with previous, national/international research and, above all, to add innovations in the forms of approach. Therefore, it is possible to follow the behavior of C&T over time through the data.
Interest in postgraduate programs in the country
The Brazilian Graduate System, which currently serves more than 320,000 students in masters and doctoral academic or professional doctorate programs, is experiencing a complex crisis marked by overlapping problems. The number of titled students has grown nonstop for more than three decades, reaching a peak of 24,400 doctors and 70.1 thousand masters in 2019, but this breath has covered in the pandemic, with the closure of laboratories and the postponement of projects. After the sanitary emergency, the crisis remained. There are obstacles to resume the previous pace: by 2022, the contingent of graduates was still 13% below 2019. In various areas of knowledge, fewer candidates are willing to claim the vacancies of the programs.
“The pandemic overshadowed two processes that had already begun before it: a removal of those interested in postgraduate, mainly due to the loss of scholarships, and a reduction in the attractiveness of this type of group formation who, in the past, used to look for it,” says political scientist Rachel Meneguello, postgraduate dean of Campinas State University (Unicamp). The preliminary version of the new National Postgraduate Plan (PNPG), which should be released in the second semester by the Higher Education Personnel Improvement Coordination (CAPES), provided a diagnosis of discredit.
Leia report published in FAPESP magazine
Carbon market
The voluntary carbon market is an important mechanism for containing global warming by stimulating countries and companies to decrease their carbon emissions through their pricing. In a report launched in June, the Advisory Group for Climate Crisis (CCAG) warns that scientific principles and transparency must support the definitions of what should be considered in carbon credit – and can serve to guide the discussion on the subject. This is one of the priority guidelines of the Senate this year.
The report is part of a series of analysis made independently by CCAG. The group brings together 15 climate experts from ten different countries, with the mission of impacting decision making about the climate crisis.
The idea of the report is to build confidence in the voluntary carbon market that, according to experts, currently has action limits in reducing carbon emissions. To this end, the text points to seven main recommendations that go beyond the principles of carbon compensation established by the University of Oxford (UK) – and describes a script for the voluntary carbon market to overcome recent criticism and rebuild their confidence through science.
Some ideas involve supporting projects that provide real carbon emissions reductions and redistribute financing and benefits to local communities where projects are based.
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Czech tool if there are common articles and projects between the candidate’s Lattes curriculum and the evaluators
The Computational Systems Biology Laboratory (CSBL) has developed Conflictulus lattes, a tool to check if there are common articles and projects between the lattes curricula of candidates and evaluators, avoiding conflicts of interest in master’s and doctoral stalls.
The CSBL is linked to the Inflammatory Disease Research Center (CRID), a FAPESP Research, Innovation and Diffusion Center (CEPID) based at the Ribeirão Preto Medical School of the University of São Paulo (FMRP-USP).
The tool was designed by Helder Nakaya, senior researcher at Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein and CSBL leader. The platform offers an initial screening of potential conflicts of interest, facilitating the analysis of professional and collaborative bonds among participants.
According to Nakaya, Conflictulus lattes can help save a lot of time from Lattes platform users. “We put a saved time counter every time the tool was run. We estimate that crossing dozens of curricula can save up to ten hours of work, sometimes much more,” points out the researcher for the agency FAPESP.
All interested parties can use the tool for free. For this, there is a system of login and registration approval. Users can load and analyze multiple lattes curricula of candidates and evaluators; quickly identify co -authorship and collaborations in common; and manage reports of potential conflicts of interest.
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