201LEDITION 2 WWW.REVISTAPESQUISA.FAPESP.BR

12 COVER ,., ,.,A platform for research SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGY

on biodiversity,climate TECHNOLOGICAL

changeand exploitation POLlCY 51 Corporate researchof the pre-salt layer, Natura works with

the new oceanographic 22 Energy scenarios universities andvessel of the Stateof Studies reveal forecasts research institutes to

São Pauloarrived in may about the share of ethanol incorporate cutting-edgeat the port of Santos. in agriculture and the fuel research within productThevessel's renovation matrix developmentin a U.5.shipyardandits transfer to Brazil 56 Engineeringrequired the overcoming SCIENCE Embraer teams up withof technical and universities to improvebureaucratic hurdles 26 Neuroscience comfort on its airplanes

Recounting neurons putsCover photo neuroscience ideas in check 62 AgricultureTheAlphaCrucisvesselonits

Companythatbreedsway to Brazil32 Evolution wasps for use in biologicalCREDITNE.lRABINQWITZ

(WWWNEILRABINOWITZ_COMI The divergence among control is ranked among thecapuchin monkeys, as old as world's 50 most innovativethat between humans and companieschimpanzees,is reflectedin

INTERVIEW their ecology and behavior 68 BiochemistryCellulose and bioglass

6 Hernan 38 Landscape in membranes stimulate cellChaimovich transformation regenerationThe Professor The Atlantic Rainforestfrom USP recalls in Espírito Santo bearshis journey from remnants of the Amazon HUMANITIESSantiago, Chile to Region from 7.8thousandSão Paulo, saying years ago 72 Expeditionthat no other country The little-known presenceintegrates cultures 44 Astronomy of naturalists on the Rondonlike Brazil The collapse of stellar winds Commission helped to

extends the cyclicalblackout formalize scientific researchof the Eta Carinae star

78 Prehistoric arrows48 Continental drift and spearsThe movement of Ten-thousand -year-old

SECTIONS Gondwana nearly resulted stone weapons from thein Brazil's northeastern State of São Paulo differ

5 Letter from the editor region becoming a part of from prehistoric artifacts82 Art Africa found in southern Brazil

PESQUISA FAPESP I 3

Parkia pendula is a characteristic treeof the Amazon Region forest that hasa height of 24 meters, a red trunk ofnearly two meters in diameter and barkthat resembles fish scales. However,

30 years ago, this species was discovered in anAtlantic Rainforest reserve in Linhares, in north-ern Espírito Santo, approximately 2,400 kilo-meters from the nearest Amazonian rainforest.The origin of this species has been unknown todate. However, in an exciting development, ex-perts from São Paulo are literally unearthing thepast: by analyzing soil and pollen fram the bot-tom sediments of a lake, it has been found thatAmazonian species have existed in the regionfor over 7,800years.

This study identifiesspeciesthat have persistedor disappeared fromLinharesas a result ofclimateand soil changes over thousands of years. Thestudy alsosuggestspotential interactions betweenenvironments that are presently distant and iso-lated, such as the coastal forest and the Amazonregion. The results indicate a transforming land-scape as various forms of native vegetation in thecountry succumb or adapt to changes in climate.''Where there is neither human interference norclimate change, the dense forests tend to expandonto open areas occupied by fields," says LuizCarlosPessenda, a researcher at the UniversityofSao Paulo (USP) Nuclear Energy Center for Ag-riculture (CENA)in Piracicaba, who coordinatesthe surveysthat are reconstructingthe submergedforest of northern Espírito Santo.

~e Over the past 20 years, Pessenda, a trainedphysicist, made approximately 200 holes in thenorthern, northeastern, midwestern and south-eastern regions ofBrazil to sample lake and soilsediments in search of pollen. He concluded thatopen areas tend to become smaller overtime, con-sistent with the trend over the last 4,000 years.However, four years ago, as he was making hisway through forested areas and observed na-tive fields for the first time, he suspected thatperhaps Linhares was unique, noting that therewere approximately 20 circular areas of rathersandy soil with undergrowth and only a few treesthat nonetheless, had resisted the advance of thejungle. "There were patches ofAmazon rainforesthere 8,000 years ago, either because the climatehad not changed much over time or the Amazonrainforest had extended this far."

Based on the data obtained thus far, Pessendaand his CENAteam concluded that the climateof northern Espírito Santo must have been rela-tively stable over the past 15,000years. Thus, thearea, composition and structure of rainforestsmust have changed little over time, whereas theforests were reduced or disappeared in responseto strong climate change in the other regions ofthe country. This difference suggests that therainforests in Espírito Santo l,11ayhave acted asbiological shelters, preserving plant and animalspecies that may have become extinct elsewhereor even promoting the formation of new spe-cies by isolating populations from one another.Another site where Pessenda conducted field

deen

f

surveys, the Fernando de Noronha Archipelago,may have also experienced no major changes invegetation but exhibits clear signs of coastlineadvancement. "Approximately 5,000 years ago:'Pessenda says, "there used to be a beach wherethere is now mangrove, which is approximately200 meters from the present beach."

If other studies confirm that these areas haveacted as biological shelters for thousands ofyears, it would increase the recognized biologi-cal value of these woods, called Bahian Hiléiadue to their similarity to Amazon forests, whichhalf a century ago extended continuously intothe south ofBahia State. The forests have shrunksignificantly due to the expansion of cities andeconomic development: Linhares used to be athriving furniture production center, procuringwood from the native forests. The rainforestin Linhares retains an area of 45,000 hectares,half of which is preserved as a federal publicarea (the Sooretama Biological Reserve); theother half is preserved by the mining companyVale and is surrounded by coffee and papayaplantations.

"Biodiversity saved the forest in this region,"saysGilberto Terra RibeiroAlves,forest engineerand research coordinator at the Vale NaturalReserve (RNV). The mining company began toform the reserve in 1955by acquiring farms withnative forests. According to the initial plan, treeswere to be cut as part of selectiveexploration, andthe wood was to be used to build railway sleep-ers for the Vitória-Minas railroad, which carries

iron ore from the Iron Quadrangle to the portin Victoria. However, these efforts would haverequired adapting the production methods andcutting machines for each species of tree thatwas harvested from the forest. Ultimately, it waseasier and cheaper to use local eucalyptus treesto build the sleepers.

The Valereservationwas givenanother destinyand became a preservation area of this unique At-lantic Rainforest region, a tableland forest. Thereservationcurrently involvesapproximately 100projects, many regarding the silviculture of non-traditional species and forest restoration. Thereserve is aIso a site ofbotanical and ecologicalresearch, and, according to Alves, is now hometo approximately 60 ongoing research projectsconducted by teams from 17national and 8 for-eign institutions. The reserve also hosts a her-barium of nearly 4,000 species and collectionsof seeds, wood and fruit that have facilitated theidentification of forest species.

Siqueira, the curator of the herbarillm, wasbom in Linares but had never been in a forestuntil he began to work at the reserve in 1995anddescribes how he was initially frightened to walkthere. "When I would enter the rainforest, thehair on myarms would raise and my heart wouldbegin to race:' he recalls. "Gradually, I saw thatthe forest was not as scary as it looked." Sincethen, he has collected 800 plants from the for-est to enhance the herbarium's collection, and heassists in species identification alongside bota-nists such as José Rubens Pirani from USP.AfterSiqueira had sent him material for identification,

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1 íIIt

.40 ESPECIALISSUE OCTOBER2012

Buso,Alves andSiqueira in frontof a massive

Parkiapendula,enlarged on theside

........

Tree pollen removedfrom the sediment at

the bottom of a lagoonin Unhares:Rinorea(Ieft). Glycydendron(below,left), Apeiba-HydrogasterandSimarouba

Pirani visited the reserve in February 2011toobserve in person Spiranthera atlantica, a newspecies representing the first tree type previ-ously known only from the Amazon rainforestand Cerrado savanna.

A preliminary survey indicated that approxi-mately 800 species of trees and palm trees - withthe most abundant species being typical of At-lantic Rainforest - are found within the Valere-serve, including some species exclusive to theseforests, such as two species of trumpet trees. Ina recently completed field count, a team fromthe Federal University ofViçosa (UFV) in MinasGerais identified 142species of trees that alsooc-cur in the Amazon, some of which are also foundin the Caatinga and Cerrado. "The species fromother ecosystems are not the most important interms of their individual numbers, but they showgreat diversity:' says forest engineer SebastianVenancio Martins, a UFV professor and coordi-nator of field studies in the forests of Linhares.In addition, such species asParkia help form thecanopy, the highest part of the forest. Martin'sdoctoral student, Luiz Fernando Magnago,foundthat the highest concentrations of Amazonianspecies are found in the best preserved stretchesof forest, far from the edges of the reserve. ForMartins, this finding reinforces the need to pre-serve large areas of native forests in this regionof Espírito Santo.

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The question that comes to mind when see-ing these rainforests is: why are these Amazo-nian tree species here? "There may have beena connection between the Amazon Region andthe Atlantic Rainforest, perhaps through thestretches along the rivers," says biologist Anto-nio Alvaro Buso Junior, who works with Pessen-da at CENA. "When? Perhaps 10 or 20 millionyears ago. Or as recently as 50 or 100 years ago.The connection may have been made throughthe riparian forests and removed through de-forestation."

Pirani agrees: "Several paleobotanical studieshave shown that at a time when the climate wasmore humid and hotter, there were stretches ofthe rainforest and patches of rainforest wherewe find Caatinga scrublands and Cerrado sa-vannas today." In addition to the probable, re-mote links between vegetation types that arevery different today but previously formed acontinuous green carpet, this forest has a sandysoil, flat terrain and climate marked by con-stant rainfall, similar to that of the Amazon.For Martins, these similarities help explain thesurvival of species that occur in forests in thenorth of the country.

FROM THE BOTTOM OF A LAGOON

Using inflatable boats, Álvaro and Paulo Edu-ardo de Oliveira,University ofSan Francisco re-searcher with experience in this area, collectedsediment samples as far as two feet deep intothe bottom sediments of the Macuco Lagoon,which extends approximately a mile wide andthree meters deep in the Sooretama Reserve. AtCENA, Álvaro identified the pollen of 234 gen-era or families of trees, shrubs, herbs, ferns andaquatic plants (each pollen grain is between 20to 60 micrometers). «The identification of pollenreliably allows taxonomic identification only tothe genus leveI,» he argues.

Most of the genera identified represented treespecies characteristic of the Atlantic Rainforest,some of which, such as Hydrogaster, are foundonly in the tableland forests of southern Bahiaand northern Espírito Santo. Other genera arealso found in the Amazon Region and AtlanticRainforest, such as Glycydendron, Rinorea andSenefeldera. "Why do you think they migratedfrom there to here?" asksDominicFolli,a botanistwho preceded Siqueira at the herbarium. "Theycould just as well have gone from here to there."Indeed, two-way exchange may have occurred.

Seeds may have been transported by wind,rain, rivers or animaIs that ranged between areasof original, perhaps connected, much-broaderforests. Jaguars and other rare species, such asharpy eagles and curassows, stilllive in this area.The Screaming Piha (Lipaugus vociferans), one

One day, a surpriseamidthe forest: a parrot singingXuxa's song

of 380 identified bird species in these forests, istypical of the Amazon.In both forests, this bird iseasily overlooked because of its plumage, whichblends in with the vegetation, but it is one of thefirst birds to sing after detecting the presenceof people. While walking through the rainfor-est one day,Alvaro heard something even moreexceptional: parrots singing Ilariê-ê-ê-ê, Xuxa'ssong! He could not believe his ears, but he thenlearned that a flockof domestic parrots had beenreleased into the forest a few days earlier, andthey were still putting on a show with their rep-ertoire obtained in captivity.

PESQUISA FAPESP 41

The yoyo motion of fields and forests

. HOT ANO HUMIO CLlMATE,.t

1! SAVANNAS/FIELDS,FORESTDRY CLlMATE

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Rondônia,Amazonas and Mato Grosso NortheastCollection points: 30 Collection points of plants.Distance:1,250 km sediments,soil and turf: 36". Distance between the farthest

r" collectionpoints:1,500km

Tl~ ~r11= = W

'tt ~'

r' , "nl North o, Espírito Santo(" ~ l ' Collection points: 9

1 ]Distance: 20 km

~ ;' "ASINGlE COLlECTIQN POINT INDICATESALOCAL ENVIRONMENTAl CHANGE nHERANGE EXTENDS TENSQF KILOMETERS)

THAT CAN BECOMEREGIONALjREA(HINGHUNDREOS ORTHOUSANOSDFKILOMETERS)IF IT 1$ASSOClATED WITH THERESULTSOBTAINEO IN OTHERPOINTS INTHE STUDIEOREGION

São Paulo and Minas

Gerais

Collection points: 27Distance: 650 km

! ! !.....................................................................................

15 TO 9.5 THOUSAND

YEARS ACiOMostlikely in a hot and humidclimate, forests dominate in thenortheast and the north

9.5 TO 4 THOUSAND

YEARS ACiOAided by the predominantly dryclimate. fieldsand savannasexpandto the north and northeast

4 THOUSAND YEARS

ACiOTO DATEThe predominantly humid

climate favored forest growth infields and savannas

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REMNANTS OF THE SEA

In the samples collected from the bottom of the

lagoon, Álvaro found pollen from three genera

of trees typical of mangroves, indicating thatapproximately 8,000 years earlier, a dense man-

grove forest must have occupied the banks of thelagoon and adjoining rivers. Under the watchful

eye of Pessenda, carbon-14 analysis confirmedthis interpretation.

"This area used to be an estuary, and the sea-

water probably reached this spot 8,000 yearsago or more," says Álvaro near the top of the

lagoon bank, at a height of almost 30 meters.

Calcified skeletons of algae and marine spongesfrom the bottom of the lagoon, much larger than

pollen grains (up to half a millimeter in diam-eter), confirm that lO,OOOyears ago, the water

from the nearby rivers mixed with seawater thatis present1y 23 kilometers away. «The mangroves,

which today can only be found in the north, onthe border with Bahia, must have disappeared

before human occupation when the sea leveI

dropped,» says Pessenda. In cooperation withMarcelo Cohen of the Federal University ofPará,

an expert on the evolution of paleomangroves,the CENA group aims to discover the geographi-

callimits and the possible causes of the loss of

this vegetation. In a previous study, Pessenda

1

42 ESPECIALISSUEOCTOBER2012

observed that the coastline of Cardoso Island,

off the southern coast of São Paulo, is lOO kilo-

meters from where it was approximately 40,000years ago. He concluded that a forest occupiedan are a on the island that is currently covered

by mangroves.

Approximately 6,000 years ago, the sea leveI

along the coast of Espírito Santo should havebeen approximately 4 meters higher than where

it is now, according to geologist Paul Gianniniand his team from the USP Biosciences Insti-

tute. This conclusion is based on the analysis of

fossil gastropod mollusks known as vermetids(Petaloconchus varians), which form colonies

on rocks along the water line.Giannini also works in Linhares: "Approxi-

mately two years ago, Pessenda asked me: 'Paul,

discover why grasslands are there.' The vegeta-

tion is not only a result of the climate. We alsohave to consider the influence of the sediment

- whether, for example, thousands of yearsago, there were lagoons in the region, which

later silted up, forming are as in which spe-

cific groups of plants grow." The forest fieldsin northern Espírito Santo are circular, lOOto 500 meters in diameter, and resemble the

landing spot of a spacecraft. They also exhibit

differences: in one field, the sand layer extends

SOURCE LUIZ PESSENDA/CENA.USP

THE PROJECT

Interdisciplinarypaleoenvironmental studiesoff the Espfrito Santo coast- no. 11/00995-7

MODALITYThematic project

COORDINATORLuiz Carlos Ruiz Pessenda -CENA-USP

INVESTMENTR$1,027,868.62 (FAPESP)

5'lest

"

..-

-usp

.

for nearly one meter deep before reaching acompact black layer of soil rich in metal andorganic material; in another, the sand layer isnearly two meters deep.

Different species of grass grow in this nu-trient-poor soil, spreading over fields, taller insome than in others and sometimes in fieldswith single trees, reminiscent of the open typesof the Cerrado. In one field, a white-floweredorchid, Sobralia liliastrum, grows on an iso-lated tree; this orchid is common in ChapadaDiamantina forests in the south of Bahia andhas already been found in the Serra dos Carajásrainforests in Pará.

Experts believe that the forest trees surround-ing the fields are adapted to a more fertile soiland would struggle in nutrient-poor fields,which, moreover, are submerged under 10 to15centimeters of water during the rainy season.Vegetation of intermediate height occupies theareas closest to the forest, but it is still unclearwhether the fields are expanding into the woods,retreating or both, in a seasonal oscillation. "Ifthe seasonal climate continues;' says Pessenda,"it is likely that the firm-soil trees that are in thevicinity of the fields will not colonize the otherarea, which is often covered by water. It is nottheir environment!"

Fieldssurrounded

by forest anda block of

compact layerin the sand:resistance

Siqueira suspects that the fields are shrinkingand has already seen many disappear.The sand iseasily removed and has been widely used in theconstruction of homes and buildings for manyyears. "If there are no major interventions," saysMartins, from Viçosa University, "the fields willtend to remain because the soil type blocks theadvance of forest species."Pessenda believes thatthe fields have occupied the same areas "for atleast 15,000years."

In 20 years of fieldwork, Pessenda has oftenwitnessed forests invading fields. He observedthis process over fiveyears Humaitá, in the southof the state of Amazonas. In the early years, Pes-senda left a string marking the border betweenthe forest and the fields. Upon his return thefollowing year, it was difficult to find the string,which had been swallowed by the forest duringits encroachment (by one or two meters) intothe field (see map).

Pessenda tells us that he had to have shouldersurgery because of the effort required to makethe holes (today, the students help, of course),but he does not consider quitting. "We are go-ing to the south of Bahia to look for signs ofmangrove forests, fields and old rainforests;' heannounces, while planning the next trips andthe expansion of the laboratory from 240 to 400square meters (it occupied 90 square meters in1990). This field of study is also proving very

fertile, as teams from Rio de Janeiro,Rio Grande do Sul and elsewhereare reconstructing the landscape ofthousands of years ago based on theanalyses of soil and pollen and won-dering how the current landscapewill change in the future.

Another indication of the favor-able situation for this fieldofresearchis the fact that the German oceano-graphic ship Maria Merian left theport ofRecife on February 11to col-lect sediments from the mouth of theParnaíba and Amazon Riversand offthe coast ofFrench Guiana. In addi-tion, researchers aim to reconstructthe change in climate in the Amazonover the last 2,000 years. "Right now[early March], we are at the mouthof the Amazon and have already col-lected sediment of excellent quality

and samples of the water column, and we wereable to map the underwater delta of the Ama-zon River with an amazing spatial resolution,"reports Cristiano Chiessi from the ship. Chiessiis a geologist from USP and one of the Brazil-ian researchers onboard. "Our final destinationis Bridgetown in Barbados where we expect toarrive on March 11.".

When leftwithoutintervention,forests advanceinto fieldsthroughoutBrazil

PESQUISA FAPESP 43