Alexandre de Gusmão Pedrini

BENTHIC MARINE ALGAE OF THE CORAL REEFS OF BRAZIL: A LITERATURE REVIEW

In Brazil, algae in coral reef environments can be found from Maranhao to Bahia State and there are today around 700 taxa, of which 78% are found on reef formations. The Rhodophyta are among the most common taxa found. Corallinales are the least studied group, in spite of their role in the formation and maintenance of Brazilian coral reefs. The species richness of algae on coral reefs is low in comparison with other coastal habitats, but there is an abundance of turf and fleshy macroalgae on certain parts of the coastal reefs. Halimeda spp., Dictyota spp., Dictyopteris spp., Hypnea spp., Gracilaria spp., Gelidium spp. and Sargassum spp. are some of the most conspicuous algae, while Caulerpa and Udotea and seagrasses are frequently found on unconsolidated sandy bottoms. Benthic marine algae are important components of shallow coral-reef communities in the Atlantic and they can be regarded as major competitors to corals. Over the last two decades, numerous cases of phase shifts from coral to algal predominance over coral reefs were reported worldwide. These reports coincide with the increasing concern with reef degradation, mainly attributed to anthropogenic nutrient enrichment and overfishing. In Brazil the effects of nutrification over coral reef dynamics are only recently being assessed, and crucial basic information is still lacking. The exploitation of marine algae, mainly of Gracilaria, is also recent in Brazil. Macroalgae growth in some disturbed Brazilian reefs were associated with grazing reduction caused by overfishing or nutrification. Rapid assessments of coral reef flora are needed in order to generate reliable information for environmental

Percepção ambiental de crianças e pré-adolescentes em vulnerabilidade social para projetos de educação ambiental

Four to twelve year-old socially vulnerable children and pre-adolescents of a private entity in Rio de Janeiro City have been studied in relation to their environmental perception and social representations regarding the environment. Social representations have been obtained from drawings and categorized. The macro-elements were classified as: a) abstract or concrete; b) artificial or natural. The macro elements were classified into: a) house or objects in general; b) animal, plant, mineral, atmospheric and human resources. Animals were predominant (40%) in natural environments. Flying animals (58%), trees without fruits or flowers (70%), grass (36%), sun (54%) and the masculine gender (27%) were the predominant macro-elements. The results show that concrete (94%) and natural (75%) elements predominated, suggesting that the perceived environment is that which is essentially visualized.

Neolyngbya gen. nov. (Cyanobacteria, Oscillatoriaceae): A new filamentous benthic marine taxon widely distributed along the Brazilian coast

Brazil has an extensive and environmentally diverse coastline, which favors the occurrence of numerous cyanobacterial morpho- and ecotypes. Nevertheless, this coastline is still poorly studied and its diversity is underestimated. Considering the family Oscillatoriaceae, Lyngbya deserves special attention. It includes many clades which are phylogenetically non-related but morphologically similar. Such clades occur in marine and freshwater environments and are traditionally treated as a single genus. In the current study, we sampled both mediolittoral and estuarine zones along the Brazilian coast. Based on a polyphasic characterization, we described a new genus of marine filamentous cyanobacteria: Neolyngbya. It includes six new species sampled in Brazil, which are described in this study (N. maris-brasilis, N. granulosa, N. irregularis, N. nodulosa, N. arenicola and N. tenuis). Additionally, the characterization included a Neolyngbya sp. from Japan in the clade, but only based on molecular data. All species presented irregular arrangement of thylakoids as described for Oscillatoriaceae. The new genus shares morphological characteristics with species in different clades of the Lyngbya complex. The ultrastructural analyses of Neolyngbya, however, showed numerous gas vesicles, especially in the interthylakoid space; such feature is not observed in benthic Lyngbya species. Neolyngbya formed a well-supported clade (16S rRNA phylogeny), however distantly related to L. aestuarii and L. confervoides, both marine species clusters. The Limnoraphis clade is in a sister relationship to the Neolyngbya clade, however the former occurs in freshwater plankton. Secondary structures of 16S-23S rRNA ITS sequences were congruent with the phylogeny. The polyphasic characterization was helpful to clarify the diversity and ecological aspects of benthic filamentous cyanobacteria and the evolutionary history of the group. This favors a better understanding of inter and infrageneric taxa. The number of novel taxa described in this study emphasizes the importance of conducting additional floristic surveys, mainly in underexplored marine environments, to reveal the real cyanobacterial biodiversity in these areas.

Os cientistas ambientais brasileiros cumprem o contrato social metafórico da ciência

A missao dos cientistas pelo Contrato Social Metaforico da Ciencia (CSMC) firmado com o governo federal e produzir e difundir informacoes de modo que a sociedade que os sustenta viva adequadamente. Essa difusao e feita aos seus pares pela disseminacao cientifica e a sociedade leiga pela divulgacao cientifica. O que e disseminado precisa ser traduzido para a sociedade leiga. Foi selecionada a especialidade cientifica ambiental da ficologia para estudo de caso. Hipotetizou-se que os cientistas-ficologos brasileiros nao vem realizando a divulgacao cientifica adequadamente para a sociedade leiga. A amostragem objetivou identificar a produtos de divulgacao cientifica (DC) pelos ficologos no pais de janeiro/1999 a outubro/2015. Como os produtos de DC mais conhecidos sao artigos de DC foram buscados os que fossem sobre ficologia nas revistas Ciencia Hoje (CH) e Ciencia Hoje das Criancas (CHC) no mesmo periodo. Foram identificados dezesseis produtos, sendo dez relatados por ficologos (30% de artigos escritos; 20% de Ciclo de Debates; 20% de Oficinas de Simulacao da vida laboratorial; 10% de videos cientificos; 10% de livros; 10% de comentarios em blog internacional) e seis artigos escritos na CH/CHC. A producao de DC por produtos escritos de artigos de ficologos representaram 0,004% na revista CH e 0,0056% na CHC. Entao, 1,6% foram os produtos que cientistas-ficologos contribuiram em quinze anos sobre DC relativo a algas em um universo de 1.000 ficologos, sugerindo uma contribuicao incipiente. A hipotese pode ser comprovada. Os cientistas ambientais (representados pelos ficologos) so cumprem parcialmente o CSMC, nao comunicando-se com a sociedade pela divulgacao cientifica.