Discovering the Attractions of Brazil

 

Brazil is one of the most popular places on earth not only because of its landscapes and places you could never get to see anywhere but also because of the fact that its history is quite captivating and enticing as well. You might not know about a lot of things that Brazil holds in its culture and historic background that you would find out going there within suitable time span. The main things why Brazil gets so highlighted for are its historical places and absence of devastating natural calamities. There are several landmarks you would have heard about in news and magazines and you would get to see them live and closely once you get there.

Brazil has a dense and complex system of rivers, one of the world's most extensive, with eight major drainage basins, all of which drain into the Atlantic. Major rivers include the Amazon (the world's second-longest river and the largest in terms of volume of water), the Paraná and its major tributary the Iguaçu (which includes the Iguazu Falls), the Negro, São Francisco, Xingu, Madeira and Tapajós rivers.
Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world, and third largest in the Americas, with a total area of 8,514,876.599 km2

Discovering attractions of Brazil is probably not one of the toughest things you would have to do around. There are a thousand reasons why you could choose this place as your destination; people here are very welcoming and interesting and they would welcome you with loads of love that you wouldn’t get in any other part of the world. There are many carnivals and charity functions that are occurring in different parts of this country all the time and you could be a part of them any time during the vacations. In Rio, this event is the biggest around the year so you cannot miss is at any cost. It is known for its famous food areas, dancing events and exhibitions that are colorful and lively more than anything else.

The Copacabana beach which is really famous in all parts of Brazil has several attractions you could be a part of. There are many restaurants for food lovers, night clubs for party freaks and sports that are related to water which would make adventurous people quite happy and entertained. There is a little bit for everyone of every gender and age group. You could spend a day at the beach or visit the rainforests and their exotic locations with your family and friends. The atmosphere is really open minded and you could do anything you want without any doubt and concern.

The jaguar is a wild animal typical of Brazil, mainly in the Amazon jungle.

Brazil is the largest national economy in Latin America, the world's seventh largest economy at market exchange rates and the seventh largest in purchasing power parity (PPP), according to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Brazil has a mixed economy with abundant natural resources. The Brazilian economy has been predicted to become one of the five largest in the world in the decades to come, the GDP per capita following and growing, provided that large investments in productivity gains are made to substitute the GDP growth of the last decade that is attributable to the increase in the number of people working. Its current GDP (PPP) per capita is $12,528 in 2014 putting Brazil in the 77th position according to IMF data. Active in agricultural, mining, manufacturing and service sectors Brazil has a labor force of over a 107 million (ranking 6th worldwide) and unemployment of 6.2% (ranking 64th worldwide).

The country has been expanding its presence in international financial and commodities markets, and is one of a group of four emerging economies called the BRIC countries. Brazil has been the world's largest producer of coffee for the last 150 years. It has become the fourth largest car market in the world. Major export products include aircraft, electrical equipment, automobiles, ethanol, textiles, footwear, iron ore, steel, coffee, orange juice, soybeans and corned beef. Adding up, Brazil ranks 23rd worldwide in value of exports.

An E-190 commercial jet, developed by Brazilian companyEmbraer, the third largest producer of civil aircraft, after Airbus andBoeing.

 

P-51, an oil platform ofPetrobras.

Iguazu Falls, Paraná, in Brazil-Argentina border, is the second most popular destination for foreign tourists who come to Brazil for pleasure.

Sancho Bay, in Fernando de Noronha Archipelago, Pernambuco, elected the most beautiful beach in the world by TripAdvisor.

Huh?

 

 

1000 LIFE HACKS

Alexander Shulgin e a Guerra contra as Drogas

 

O "padrinho do êxtase" tinha esperança de que ensaios clínicos revelariam benefícios medicinais das novas drogas psicodélicas.

A morte de Alexander "Sasha" Shulgin nesta semana, o químico de Berkeley, reconhecido pelo desenvolvimento da droga ecstasy, nos lembrou de um artigo de 2005 que ele escreveu para o MIT Technology Review ("Abused Substances"), no qual argumentou que a chamada guerra contra as drogas inibia a pesquisa de compostos psicodélicos potencialmente benéficos. Na época, os ensaios clínicos analisaram se as drogas psicodélicas poderiam ser usadas para ajudar as pessoas com transtorno obsessivo-compulsivo, ansiedade ou transtorno de estresse pós-traumático e Shulgin esperava que as tendências médicas e legais mudariam para se tornar a favor de seu tipo de pesquisa.

Isso não foi realmente confirmado. Mas leia a história mesmo assim para entender a diferença entre "entactogens", "empathogens" e "entheogens".

Immune response affects sleep and memory

 

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Sickness-induced insomnia is common because of link between brain and immune system. Fighting off illness- rather than the illness itself- causes sleep deprivation and affects memory, a new study has found. University of Leicester biologist Dr Eamonn Mallon said a common perception is that if you are sick, you sleep more.

But the study, carried out in flies, found that sickness induced insomnia is quite common.

Dr Mallon said: "Think about when you are sick. Your sleep is disturbed and you're generally not feeling at your sharpest. Previously work has been carried out showing that being infected leads to exactly these behaviours in fruit flies.

"In this paper we show that it can be the immune system itself that can cause these problems. By turning on the immune system in flies artificially (with no infection present) we reduced how long they slept and how well they performed in a memory test.

"This is an interesting result as these connections between the brain and the immune system have come to the fore recently in medicine. It seems to be because the two systems speak the same chemical language and often cross-talk. Having a model of this in the fly, one of the main systems used in genetic research will be a boost to the field.

"The key message of this study is that the immune response, sleep and memory seem to be intimately linked. Medicine is beginning to study these links between the brain and the immune system in humans. Having an easy to use insect model would be very helpful."

Funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), Dr Mallon carried out the study with Ezio Rosato (Genetics), Robert Holdbrook (Biology undergraduate) and Akram Alghamdi (Taif University, Saudi Arabia while a PhD student at Leicester).

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Story Source:

The above story is based on materials provided by University of Leicester. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

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Journal Reference:

1. Eamonn B. Mallon, Akram Alghamdi, Robert T.K. Holdbrook, Ezio Rosato. Immune stimulation reduces sleep and memory ability inDrosophila melanogaster. PeerJ, 2014; 2: e434 DOI: 10.7717/peerj.434

Alcohol abuse damage in neurons at a molecular scale identified for first time

 

June 12, 2014

University of the Basque Country

New research has identified, for the first time, the structural damage caused at a molecular level to the brain by the chronic excessive abuse of alcohol. In concrete, the research team has determined the alterations produced in the neurons of the prefrontal zone of the brain (the most advanced zone in terms of evolution and that which controls executive functions such as planning, designing strategies, working memory, selective attention or control of behavior. This research opens up pathways for generating new pharmaceutical drugs and therapies that enhance the life of alcoholic persons and reduce the morbimortality due to alcoholism.

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The samples of alcoholic individuals show a significant reduction in proteins. C: samples of non-alcoholic individuals. A: samples of alcoholic individuals.

Joint research between the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) and the University of Nottingham has identified, for the first time, the structural damage caused at a molecular level to the brain by the chronic excessive abuse of alcohol. In concrete, the research team has determined the alterations produced in the neurons of the prefrontal zone of the brain (the most advanced zone in terms of evolution and that which controls executive functions such as planning, designing strategies, working memory, selective attention or control of behaviour. This research opens up pathways for generating new pharmaceutical drugs and therapies that enhance the life of alcoholic persons and reduce the morbimortality due to alcoholism.

The research was published in the digital journal specialised in biomedical sciences, PLoS One.

In the research, doctors Luis F. Callado, Benito Morentin and Amaia Erdozain, from the UPV/EHU, together with doctor Wayne G. Carter's team from the University of Nottingham, analysed the postmorten brains of 20 persons diagnosed with alcohol abuse/dependence, alongside another 20 non-alcoholic brains. Studying the prefrontal cortex, researchers detected alterations in the neuronal cytoskeleton in the brains of alcoholic patients; in concrete, in the α- and β-tubulin and the β II spectrin proteins. These changes in the neuronal structure, induced by ethanol ingestion, can affect the organisation, the capacity for making connections and the functioning of the neuronal network, and could largely explain alterations in cognitive behavior and in learning, attributed to persons suffering from alcoholism.

The description of damage and alterations, now detected for the first time at a molecular level in the prefrontal zone of the brain, is the first step for investigation in other fields. Highlighted amongst the new targets put forward is to elucidate the concrete mechanism by which alcohol produces these alterations -- to determine what the possible changes that the enzymes responsible for regulating the functioning of these proteins undergo, and to see if these processes also occur in other parts of the brain, for example, those controlling motor function. The final objective is to identify these molecular changes in order to be able to, on the one hand, link them with the processes of alcohol abuse and dependence and, on the other, generate new pharmaceutical drugs and therapeutic options that reverse the alterations produced by alcohol, enhancing the quality of life of alcoholic persons and reducing the mortality rate due to alcoholism.

The research process

The brain samples employed came from the collection of samples of the Neuropsychopharmacology Research Group at the Department of Pharmacology (UPV/EHU). These samples are a result of an agreement between the UPV/EHU and the Basque Institute of Legal Medicine. The diagnoses of the individuals were undertaken by the doctors responsible for the patients prior to their death, complying with the directives of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM of the American Psychiatric Association).

In order to undertake the research, the researchers used techniques of optical microscopy, proteomics, Western blot and mass spectrometry. Optical microscopy demonstrated that the neurons in the prefrontal zone of the brains of the alcoholic patients had undergone alterations compared to those of non-alcoholic patients. In the following step, the research team used proteomic techniques, in order to identify which proteins were modified in these neurons. Thus, they determined that the altered elements belong to the families of proteins known as tubulins and spectrins. Tubulins make up the cytoskeleton of the neurons -- their architecture. The spectrins are responsible for maintaining the cell shape. In this way, both facilitate the relation between and the activity of the components of the brain's neuron network.

With the objective of quantifying the quantity of protein in each sample, they used the Western blot technique, checking that the levels of proteins were reduced as a consequence of the damage produced by the ethanol. The next stage was using mass spectrometry, which enabled confirming the exact identification of the proteins affected; i.e. within the tubulin family they observed the reduction in the α and β proteins; while amongst the spectrins, they located a decrease in the β II protein.

The research team

Doctors Koldo Callado and Amaia Erdozain are members of the Neuropsychopharmacology Research Group, ascribed to the Department of Pharmacology at the UPV/EHU and currently led by J. Javier Meana. Their lines of research are focused on undertaking cooperative research with a clear translational vision, i.e. forming closer links between clinical and basic research. One of these lines of research is based on the study of neurochemical disorders directly observed in the post-mortem brain. Benito Morentin is Head of the Forensic Pathology Service at the Basque Institute of Legal Medicine and Associate Professor of the Department of Medical-Surgical Specialities of the UPV/EHU.

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Story Source:

The above story is based on materials provided by University of the Basque Country. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

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Journal Reference:

1. Amaia M. Erdozain, Benito Morentin, Lynn Bedford, Emma King, David Tooth, Charlotte Brewer, Declan Wayne, Laura Johnson, Henry K. Gerdes, Peter Wigmore, Luis F. Callado, Wayne G. Carter. Alcohol-Related Brain Damage in Humans. PLoS ONE, 2014; 9 (4): e93586 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0093586

Brain power: New insight into how brain regulates its blood flow

 

June 12, 2014

Columbia University School of Engineering and Applied Science

Engineering professors have identified a new component of the biological mechanism that controls blood flow in the brain, demonstrating that the vascular endothelium plays a critical role in the regulation of blood flow in response to stimulation in the living brain. Understanding how and why the brain regulates its blood flow could provide important clues to understanding early brain development, disease, and aging.

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The vasculature of the brain's cortex is organized with large arteries and veins on its surface. Arterioles dive into the cortex to feed capillary beds weaving amongst active brain cells. Ascending venules bring blood from the capillary beds to draining veins. During functional stimulation, blood flow increases in the capillary bed (hyperemia) and dilation of feeding arterioles spreads back up the vascular tree to surface arteries.

In a new study published online in the Journal of the American Heart Association June 12, 2014, researchers at Columbia Engineering report that they have identified a new component of the biological mechanism that controls blood flow in the brain. Led by Elizabeth M. C. Hillman, associate professor of biomedical engineering, the team has demonstrated, for the first time, that the vascular endothelium plays a critical role in the regulation of blood flow in response to stimulation in the living brain.

"We think we've found a missing link in our understanding of how the brain dynamically tunes its blood flow to stay in sync with the activity of neurons," says Hillman, who has a joint appointment in Radiology. Hillman has spent more than 10 years using advanced imaging tools to study how blood flow is controlled in the brain. "Earlier studies identified small pieces of the puzzle, but we didn't believe they formed a cohesive 'big picture' that unified everybody's observations. Our new finding seems to really connect the dots."

Understanding how and why the brain regulates its blood flow could provide important clues to understanding early brain development, disease, and aging. The brain increases local blood flow when neurons fire, and this increase is what is detected by a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scan. Hillman found that the vascular endothelium, the inner layer of blood vessels, plays a critical role in propagating and shaping the blood flow response to local neuronal activity. While the vascular endothelium is known to do this in other areas of the body, until now the brain was thought to use a different, more specialized mechanism and researchers in the field were focused on the cells surrounding the vessels in the brain.

"Once we realized the importance of endothelial signaling in the regulation of blood flow in the brain," Hillman adds, "we wondered whether overlooking the vascular endothelium might have led researchers to misinterpret their results."

"As we identified this pathway, so many things fell into place," she continues, "We really hope that our work will encourage others to take a closer look at the vascular endothelium in the brain. So far, we think that our findings have far-reaching and really exciting implications for neuroscience, neurology, cardiovascular medicine, radiology, and our overall understanding of how the brain works."

This research was carried out in Hillman's Laboratory for Functional Optical Imaging, led by PhD student and lead author on the study, Brenda Chen. Other lab members who assisted with the study included PhD and MD/PhD students from Columbia Engineering, Neurobiology and Behavior, and Columbia University Medical Center. The group combined their engineering skills with their expertise in neuroscience, biology, and medicine to understand this new aspect of brain physiology.

To tease apart the role of endothelial signaling in the living brain, they had to develop new ways to both image the brain at very high speeds, and also to selectively alter the ability of endothelial cells to propagate signals within intact vessels. The team achieved this through a range of techniques that use light and optics, including imaging using a high-speed camera with synchronized, strobed LED illumination to capture changes in the color, and thus the oxygenation level of flowing blood. Focused laser light was used in combination with a fluorescent dye within the bloodstream to cause oxidative damage to the inner endothelial layer of blood brain arterioles, while leaving the rest of the vessel intact and responsive. The team showed that, after damaging a small section of a vessel using their laser, the vessel no longer dilated beyond the damaged point. When the endothelium of a larger number of vessels was targeted in the same way, the overall blood flow response of the brain to stimulation was significantly decreased.

"Our finding unifies what is known about blood flow regulation in the rest of the body with how it is regulated in the brain," Hillman explains. "This has wider reaching implications since there are many disease states known to affect blood flow regulation in the rest of the body that, until now, were not expected to directly affect brain health." For instance, involvement of the endothelium might explain neural deficits in diabetics; a clue that could lead to new diagnostics tests and treatments for neurological conditions associated with broader cardiovascular problems. "Improving our fundamental understanding of how and why the brain regulates its blood flow is key to understanding how and when this mechanism could be altered or broken," she says. "We think this could extend to studies of early brain development, aging, and diseases such as Alzheimer's and dementia."

The team's research findings may also explain the effects of some drugs on the brain, and on the fMRI response to stimulation, since the vascular endothelium is exposed to chemicals in the bloodstream. "Overall, this work could dramatically improve our ability to interpret fMRI data collected in humans, perhaps making it a better tool for doctors to understand brain disease," she adds.

Hillman plans next to address the broad range of implications her latest finding may have. She wants to explore the effects of drugs and disease states on the coupling of blood flow to neuronal activity in the brain, and is now starting studies to explore fMRI data from a range of different disease states to see whether she can find signs of neurovascular dysfunction. She is also working on characterizing the co-evolution of neuronal and hemodynamic activity during brain development and is beginning to develop new imaging tools that will enable non-invasive, inexpensive monitoring of brain hemodynamics in infants and children who cannot be imaged within an MRI scanner.

"Our latest finding gives us a new way of thinking about brain disease -- that some conditions assumed to be caused by faulty neurons could actually be problems with faulty blood vessels," Hillman adds. "This gives us a new target to focus on to explore treatments for a wide range of disorders that have, until now, been thought of as impossible to treat. The brain's vasculature is a critical partner in normal brain function. We hope that we are slowly getting closer to untangling some of the mysteries of the human brain."

This research is supported by the National Institutes of Health (through the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke) as well as the National Science Foundation, the Human Frontier Science Program and the Rodriguez family.