“É irreal fazer inovação no Brasil”

Antonio Carlos Martins de Camargo: médico e farmacologista

O farmacologista Antonio Carlos Martins de Camargo, há oito anos diretor do Centro de Toxinologia Aplicada (CAT) do Instituto Butantã, pediu demissão do cargo. Motivo: “É irreal pensar em fazer inovação no Brasil atualmente. Você pode dar dinheiro para o melhor cientista do mundo que ele vai morrer na praia”, justificou, em entrevista exclusiva ao Estado. “Comecei a me sentir mal em mistificar uma coisa que não funciona. Não vou mexer mais com isso”, desabafa.

Inaugurado em 2000, o CAT é um dos 11 Centros de Pesquisa, Inovação e Difusão (Cepids) da Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (Fapesp). Foi criado para trabalhar em uma das áreas supostamente mais promissoras da biotecnologia: a busca de novos princípios ativos para drogas em espécies da biodiversidade brasileira. Espalhados em laboratórios de várias especialidades, os cientistas do CAT procuram e estudam moléculas com potencial farmacológico produzidas por cobras, aranhas, escorpiões, lacraias e outros bichos venenosos da fauna nacional. Em oito anos, o centro recebeu US$ 11 milhões em recursos públicos da Fapesp e publicou dezenas de trabalhos científicos, segundo Camargo. O início foi ótimo, diz ele. O CAT patenteou 13 moléculas e fechou vários contratos com a indústria farmacêutica nacional para levar as pesquisas adiante e tentar transformá-las em produtos. Ou seja: transformar conhecimento científico em inovação tecnológica, que é a grande promessa não cumprida da pesquisa brasileira.

A partir de 2005, porém, o cenário mudou. “As empresas caíram fora”, segundo Camargo, afugentadas por mudanças na legislação que minaram a segurança da propriedade intelectual privada sobre os eventuais produtos. Sem o apoio financeiro das empresas, e desgastado por desentendimentos profissionais e pessoais com a diretoria científica da Fapesp, Camargo jogou a toalha. Pediu demissão do cargo de diretor e voltou a ser “só” pesquisador. “É uma saída estratégica. Se continuar aqui vou atrair todos os anticorpos para mim, e não quero que isso prejudique o CAT”, disse. A seguir, os principais trechos da entrevista. (continua)

* leia mais em O Estado de São Paulo

The beast that will not die

New claims that cold fusion is no myth

IN GREEK legend, the hydra was a many-headed monster. If a head was severed, it grew back. Indeed, in some versions of the story, two new heads sprouted. Some scientists wonder whether cold fusion is a similar beast. On March 23rd, 20 years to the day since Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons announced that they had accomplished nuclear fusion at room temperature in apparatus built on a laboratory bench (they hadn’t), experimental results purporting to demonstrate such cold fusion were presented to a meeting of the American Chemical Society in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Cold fusion is so called to distinguish it from the sort that goes on in stars and hydrogen bombs. That needs a temperature of several million degrees. If cold fusion worked, it could provide an inexhaustible supply of clean energy. But it has been cold-shouldered by most scientists. Funding has dried up. What research there is, is conducted outside mainstream laboratories. In fact, its advocates have renamed their endeavours “low-energy nuclear reactions” because cold fusion has received such a drubbing. That is because most scientists think it impossible. (continua)

* leia mais em The Economist

Update em 28/03/2009

Cold fusion raises its head above the parapet again

20 years after bringing ignominy and academic exile to its founding scientists, the idea of free energy at room temperature is making a comeback

American scientists claim to have discovered fresh evidence for “cold fusion”, the controversial and discredited process that was once touted as the answer to the world’s energy problems.

Pamela Mosier-Boss, a researcher at the US Navy’s Space and Naval Warfare Systems Centre in San Diego, said her group had detected telltale signs that nuclear fusion reactions normally found in the centre of the sun were afoot in a simple bench-top device.

The results were announced today at a meeting of the American Chemical Society to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the first enthusiastic – and ultimately doomed – claims for cold fusion at the University of Utah. (continua)

* leia mais em The Guardian

Biochar

La «terra nera» degli indios ci salverà dall’effetto serra?

Sperimentata anche in Italia all’Istituto di biometeorologia del CNR con promettenti risultati

Sarà la riproposizione, in chiave moderna, di un’antica tecnica agricola precolombiana a salvare il pianeta dall’effetto serra? L’ipotesi è suggestiva ma non peregrina: ci stanno lavorando in diversi centri di ricerca scientifica in tutto il mondo, compreso l’Istituto di biometeorologia del CNR (Ibimet) di Firenze, dove un’equipe di studiosi coordinata dal dottor Franco Miglietta ha ottenuto già risultati molto incoraggianti.

LA SCOPERTA - Tutto parte dalla scoperta, fatta in Brasile anni fa, che esistono dei terreni caratterizzati da un alto contenuto di materiale carbonioso, fino a 70 volte di più dei suoli circostanti: scaglie scure e friabili, del tutto simili alla carbonella che si adopera per accendere i barbecue. «Sembra che questo carbone sia stato prodotto dalla combustione incompleta di parti vegetali introdotte volontariamente nel terreno dalle popolazioni locali, nel corso di migliaia di anni. Insomma, in alternativa al “taglia e brucia”, si praticava il “taglia e carbonifica” a scopo di fertilizzazione», spiega Miglietta. (continua)

* leia mais em Corriere della Sera

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Woodchips with everything. It’s the Atkins plan of the low-carbon world

The latest miracle mass fuel cure, biochar, does not stand up; yet many who should know better have been suckered into it

Whenever you hear the word miracle, you know there’s trouble just around the corner. But no matter many times they lead to disappointment or disaster, the newspapers never tire of promoting miracle cures, miracle crops, miracle fuels and miracle financial instruments. We have a limitless ability to disregard the laws of economics, biology and thermodynamics when we encounter a simple solution to complex problems. So welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the new miracle. It’s a low-carbon regime for the planet that makes the Atkins diet look healthy: woodchips with everything.

Biomass is suddenly the universal answer to our climate and energyproblems. Its advocates claim that it will become the primary source of the world’s heating fuel, electricity, road transport fuel (cellulosic ethanol) and aviation fuel (biokerosene). Few people stop to wonder how the planet can accommodate these demands and still produce food and preserve wild places. Now an even crazier use of woodchips is being promoted everywhere (including in the Guardian). The great green miracle works like this: we turn the planet’s surface into charcoal.

Sorry, not charcoal. We don’t call it that any more. Now we say biochar. The idea is that wood and crop wastes are cooked to release the volatile components (which can be used as fuel), then the residue – the charcoal – is buried in the soil. According to the magical thinkers who promote it, the new miracle stops climate breakdown, replaces gas and petroleum, improves the fertility of the soil, reduces deforestation, cuts labour, creates employment, prevents respiratory disease and ensures that when you drop your toast it always lands butter side up. (I invented the last one, but give them time).

They point out that the indigenous people of the Amazon created terras pretas (black soils) by burying charcoal over hundreds of years. (continua)

* leia mais, por George Monbiot, em The Guardiam

Biochar: Much is unknown but this is no reason to rule it out

Biochar – where wood and crop wastes are cooked to release the volatile components buried in the soil – is a cheap and highly beneficial way of disrupting the global carbon cycle

George Monbiot is right to tell biochar enthusiasts to calm down. Some of us have been guilty of febrile proselytising for this most unlikely scheme for geo-engineering. It is often thus: it is only after a period of reflection and assessment that some of the disadvantages of a new weapon against climate change become apparent.

Nevertheless in his eagerness to get us to tone down our enthusiasm he goes too far. Biochar is a useful and important way to help reduce atmospheric concentrations of CO2. (continua)

* leia mais em The Guardian

Sequestro oceânico de CO2 falha em teste

A natureza acaba de pregar uma peça em cientistas que testavam uma nova técnica contra o aquecimento global. Um experimento em larga escala realizado no Atlântico Sul para testar essa técnica, a fertilização dos oceanos com ferro, mostrou-se um fracasso. Os resultados do teste, divulgados ontem por pesquisadores da Alemanha e da Índia, lançam um balde de água fria na chamada geoengenharia, nome dado às soluções tecnológicas mirabolantes para amenizar a mudança climática.

De todos os esquemas de geoengenharia já propostos (coisas que incluem até mandar guarda-sóis gigantes para o espaço, por exemplo), a fertilização dos oceanos é o que tem o maior potencial. A ideia é relativamente simples: despejar quantidades maciças de ferro na superfície de oceanos em altas latitudes, onde há muitos nutrientes na água, mas pouca clorofila. (continua)

* leia mais em Folha Online

Update em 26/03/2009

 

Who ate all the algae?

Using phytoplankton to trap carbon dioxide faces a snag

MESSING around with ecosystems is an unpredictable business. That proved true again this week when a group of Indian and German researchers gave their first report from the biggest ever experiment in geo-engineering: an expedition to pour iron into the Southern Ocean, a vast area that encircles Antarctica, to stimulate a giant bloom of phytoplankton.

Phytoplankton are tiny algae that absorb carbon dioxide when they grow and then lock up some of the greenhouse gas when they die and sink to the seabed. Stimulate the growth of more phytoplankton, the theory goes, and you might send more CO2 to the bottom of the ocean, where it cannot contribute to global warming. But the experiment did not quite turn out like that.

The voyage, a joint venture by India’s National Institute of Oceanography and the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Germany, was controversial from the start. Some environmental groups claimed it was akin to pollution, and thus illegal. At one point, therefore, the German government ordered the Wegener Institute to suspend operations while it looked into the matter. Eventually, permission to continue was given and the research shipPolarstern made a two-and-half-month passage through stormy seas following the bloom that the researchers had created. (continua)

* leia mais em The Economist

Shell dumps wind, solar and hydro power in favour of biofuels

Shell will no longer invest in renewable technologies such as wind, solar and hydro power because they are not economic, the Anglo-Dutch oil company said today. It plans to invest more in biofuels which environmental groups blame for driving up food prices and deforestation.

Executives at its annual strategy presentation said Shell, already the world’s largest buyer and blender of crop-based biofuels, would also invest an unspecified amount in developing a new generat­ion of biofuels which do not use food-based crops and are less harmful to the environment. (continua)

* leia mais em The Guardian

E leia também

Big Oil Buys Struggling Ethanol Maker

Lately it’s been nothing but bad news for the ethanol industry. Ethanol prices have been dropping, gasoline consumption is down, political support is flagging, and dozens of plants around the country are idle or producing well below capacity.

But suddenly there is some good news from an unexpected quarter. Valero Energy, the country’s biggest independent refiner, is going to buy seven ethanol plants from bankrupt VeraSun Energy for $477 million.

For years, refiners like Valero have opposed Congressional mandates forcing them to blend ethanol. But now that Valero can buy some plants for pennies on the dollar, the company is going to become an ethanol producer itself. (continua)

* leia mais em The NY Times

Did climate conference just confuse the politicians?

HAVE scientists muddied the waters over what needs to be done to stave off dangerous climate change? Have they caused confusion instead of telling politicians how to save the world? That’s what many are asking in the wake of a major meeting intended to inform politicians before vitally important negotiations later this year.

This December, the Bella Centre in Copenhagen, Denmark, will play host to thousands of politicians, policy-makers and their entourage as they try to agree on emissions targets. In an attempt to make their mission clearer, last week 2500 scientists gathered in the same halls to deliver the latest findings on how human emissions of greenhouse gases are affecting the environment and how that is likely to evolve over the coming century. (continua)

* leia mais em New Scientist

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Ciência enfrenta política em encontro sobre clima

Organizado para atualizar estimativas sobre o aquecimento global, o Congresso Científico Internacional sobre Mudanças Climáticas terminou ontem em Copenhague com um intenso debate entre cientistas e o primeiro-ministro da Dinamarca.

O premier Anders Rasmussem, após a apresentação dos resultados finais do encontro, defendeu que o novo acordo climático deve estabelecer uma meta que permita uma elevação de até 2ºC na temperatura global.

A Dinamarca assumirá a presidência da Convenção do Clima da ONU em dezembro, quando 190 países negociarão novas metas de emissão para o próximo período de Protocolo de Kyoto, o pós-2012.(continua)

* leia mais em Folha Online

Without commercial carbon capture, it’s ‘game over’, E.ON boss tells government

Chief executive Paul Golby says technology will only be developed with state funding

Leading energy industry executives today called on the government to ensure the development of carbon capture and storage becomes commercially viable.

Paul Golby, chief executive of E.ON UK said the commercial development of the technology, which stops the carbon dioxide produced through burning fossil fuels being released into the atmosphere, was vital if the world was to meet the growing demand for energy and still tackle climate change.

“For me it is clear there will be worldwide coal-fuelled growth in energy supply and that CCS is the most important technology in the fight against climate change.CCS is by no means the only low-carbon technology we are investing in, but it’s the most important. Without it, it really is game over.” (continua)

* leia mais em The Guardian

Ministério do Meio Ambiente vai incentivar geração de energia eólica

Carlos Minc quer ampliar o debate com a participação de ministérios, universidades, secretarias estaduais e sociedade civil O Ministério do Meio Ambiente vai incentivar os estados a ampliar a geração de energia eólica como fonte sustentável de eletricidade, com baixo impacto ambiental, para ajudar a combater os efeitos das mudanças climáticas.

O ministro do Meio Ambiente, Carlos Minc, participou nesta terça-feira, dia 17, em Brasília, do Fórum de Secretários de Estados para Assuntos de Energia, onde foram debatidas medidas necessárias para incentivar a participação dessa modalidade na matriz energética do País. (continua)

* leia mais em Jornal da Ciência

Climate Change

A sinking feeling

Sea levels are rising twice as fast as had been thought

SCIENCE and politics are inextricably linked. At a scientific conference on climate change held this week in Copenhagen, four environmental experts announced that sea levels appear to be rising almost twice as rapidly as had been forecast by the United Nations just two years ago. The warning is aimed at politicians who will meet in the same city in December to discuss the same subject and, perhaps, to thrash out an international agreement to counter it.

The reason for the rapid change in the predicted rise in sea levels is a rapid increase in the information available. In 2007, when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change convened by the UN made its prediction that sea levels would rise by between 18cm and 59cm by 2100, a lack of knowledge about how the polar ice caps were behaving was behind much of the uncertainty. Since then they have been closely monitored, and the results are disturbing. Both the Greenland and the Antarctic caps have been melting at an accelerating rate. It is this melting ice that is raising sea levels much faster than had been expected. Indeed, scientists now reckon that sea levels will rise by between 50cm and 100cm by 2100, unless action is taken to curb climate change. (continua)

* leia mais em The Economist

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Cap and binge

America’s politicians are at last getting to grips with global warming, but in a dangerously expensive way

Sins of emission

Barack Obama is keen to curb greenhouse-gas emissions with a cap-and-trade scheme. Can Congress come round to his way of thinking

ONU oferece bolsas de estudo para jornalistas

Estão abertas as inscrições para o Fundo de Bolsas Dag Hammarskjöld, programa de bolsas de estudos oferecido pela ONU para jornalistas de países de regiões em desenvolvimento como como África, Ásia, América do Sul, Caribe.

O programa, que consiste em um estágio de dez semanas em Nova York, recebe isncrições até o próximo dia 22 de março. Denominado Fellowship, o programa engloba trabalhos em Rádio, Televisão, mídia impressa e web. Direcionado para jornalistas com idade entre 25 e 35 anos, o programa prevê que os participantes farão a cobertura da 63ª sessão da Assembléia das Nações Unidas.

O programa terá início em Setembro e inclui o custo das passagens e estadia, bem como uma bolsa-auxílio complementar. Mais detalhes sobre os requisitos e sobre o processo de seleção podem ser obtidos por meio do site oficial do programa: www.unjournalismfellowship.org .

Para eventuais dúvidas, também está disponível o contato info@unjournalismfellowship.org.