Guest Editorial: Electroanalysis and Electrochemical Biosensors in Brazil

Abstract

During the last years, Brazil has experienced an impressive growth in many fields. The economy is currently the seventh in the world, with a gross domestic product surpassing US$ 2 trillions. The scientific progress achieved in this period is also noteworthy. At the end of the eighties, Brazilian researchers were authoring less than 0.7 % of the science published worldwide. Nowadays, this share has grown to 2.7 % and the country occupies the 13th position in the rank of the more productive nations in the world. To attain this remarkable growth, the funding from Federal Agencies (CNPq and CAPES) and State Foundations was essential. São Paulo State concentrates simultaneously the most productive group of universities and the strongest State Foundation. For example, in 2010 FAPESP – the São Paulo State Research Foundation – injected some US$ 500 millions in the research institutions of the State of São Paulo, that outputs half of the Brazilian science. The University of São Paulo (USP) alone generates about 25 % of all papers published in Brazil and is constituted by 11 campi – 4 in São Paulo City and 7 in other cities of São Paulo State – congregates almost 55 000 undergraduate students, 12 000 master students, 12 000 PhD and 1200 post-docs. Founded in 1934, USP is the largest university in Brazil and this year, it will reach the expressive number of 100 000 dissertations+theses. Chemistry is responsible for more than 3400 of this total but its contribution in the number of papers published is close to 10 %. Electroanalytical chemistry is a strong branch in chemistry and in less than 60 years experienced a marked growth. The first researcher to work with electroanalysis in the Chemistry Institute of the USP was P. Senise, after returning from a post-doc with P. W. West and P. Delahay (1950–52). The most prolific of his 10 followers, O. E. S. Godinho, J. Lichtig and E. F. A. Neves, supervised dozens of PhDs each, which are widespread around the country. Successive generations are amplifying this numbers and at least 400 scientists have their roots in this school. Many other researchers are active in electroanalysis and/or electrochemistry in Brazil, as reflected by the biannual symposium in this field, started in 1978 and with 540 communications in the 2011 edition. A search for the keyword “voltametr” in the scientific literature reveals that 3.5 % has Brazilian authors (9th position) with 1.3 % belonging to USP, that occupies the 3th position in the world rank of institutions. In the present topical cluster of articles the reader will find a representative sample of the research going on in Brazil. 1 Lúcio Angnes Guest Editor University of São Paulo São Paulo, Brazil