People In South America Research Articles

Examining knowledge and epistemic justice in the design of nature-based solutions for water management

Over the last decade, Nature-based Solutions (NbS) for water management have gained traction as triple-win options for climate action due to their ability to address social, economic, and environmental challenges. Recent developments in the literature of NbS have resulted in a body of work addressing questions about knowledge and justice. In line with these developments, this paper proposes the Knowledge and Epistemic Injustice in NbS for Water Framework (KEIN Framework) to identify the production of epistemic injustices in the design of NbS for water management. The KEIN framework draws on questions about knowledge and power raised by Avelino and five mechanisms that lead to epistemic injustice based on work by Fricker and Byskov. We apply the framework to examine a proposal presented to the Green Climate Fund (GCF) that included both NbS for water management and Indigenous People in South America. Rather than being an analysis of the project or the GCF per se, the goal of this analysis is to demonstrate the utility of the framework to analyze proposals during the design stage. We argue that proposals submitted to the GCF are reflective of a broadly held international environmental logic. We also identify indications that knowledge was organized and treated in a way that favored external actors at the expense of local actors. Our analysis also revealed prejudices against people’s epistemic capacities, with potential implications for how the generation of local knowledge is adopted on the ground. The framework illustrates how the design of NbS may minimally disrupt power relations due to the influential role of some actors in generating knowledge. This study contributes to the operationalization of epistemic justice in designing NbS. Through the application of the proposed framework, the study contributes to future work advancing the construction of epistemically just NbS.

Tourism and Indigenous peoples in South America: reflections on experiences in Argentina and Chile

ABSTRACT Since the 1990s, the participation of Indigenous peoples in tourism has been fostered as part of global development policies to address rural poverty in Latin America. In this article, our aim is to examine the promotion of indigenous tourism in relation to multicultural transformations and local inter-ethnic relations in South America, taking two experiences, one in southern Chile’s Araucanía Region and the other in the General San Martín Department of northern Argentina’s Salta Province. We reflect on the relevance of institutions – state and non-state – which promote these development perspectives and the links that Indigenous people establish with them for the understanding of indigenous tourism. First, we consider the promotion of indigenous tourism in both countries within the particular dynamics of multiculturalism transformations in each one. Then we focus on the two experiences of indigenous tourism, to think about the relations between Indigenous people, institutions and interethnic relationships in these projects. We suggest that the definition of community tourism should not be considered as a reified field, but rather as a definition that is determined through negotiations and inter-ethnic disputes.

Violence and human rights

The decisions taken by Jair Bolsonaro’s government since the first day of his mandate, in January 2019, have weakened the country’s environmental control policies and contributed to reduced inspection, increased deforestation on public lands and, consequently, the violation of the rights of indigenous peoples. There is a great diversity of contexts for isolated indigenous peoples in Brazil, from small groups to a single individual. These groups are the survivors of successive massacres and are threatened by the spread of disease, and for these reasons avoid contact with other agents at any cost. In addition to the need to ensure that their territories remain protected, the decision itself to live in isolation must be guaranteed in accordance with the already established instruments, including the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and Convention No. 169 of the International Labor Organization (ILO). Despite the traumatic history of contact, Brazil is the country with the largest number of isolated indigenous peoples in South America, as well as has the oldest public policy in terms of guaranteeing the rights of these peoples to self-determination. The measures presented in this article substantially undermine the protection of the rights of isolated indigenous peoples and obstruct the possibility of advancing or enforcing human rights which are internationally recognised and provided for in domestic law.

Advances and challenges in marine conservation in Chile: A regional and global comparison

Abstract Despite significant progress made in Chile, and globally, in establishing marine protected areas (MPAs), the actual contribution to marine biodiversity conservation needs to be revised, to focus on representativeness and the diversity of tools alongside effective implementation, management, and enforcement. This study makes progress in this direction, describing the most recent advances in marine conservation in Chile and analysing the contribution of the different conservation instruments as well as the distribution of designated areas across ecoregions. Furthermore, it examines the potential contribution of alternative area‐based instruments to balance ocean protection. The advances observed in Chile were compared among four South American countries and five leading countries in ocean conservation, analysing protection levels in coastal areas, continental exclusive economic zones, and overseas territories. Data on MPA boundaries and attributes were sourced from the World Database on Protected Areas and complemented the official information on MPAs and territorial user rights for fisheries and for indigenous people in South America. The current level of protection in Chile is among the highest in the world in area coverage and in the proportion of the continental exclusive economic zone assigned to fully protected areas. However, it exhibits the strongest imbalances in the distribution of designated MPAs between coastal and oceanic waters, in comparison with the leading countries and also within South America (Perú, Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay), and among ecoregions. The patterns observed suggest that Chile has advanced, but concentrated, conservation efforts in low‐threat, remote ecoregions. There is an urgent need to progress towards high‐threat ecoregions, which implies balancing the needs of nature and people. The distribution of ancillary conservation instruments can help double the level of protection in threatened coastal areas, filling gaps in marine conservation and creating an opportunity to progress and diversify conservation strategies.

Lux et Tenebris? Coloniality and Anglican Missions in Argentine Patagonia in the Nineteenth Century

Within the modern capitalist World-System, Missionary work was mostly developed through the connubiality with colonial powers. The missionary work of the Anglican Church is no exception. This article centers on the missionary enterprise carried out in Argentine Patagonia in the nineteenth century. Missionaries’ reports carefully narrated that venture. However, the language and the notions underlying the missionary work’s narration reveal the dominion of colonial ideologies that imbued how religious agents constructed alterity. Connecting the missionaries’ worldview with the political context and expansion of the British Empire allows us to unfold the complex intersections of religious, ethnic, racial, and geopolitical discourses that traverse the lives of indigenous peoples in South America.

Neural machine translation with a polysynthetic low resource language

Low-resource languages (LRL) with complex morphology are known to be more difficult to translate in an automatic way. Some LRLs are particularly more difficult to translate than others due to the lack of research interest or collaboration. In this article, we experiment with a specific LRL, Quechua, that is spoken by millions of people in South America yet has not undertaken a neural approach for translation until now. We improve the latest published results with baseline BLEU scores using the state-of-the-art recurrent neural network approaches for translation. Additionally, we experiment with several morphological segmentation techniques and introduce a new one in order to decompose the language’s suffix-based morphemes. We extend our work to other high-resource languages (HRL) like Finnish and Spanish to show that Quechua, for qualitative purposes, can be considered compatible with and translatable into other major European languages with measurements comparable to the state-of-the-art HRLs at this time. We finalize our work by making our best two Quechua–Spanish translation engines available on-line.

Repositioned Drugs for Chagas Disease Unveiled via Structure-Based Drug Repositioning.

Chagas disease, caused by the parasite Trypanosoma cruzi, affects millions of people in South America. The current treatments are limited, have severe side effects, and are only partially effective. Drug repositioning, defined as finding new indications for already approved drugs, has the potential to provide new therapeutic options for Chagas. In this work, we conducted a structure-based drug repositioning approach with over 130,000 3D protein structures to identify drugs that bind therapeutic Chagas targets and thus represent potential new Chagas treatments. The screening yielded over 500 molecules as hits, out of which 38 drugs were prioritized following a rigorous filtering process. About half of the latter were already known to have trypanocidal activity, while the others are novel to Chagas disease. Three of the new drug candidates—ciprofloxacin, naproxen, and folic acid—showed a growth inhibitory activity in the micromolar range when tested ex vivo on T. cruzi trypomastigotes, validating the prediction. We show that our drug repositioning approach is able to pinpoint relevant drug candidates at a fraction of the time and cost of a conventional screening. Furthermore, our results demonstrate the power and potential of structure-based drug repositioning in the context of neglected tropical diseases where the pharmaceutical industry has little financial interest in the development of new drugs.

The Origins of Coca: Museum Genomics Reveals Multiple Independent Domestications from Progenitor Erythroxylum gracilipes.

Coca is the natural source of cocaine as well as a sacred and medicinal plant farmed by South American Amerindians and mestizos. The coca crop comprises four closely related varieties classified into two species (Amazonian and Huánuco varieties within Erythroxylum coca Lam., and Colombian and Trujillo varieties within Erythroxylum novogranatense (D. Morris) Hieron.) but our understanding of the domestication and evolutionary history of these taxa is nominal. In this study, we use genomic data from natural history collections to estimate the geographic origins and genetic diversity of this economically and culturally important crop in the context of its wild relatives. Our phylogeographic analyses clearly demonstrate the four varieties of coca comprise two or three exclusive groups nested within the diverse lineages of the widespread, wild species Erythroxylum gracilipes; establishing a new and robust hypothesis of domestication wherein coca originated two or three times from this wild progenitor. The Colombian and Trujillo coca varieties are descended from a single, ancient domestication event in northwestern South America. Huánuco coca was domesticated more recently, possibly in southeastern Peru. Amazonian coca either shares a common domesticated ancestor with Huánuco coca, or it was the product of a third and most recent independent domestication event in the western Amazon basin. This chronology of coca domestication reveals different Holocene peoples in South America were able to independently transform the same natural resource to serve their needs; in this case, a workaday stimulant. [Erythroxylum; Erythroxylaceae; Holocene; Museomics; Neotropics; phylogeography; plant domestication; target-sequence capture.]

Exome Sequencing of Native Populations From the Amazon Reveals Patterns on the Peopling of South America.

Studies on the peopling of South America have been limited by the paucity of sequence data from Native Americans, especially from the east part of the Amazon region. Here, we investigate the whole exome variation from 58 Native American individuals (eight different populations) from the Amazon region and draw insights into the peopling of South America. By using the sequence data generated here together with data from the public domain, we confirmed a strong genetic distinction between Andean and Amazonian populations. By testing distinct demographic models, our analysis supports a scenario of South America occupation that involves migrations along the Pacific and Atlantic coasts. Occupation of the southeast part of South America would involve migrations from the north, rather than from the west of the continent.

Scientific Landscape Related to Mapuche Indigenous Peoples and Wallmapu Territory

Recent international recognition of indigenous peoples, their rights and contributions to solving current challenges has directed academic attention to the way research is conducted in relation to them, what topics are studied, by whom, and using which methodologies. The Mapuche are the most numerous indigenous peoples in South America and have ancestrally inhabited a territory denominated Wallmapu. This study undertook a comprehensive revision and meta-analysis of the scientific literature related to the Mapuche and Wallmapu. Through quantification and visualization of the scientific landscape, the goal was to enhance the understanding of the themes and patterns that have guided research in this field of study. We found 1611 documents in Web of Science and SciELO collections published between 1975 and 2020. Using CiteSpace software, we analyzed the main conceptual hotspots, identified central authors and pivotal works, among other aspects of the scientific knowledge domain. The main research themes found revolve around political and historical aspects of the relationship between Mapuche and the State; ethnobotanical research including plant properties and cultural knowledge transmission; and the indisputable connection between indigenous resistance and environmental depredation. We argue that valuing cultural diversity paves the road for reclaiming indigenous knowledge as a contribution to our understanding of the world.

Contrasting the ancestry patterns of three distinct population groups from the northernmost region of South America.

Colombia, located in the north of the South American subcontinent is a country of great interest for population genetic studies given its high ethnic and cultural diversity represented by the admixed population, 102 indigenous peoples and African descent populations. In this study, an analysis of the genetic structure and ancestry was performed based on 46 ancestry informative INDEL markers (AIM-INDELs) and considering the genealogical and demographic variables of 451 unrelated individuals belonging to nine Native American, two African American, and four multiple ancestry populations. Measures of genetic diversity, ancestry components, and genetic substructure were analyzed to build a population model typical of the northernmost part of the South American continent. The model suggests three types of populations: Native American, African American, and multiple ancestry. The results support hypotheses posed by other authors about issues like the peopling of South America and the existence of two types of Native American ancestry. This last finding could be crucial for future research on the peopling of Colombia and South America in that a single origin of all indigenous communities should not be assumed. It then would be necessary to consider other events that could explain their genetic variability and complexity throughout the continent.

Perishable Technology and the Successful Peopling of South America

ABSTRACT Recent research demonstrates that perishable industries – specifically including the manufacture of textiles, basketry, cordage, and netting – were a well-established, integral component of the Upper Paleolithic milieu in many parts of the Old World. Moreover, extant data suggest that not only were these synergistic technologies part and parcel of the armamentarium of the first migrants to the New World, but, also, that these technologies played critical, and hitherto, largely unappreciated roles in the ecological success of late Pleistocene populations, notably including the first South Americans. This paper examines the evidence for, and varied roles of, early plant fiber technology in highland and lowland South America and also examines the adaptive qualities, potential impacts on social organization, and alteration of food procurement strategies implicit in this fundamentally crucial series of interrelated industries.

Human cranium of Candonga Cave site and its implications for the initial peopling of South America.

The aim of this paper is to analyze the morphology of a skull from Candonga Cave (central Argentina), dating to the Pleistocene-Holocene transition, and to discuss its implications for the early peopling of South-America by Palaeoamerican and Amerindian populations. Although this cranium is fragmented, impeding the standard morphometric analysis, an alternative methodology ad hoc was implemented in order to obtain relevant information about the South American people origins. Results of measurements provide new information to reinforce the hypothesis that Paleoamerican crania possess similar morphological traits to those of current Fueguian populations, as previous studies have claimed, and to suggest that the cranium of Candonga has strong morphological affinities with Early Holocene specimens from Lagoa Santa (Brazil) and Late Holocene of Beagle Channel (Argentina), both belonging to Paleoamerican morphology.

Humans, Technology, and Environment in the Early Peopling of South America

ABSTRACTThis special issue includes papers about the early settlement of South America. New evidence based on taphonomy, technology, bioanthropology, environment, subsistence strategies, and settlement patterns are presented for several regions of the Andes and the Southern Cone. The editors hope this volume stimulates debate about early peopling as much as it updates the latest trends in this research.

Animais exóticos de origem europeia ou africana entre povos indígenas nas terras baixas da América do Sul Notas para pesquisas futuras

Este artigo busca sugerir um conjunto de novos rumos para a investigação dos fenômenos ligados à introdução, difusão, adaptação, circulação, exploração e uso de animais de origem exótica entre os povos indígenas nas terras baixas sul-americanas, de modo a constituir um mais completo panorama dos impactos materiais e simbólicos desses seres nos contextos ameríndios. Partindo da coleta e análise de informações históricas e etnográficas acerca do aparecimento e da incorporação desses animais – a saber, galinhas, bois, cavalos, cabras, bodes, porcos, cachorros, gatos, coelhos, ratos, pombos e outros – nos mais distintos povos nativos na América do Sul, busca-se extrair uma (ou múltiplas) história(s) alternativa(s) desses adventícios, bem como compreender as linhas gerais que, fundamentadas na ideia de um pensamento ameríndio, podem caracterizar a adoção e aclimatação dessas espécies nas cosmologias e práticas sociais indígenas, configurando novas formas de conhecimento zoológico e mesmo zootécnico e veterinário, bem como construções singulares da domesticidade e de outros conceitos que usualmente descrevem as relações entre humanos e animais. Espera-se aliar os estudos em etnologia americanista com pesquisas antropológicas sobre relações entre humanos e animais, dois campos que, apesar da centralidade dos não humanos nas vidas e cosmologias indígenas, ainda pouco dialogam no campo etnológico americanista.

Quinoa Secondary Metabolites and Their Biological Activities or Functions.

Quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa Willd.) was known as the “golden grain” by the native Andean people in South America, and has been a source of valuable food over thousands of years. It can produce a variety of secondary metabolites with broad spectra of bioactivities. At least 193 secondary metabolites from quinoa have been identified in the past 40 years. They mainly include phenolic acids, flavonoids, terpenoids, steroids, and nitrogen-containing compounds. These metabolites exhibit many physiological functions, such as insecticidal, molluscicidal and antimicrobial activities, as well as various kinds of biological activities such as antioxidant, cytotoxic, anti-diabetic and anti-inflammatory properties. This review focuses on our knowledge of the structures, biological activities and functions of quinoa secondary metabolites. Biosynthesis, development and utilization of the secondary metabolites especially from quinoa bran were prospected.

Territorial sovereignty and the end of inter-cultural diplomacy along the “Southern frontier”

European politics at the turn of the 19th century saw a dramatic reduction in the number and diversity of polities as the territorial nation-state emerged as the dominant form of political organization. The transformation had a profound impact on the periphery. The study examines how embracing the principle of territoriality transformed relations between settler societies and indigenous peoples in South America. As this shift coincided with independence from Spain, Creole elites rapidly dismantled the remnants of imperial heteronomy, ending centuries of inter-cultural diplomacy. The study illustrates this shift in the case of the “Southern frontier,” where Spain had maintained a practice of treaty making with the Mapuche people since the mid-17th century. This long-standing practice broke down shortly after Chile gained independence in 1818. What followed was a policy of coercive assimilation through military conquest and forced displacement — a policy that settler societies implemented elsewhere in the 19th century. In contrast to explanations that emphasize the spread of capitalist agriculture and racist ideologies, this study argues that territoriality spelled the end of inter-cultural diplomacy along the “Southern frontier.”

Designed mono- and di-covalent inhibitors trap modeled functional motions for Trypanosoma cruzi proline racemase in crystallography.

Chagas disease, caused by Trypanosoma cruzi, affects millions of people in South America and no satisfactory therapy exists, especially for its life threatening chronic phase. We targeted the Proline Racemase of T. cruzi, which is present in all stages of the parasite life cycle, to discover new inhibitors against this disease. The first published crystal structures of the enzyme revealed that the catalytic site is too small to allow any relevant drug design. In previous work, to break through the chemical space afforded to virtual screening and drug design, we generated intermediate models between the open (ligand free) and closed (ligand bound) forms of the enzyme. In the present work, we co-crystallized the enzyme with the selected inhibitors and found that they were covalently bound to the catalytic cysteine residues in the active site, thus explaining why these compounds act as irreversible inhibitors. These results led us to the design of a novel, more potent specific inhibitor, NG-P27. Co-crystallization of this new inhibitor with the enzyme allowed us to confirm the predicted protein functional motions and further characterize the chemical mechanism. Hence, the catalytic Cys300 sulfur atom of the enzyme attacks the C2 carbon of the inhibitor in a coupled, regiospecific—stereospecific Michael reaction with trans-addition of a proton on the C3 carbon. Strikingly, the six different conformations of the catalytic site in the crystal structures reported in this work had key similarities to our intermediate models previously generated by inference of the protein functional motions. These crystal structures span a conformational interval covering roughly the first quarter of the opening mechanism, demonstrating the relevance of modeling approaches to break through chemical space in drug design.

Built environment and physical activity for the elderly: a systematic review of South Ame

A systematic review was conducted to evaluate studies on the association between the characteristics of a built environment and levels of physical activity (LPA) of elderly people in South America. The searches were conducted on the Bireme, SciElo, Web Of Science and Scopus databases in 2017. Empirical quantitative studies published in Portuguese, English and Spanish, starting in 1990, were included to provide information on the relationship between a built environment and physical activity (PA) for older adults in South America. After the exclusion of repeated titles, 9,592 studies were found, only nine of which were selected, all with a cross-sectional design and samples composed of both sexes, and 77.8% carried out in Brazil. Most of the studies (66.7%) used the abbreviated version of the Neighborhood Environment Walkability Scale (NEWS-A Brazil) to evaluate the built environment and 88.9% used the International Physical Activity Questionnaire to evaluate LPA. Total walking distance (leisure and active transport) was investigated in 22.2% of the studies, leisure PA in 55.5% and displacement PA in 44.4%. The presence of PA facilities and services was associated with LPA, as well as connectivity, street incline and perceived safety. It was concluded that the installation of PA facilities, as well as improved safety, can increase the LPA of the elderly. In addition, satellite image information and audits should be considered when evaluating the built environment.

Problemática acuífera en el contexto sudamericano del siglo XXI

The problem of water is a significant fact that arises as a priority in the social and economic agenda of the twenty-first century and point from an optical geopolitics, the vital liquid is seen as a strategic element of the first order, since it is life but also I become death, pollution and scarcity, with everything that that entails an inexhaustible asset that has led man to waste it, pursuant to the water by its level of importance in the twenty-first century becomes an important factor in the life of human beings and therefore in international relations. The rivers or aquifers are invisible resources for ordinary people in South America, so it can become potential conflict or source of cooperation and regional integration, as a way of survival not only of the people who live there, but for all of humanity. Little effort has been made to share responsibilities and decision making in the management of water, since it is in the presence of a great crisis which is part of the problem in South America, as it is the deterioration of the quality of the water, with consequences such as the agriculture which is larger, with the use of fertilizers and pesticides polluters, has contaminated ground water as well as the supply of surface water, adding to domestic and industrial pollution that is increasing, and the problem affects both developed and developing countries, requiring an immediate solution to this problem that arises.