Butantan Institute

Yesterday was a full day of activity in the state of Sao Paulo. First, we met up with our friends, Sr. Helenice and Rafael Bianchi, from the Ursuline school in Riberao Preto. Together we went to tour a fabulous campground which will be the site for the 2012 Global Ursuline Student Conference. In the afternoon, we returned to Sao Paulo and had just enough time to visit the world famous Butantan Institute and to return to our scientific endeavors. The Instituto Butantan is an important biomedical research facility located near the University of Sao Paulo. It was founded in 1901 and is reknown for its research on venomous animals and vaccines. Although much of the institute was destroyed by a fire in 2010, it is still a fascinating place to visit and to learn (and for some of us to be creeped out, let's be honest).
Today we have left Sao Paulo and have arrived (delayed but safely) in Iguassu Falls. Tomorrow will be a huge day for us as we plan to visit the waterfalls and the Itaipu Dam. Tonight it's cold and raining so we hope things will clear up soon.
Thanks for all of those awesome comments and for following our adventures!!!

Pomar Project and Scallop production by Dr Scott

Thursday, July 28, 2011 –

Our connections in Angra dos Reis with the IED-BIG/ Projeto POMAR's are great. This aquaculture education/ environmental restoration project has been supported by Petrobras (Brazilian state oil company) for 17 years now, mostly under the supervision of our friend Dr. Luiz Zaganelli, who has hosted UA Dallas students and teachers for 3 consecutive years now.

Nodipecten nodosus, is the scientific name of the local species of sea scallop. It is an endangered species, still recovering in numbers but under special protection status. To assist in this environmental restoration, the POMAR Project produces between 3 - 12 million scallop 'spat' per year. Part of these very young scallops are released in sheltered areas of the Ilha Grande bay where they can then grow and enhance local stocks, allowing the fishery to fully recover. Another part of the lab production is distributed among shellfish farmers - aquaculturists.
The 'baby' scallops are born as free swimming planktonic larvae by the millions… However, in the open sea, they are mostly devoured by other marine organisms low in the food chain… At POMAR, Nodipecten ‘babies’ are artificially mass produced and reared under the protected conditions of the lab environment for at least 12 days. They then settle down on rigid surfaces provided for them. Passing through a metamorphosis they grow in their adult ‘benthic’ form, looking much more like their parents, as a little two-valve mollusk! We had a peek at some 11 day old planktonic babies, under the microscope just a day before they should be ‘settling’ down for their adult life.

11 day old planktonic scallop larvae observed
by keen UA Dallas budding scientist

Juvenile Scallop rearing tanks at POMAR

Initially, the baby scallops settle down in Netlon® netting. (see blue and green netting on right side of below image.) As they grow, they are transferred to ‘lanterns’ which may vary in mesh size and holding capacity, from a few millimeters and several thousand individuals per level of the lantern to finally a large gauge netting holding only 2 dozen scallops in a 6 tier lantern such as held by Emily (see far left of the below image).

Our group with scallop rearing lanterns of varying capacities

These lanterns, of course, must be periodically cleansed of marine ‘fouling’ i.e. several other (undesired) species of marine organisms willing to settle and grow on the lantern surfaces, thus reducing the free flow of water and food supply for the baby scallops.

Samantha and Rachel observing future seafood

During their 2 weeks in the POMAR lab, scallop babies are fed a diet consisting of up to 10 different species of marine microscopic algae, furnished sequentially as a function of the baby scallops capacity to ingest different sizes of phytoplankton, and their changing dietary requirements.

Machelli and a juvenile Nodipecten nodosus scallo

Whereas scallop farming and scallop stock enhancement are the primary goals of POMAR, a new line of use for this important mollusk is being examined – its potential as a bioindicator of environmental quality around petroleum production and research operating equipment. Thus, adult individuals are placed in cages around oil rigs and platforms to be later recovered and examined for evidence of environmental quality history.

Scallop rearing lantern - 10,000 individuals here...

Finally, we are thankful to Dr Zaganelli not only for giving us a complete tour of the site, but also for inviting UA Dallas students to come in the future as scientific trainees. In the past he has received students from the US, Cuba, Germany and Venezuela which have collaborated in the production and also managed to collect and compile data which have been used in several theses. He would be happy to have any of our promising group of young scientists!

Dr Zaganelli, Jessica, Machelli, Rachel, Samantha, Dr Scott, Emily and Ms Haley

Girls just wanna have fun ....

In case you are thinking that we are too serious with all of our scientific endeavors, we wanted to share a few festive photos with you of our more relaxed moments. Never forget that despite their extraordinary intellectual curiosity, we are still dealing with teenage girls here and it's never a dull moment. One of the best unforseen consequences of this type of learning is the relationships that are built and the bonds that are formed. Our fabulous five are no exception - they really didn't know each other too well when our travel began and now they are inseparable. It's been a joy to see their true personalities emerge and to laugh with them every day!!

Updates & Videos!

Our happy group has left the beauty of Angra for the urban environment of Sao Paulo where we are installed in the rather sophisticated Marriott Airport Hotel. Our goals at this stop are a bit different as we will be meeting up with our friends from the Ursuline school in Riberao Preto in order to tour a potential site for the upcoming 2012 global gathering of Ursuline students which we at Ursuline Dallas will co-host with the Riberao Preto Ursuline school. As you can imagine, it's a whole different world in this business hotel than in our previous little family-owned pousada. Our students remain delighted with every new experience and they are currently shopping at the local grocery market for a fresh supply of their favorite Brazilian treats. Now that we have a top speed internet connection (woo hoo), we can share a few videos from the past couple of days with you - One of the penguin sighting, one of another thrilling lab experience with Dr. Scott and one of a reflection of our favorite moments of the day (sorry about the poor sound quality on that one). We hope you will enjoy the videos!! Tomorrow we will be back in touch to share our impressions of the site for the 2012 Ursuline student conference.

Ilha Grande - The Big Island

Araçatiba Beach- from Google Maps

Araçatiba beach used to be the home of a Japanese family. They and other Japanese families ran sardine canneries in the 1960's on the ' Big Island' - Ilha Grande  while it was still used as a prison island, similar to Devil's Island in French Guyana... Today, the scenario is different: The prison was demolished years ago, the canneries shut down due to overfishing of sardines, and today tourists flock in especially in the summer. Aquaculture, or the farming of marine organisms, is slowly being accepted and incorporated as a way of life by local residents of the island. By the way, follow our trip on our Google Maps collaborative effort. You can see some of our discoveries and places we visited at this site - click here  

Araçatiba Beach - old sardine cannery pier and our boat the 'Yank I'

Mussel farm on Ilha Grande

On our way to Raquel's restaurant after a morning of discovering how to measure certain water quality parameters such as phosphates, nitrates and salinity on Araçatiba beach , we passed by one such aquaculture operation. Yellow buoys mark the limits of the farm, blue buoys hold the actual lines with mussels.

Giant sea cucumber - Isostichopus badionotus

On the sea bottom below mussel farms, in this area of the Atlantic, sea cucumbers find plentiful organic-rich sediments to feed on.... These important marine echinoderm invertebrates are coveted world over as a delicacy - sold mostly in Asian markets at USD 80/ kg. They are, however, a fragile marine fisheries stock, and have been menaced in this region. Recently they have been placed under special protection, and their harvesting prohibited. Seafood is all important on any island, and we went to the best seafood restaurant on the island, Raquel's, where we had a rather large 'moqueca' - a seafood stew consisting of piece of a freshly caught 16 kg King Mackerel cooked with calamari, shrimp and plenty of green peppers, tomato, and cilantro.

More work and adventures in Angra

This morning, Professor Bruno came over and shared a few of his photos and videos from yesterday with us. Since we know that we have a lot of parents and friends out there who want to see what the students are learning and doing, we thought we would share some of the photos with you as well. We hope to share more videos as soon as we get somewhere with a faster internet connection. Let us hear from you - we love comments!

Experiential Learning around Angra

What a busy and fantastic day! Today was the day when our students got to put many of their new skills into action. They went snorkeling and diving and mapped our path around the bay and many islands in the area. We knew that it was going to be a day full of surprise encounters when we saw a penguin swimming just moments after beginning our journey. Of course, the poor little guy was lost since this is not a typical or favorable area for penguins .. Nevertheless, he seemed pretty content and we were thrilled for the close-up encounter! By the end of the day, the girls had encountered all sorts of aquatic life (including a pregnant male seahorse and a baby seahorse!). The learning continues tomorrow as we visit a local scallop lab...

Angra

Today we have arrived in beautiful Angra, a small fishing village in the state of Rio de Janeiro. We are joined by Bruno, Oliver & Sophia, scientists from Santa Ursula University in Rio. They will spend the next three days with us, helping to inspire our young biologists. Today they assisted Dr. Scott in giving an introductory lesson on snorkeling, water safety and plankton sampling in preparation for a big day tomorrow of navegation and experimentation. As you can see, the weather is lovely and the students are literally diving right in. Today they collected sea cucumbers, crabs and even a Puffer fish (yes, puffer fishes are cute). All organisms were inspected closely and then returned to the sea, no worries. All in all, it was a great day and tomorrow promises to be even better.