BIOCIVILIZACAO: OVERVIEW AND BACKGROUND TO COMPLETE OUR independence

Latin American countries have a privileged position to tackle the environmental crisis, producing a new framework of relations and interdependencies: a biocivilizacao. Inspired by the ideas and Gourou Sachs, founded in centralities other than those of the "global market", and fed by other "sources" than those of high-carbon, embodied in examples like those provided by the Amazons, that teach us how the interaction between cultural and natural elements can produce the main source of biodiversity on the planet and your invaluable environmental service. Countries that share, if you can settle in other conditions (have) dependencies, guided references and values different from those that have chaired the hegemonic order. But for that, the paths that lead only to "cooperate" with the construction of "common markets", which will be replaced by others, eg, dialogues between the Organization of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty and Pan Amazonian Social Forum.

Transiting exoplanets from the CoRoT space mission XXII. CoRoT-16b: a hot Jupiter with a hint of eccentricity around a faint solar-like star

Aims. We report the discovery of CoRoT-16b, a low density hot jupiter that orbits a faint G5V star (mV = 15.63) in 5.3523 +/- 0.0002 days with slight eccentricity. A fit of the data with no a priori assumptions on the orbit leads to an eccentricity of 0.33 +/- 0.1. We discuss this value and also derive the mass and radius of the planet. Methods. We analyse the photometric transit curve of CoRoT-16 given by the CoRoT satellite, and radial velocity data from the HARPS and HIRES spectrometers. A combined analysis using a Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm is used to get the system parameters. Results. CoRoT-16b is a 0.535 -0.083/+0.085 M-J, 1.17 -0.14/+0.16 R-J hot Jupiter with a density of 0.44 -0.14/+0.21 g cm(-3). Despite its short orbital distance (0.0618 +/- 0.0015 AU) and the age of the parent star (6.73 +/- 2.8 Gyr), the planet orbit exhibits significantly non-zero eccentricity. This is very uncommon for this type of objects as tidal effects tend to circularise the orbit. This value is discussed taking into account the characteristics of the star and the observation accuracy.

EVOLUTIONARY TRAJECTORIES OF ULTRACOMPACT "BLACK WIDOW" PULSARS WITH VERY LOW MASS COMPANIONS

The existence of millisecond pulsars with planet-mass companions in close orbits is challenging from the stellar evolution point of view. We calculate in detail the evolution of binary systems self-consistently, including mass transfer, evaporation, and irradiation of the donor by X-ray feedback, demonstrating the existence of a new evolutionary path leading to short periods and compact donors as required by the observations of PSR J1719-1438. We also point out the alternative of an exotic nature of the companion planet-mass star.

Alienígenas na sala: o que fazer com espécies exóticas em trabalhos de taxonomia, florística e fitossociologia?

A presença cada vez mais disseminada de organismos exóticos (muitos dos quais se tornam invasores) nas diferentes regiões do planeta levou ao surgimento de uma linha de pesquisa na ecologia voltada às invasões biológicas. E para permitir a comunicação entre autores também foi desenvolvido um arcabouço terminológico. Mas, apesar disso, a terminologia relativa às bioinvasões tem sido ignorada por boa parte dos botânicos no Brasil. Há uma boa dose de confusão entre botânicos sobre o que seja uma espécie exótica, naturalizada, invasora, daninha e ruderal, levando ao uso inconsistente da terminologia. Além disso, diferentes autores têm adotado posturas praticamente opostas ao lidar com espécies exóticas em suas áreas de estudo, seja na preparação de tratamentos taxonômicos, seja na publicação de levantamentos florísticos e fitossociológicos. Enquanto alguns pesquisadores incluem em floras mesmo espécies cultivadas que não se reproduzem, outros excluem plantas invasoras comuns e conspícuas. Nós apresentamos aqui, em português, os principais conceitos relativos ao tema da bioinvasão e chamamos a atenção dos autores brasileiros para a necessidade de utilizar de modo consistente o arcabouço terminológico já existente na literatura. Também propomos a adoção de rótulos claros para informar quais espécies são exóticas na área estudada, diferenciando-as das nativas, e sugerimos critérios para ajudar botânicos a decidirem quando uma planta exótica deve ou não ser incluída em tratamentos taxonômicos ou levantamentos de florística.

Phylodynamics and movement of Phycodnaviruses among aquatic environments

Phycodnaviruses have a significant role in modulating the dynamics of phytoplankton, thereby influencing community structure and succession, nutrient cycles and potentially atmospheric composition because phytoplankton fix about half the carbon dioxide (CO2) on the planet, and some algae release dimethylsulphoniopropionate when lysed by viruses. Despite their ecological importance and widespread distribution, relatively little is known about the evolutionary history, phylogenetic relationships and phylodynamics of the Phycodnaviruses from freshwater environments. Herein we provide novel data on Phycodnaviruses from the largest river system on earth-the Amazon Basin-that were compared with samples from different aquatic systems from several places around the world. Based on phylogenetic inference using DNA polymerase (pol) sequences we show the presence of distinct populations of Phycodnaviridae. Preliminary coarse-grained phylodynamics and phylogeographic inferences revealed a complex dynamics characterized by long-term fluctuations in viral population sizes, with a remarkable worldwide reduction of the effective population around 400 thousand years before the present (KYBP), followed by a recovery near to the present time. Moreover, we present evidence for significant viral gene flow between freshwater environments, but crucially almost none between freshwater and marine environments. The ISME Journal (2012) 6, 237-247; doi: 10.1038/ismej.2011.93; published online 28 July 2011

Transiting exoplanets from the CoRoT space mission XXIII. CoRoT-21b: a doomed large Jupiter around a faint subgiant star

CoRoT-21, a F8IV star of magnitude V = 16 mag, was observed by the space telescope CoRoT during the Long Run 01 ( LRa01) in the first winter field (constellation Monoceros) from October 2007 to March 2008. Transits were discovered during the light curve processing. Radial velocity follow-up observations, however, were performed mainly by the 10-m Keck telescope in January 2010. The companion CoRoT-21b is a Jupiter-like planet of 2.26 +/- 0.33 Jupiter masses and 1.30 +/- 0.14 Jupiter radii in an circular orbit of semi-major axis 0.0417 +/- 0.0011 AU and an orbital period of 2.72474 +/- 0.00014 days. The planetary bulk density is ( 1.36 +/- 0.48) x 10(3) kg m(-3), very similar to the bulk density of Jupiter, and follows an M-1/3 - R relation like Jupiter. The F8IV star is a sub-giant star of 1.29 +/- 0.09 solar masses and 1.95 +/- 0.2 solar radii. The star and the planet exchange extreme tidal forces that will lead to orbital decay and extreme spin-up of the stellar rotation within 800 Myr if the stellar dissipation is Q(*)/k2(*) <= 107.

Planetary transit candidates in the CoRoT LRa01 field

Context. CoRoT is a pioneering space mission whose primary goals are stellar seismology and extrasolar planets search. Its surveys of large stellar fields generate numerous planetary candidates whose lightcurves have transit-like features. An extensive analytical and observational follow-up effort is undertaken to classify these candidates. Aims. We present the list of planetary transit candidates from the CoRoT LRa01 star field in the Monoceros constellation toward the Galactic anti-center direction. The CoRoT observations of LRa01 lasted from 24 October 2007 to 3 March 2008. Methods. We acquired and analyzed 7470 chromatic and 3938 monochromatic lightcurves. Instrumental noise and stellar variability were treated with several filtering tools by different teams from the CoRoT community. Different transit search algorithms were applied to the lightcurves. Results. Fifty-one stars were classified as planetary transit candidates in LRa01. Thirty-seven (i.e., 73% of all candidates) are "good" planetary candidates based on photometric analysis only. Thirty-two (i.e., 87% of the "good" candidates) have been followed-up. At the time of writing twenty-two cases were solved and five planets were discovered: three transiting hot-Jupiters (CoRoT-5b, CoRoT-12b, and CoRoT-21b), the first terrestrial transiting planet (CoRoT-7b), and another planet in the same system (CoRoT-7c, detected by radial velocity survey only). Evidence of another non-transiting planet in the CoRoT-7 system, namely CoRoT-7d, was recently found as well.

THE ROLE OF TURBULENT MAGNETIC RECONNECTION IN THE FORMATION OF ROTATIONALLY SUPPORTED PROTOSTELLAR DISKS

The formation of protostellar disks out of molecular cloud cores is still not fully understood. Under ideal MHD conditions, the removal of angular momentum from the disk progenitor by the typically embedded magnetic field may prevent the formation of a rotationally supported disk during the main protostellar accretion phase of low-mass stars. This has been known as the magnetic braking problem and the most investigated mechanism to alleviate this problem and help remove the excess of magnetic flux during the star formation process, the so-called ambipolar diffusion (AD), has been shown to be not sufficient to weaken the magnetic braking at least at this stage of the disk formation. In this work, motivated by recent progress in the understanding of magnetic reconnection in turbulent environments, we appeal to the diffusion of magnetic field mediated by magnetic reconnection as an alternative mechanism for removing magnetic flux. We investigate numerically this mechanism during the later phases of the protostellar disk formation and show its high efficiency. By means of fully three-dimensional MHD simulations, we show that the diffusivity arising from turbulent magnetic reconnection is able to transport magnetic flux to the outskirts of the disk progenitor at timescales compatible with the collapse, allowing the formation of a rotationally supported disk around the protostar of dimensions similar to 100 AU, with a nearly Keplerian profile in the early accretion phase. Since MHD turbulence is expected to be present in protostellar disks, this is a natural mechanism for removing magnetic flux excess and allowing the formation of these disks. This mechanism dismisses the necessity of postulating a hypothetical increase of the ohmic resistivity as discussed in the literature. Together with our earlier work which showed that magnetic flux removal from molecular cloud cores is very efficient, this work calls for reconsidering the relative role of AD in the processes of star and planet formation.

Records of migration in the exoplanet configurations

When compared to our Solar System, many exoplanet systems exhibit quite unusual planet configurations; some of these are hot Jupiters, which orbit their central stars with periods of a few days, others are resonant systems composed of two or more planets with commensurable orbital periods. It has been suggested that these configurations can be the result of a migration processes originated by tidal interactions of the planets with disks and central stars. The process known as planet migration occurs due to dissipative forces which affect the planetary semi-major axes and cause the planets to move towards to, or away from, the central star. In this talk, we present possible signatures of planet migration in the distribution of the hot Jupiters and resonant exoplanet pairs. For this task, we develop a semi-analytical model to describe the evolution of the migrating planetary pair, based on the fundamental concepts of conservative and dissipative dynamics of the three-body problem. Our approach is based on an analysis of the energy and the orbital angular momentum exchange between the two-planet system and an external medium; thus no specific kind of dissipative forces needs to be invoked. We show that, under assumption that dissipation is weak and slow, the evolutionary routes of the migrating planets are traced by the stationary solutions of the conservative problem (Birkhoff, Dynamical systems, 1966). The ultimate convergence and the evolution of the system along one of these modes of motion are determined uniquely by the condition that the dissipation rate is sufficiently smaller than the roper frequencies of the system. We show that it is possible to reassemble the starting configurations and migration history of the systems on the basis of their final states, and consequently to constrain the parameters of the physical processes involved.

Stability and dynamics of terrestrial planets in binary star systems: application on Alpha Centauri

Binary stars are frequent in the universe, with about 50% of the known main sequence stars being located at a multiple star system (Abt, 1979). Even though, they are universally thought as second rate sites for the location of exo-planets and the habitable zone, due to the difficulties of detection and high perturbation that could prevent planet formation and long term stability. In this work we show that planets in binary star systems can have regular orbits and remain on the habitable zone. We introduce a stability criterium based on the solution of the restricted three body problem and apply it to describe the short period planar and three-dimentional stability zones of S-type orbits around each star of the Alpha Centauri system. We develop as well a semi-analytical secular model to study the long term dynamics of fictional planets in the habitable zone of those stars and we verify that planets on the habitable zone would be in regular orbits with any eccentricity and with inclination to the binary orbital plane up until 35 degrees. We show as well that the short period oscillations on the semi-major axis is 100 times greater than the Earth's, but at all the time the planet would still be found inside the Habitable zone.

Tidal perturbations of the rotation of the moon: the creep tide approach

In this communication we report results from the application to the study of the rotation of the Moon of the creeping tide theory just proposed (Ferraz-Mello, Cel. Mech. Dyn. Astron., submitted. ArXiv astro-ph 1204.3957). The choice of the Moon for the first application of this new theory is motivated by the fact that the Moon is one of the best observed celestial bodies and the comparison of the theoretical predictions of the theory with observations i may validate the theory or point out the need of further improvements. Particularly, the tidal perturbations of the rotation of the Moon - the physical libration of the Moon - have been detected in the Lunar Laser Ranging measurements (Williams et al. JGR 106, 27933, 2001). The major difficulty in this application comes from the fact that tidal torques in a planet-satellite system are very sensitive to the distance between the two-bodies, which is strongly affected by Solar perturbations. In the case of the Moon, the main solar perturbations - the Evection and the Variation - are more important than most of the Keplerian oscillations, being smaller only than the first Keplerian harmonic (equation of the centre). Besides, two of the three components of the Moon's libration in longitude whose tidal contributions were determined by LLR are related to these perturbations. The results may allow us to determine the main parameter of a possible Moon's creeping tide. The preliminary results point to a relaxation factor (gamma) 2 to 4 times smaller than the one predicted from the often cited values of thr Moon's quality factor Q (between 30 and 40), and points to larger Q values.

Determination of dynamical and physical parameters of the system CoRoT 3

The two main tools to determine the dynamical and physical parameters of exoplanet systems are the radial velocity (RV) measurements and, when available, transit timings. The two techniques are complementary: The RV's allow us to know some of the orbital elements while the transit timings allow us to obtain the orbital inclination and planetary radius, impossible of obtain from the RV, and to resolve the indetermination in the determination of the planet mass from the RV's. The space observation of transiting planets is however not limited to transit times. They extend to long periods of time and are precise enough to provide information on variations along the orbit. Besides the effects of stellar rotation, deserve mention the Doppler shift in the radiation flux, as consequence of stellar movement around the center of mass, or Beaming Effect (BE); the Ellipsoidal Variability (EV) due to the tidal deformation of the star due to the gravitation of its close companion; and the Reflection (ER) of the stellar radiation incident on the planet and re-emitted to the observer. In the case of large hot Jupiters, these effects are enhanced by the strong gravitational interaction and the analysis of the light variation allows us independent estimates of the mass and radius of planet. The planetary system CoRoT 3 is favorable for such analysis. In this case, the secondary is a brown dwarf whose mass is of the order of 22Mj. We show results obtained from the analysis of 35 RV measurements, 236999 photometric observations and 11 additional RV observations made during a transit to determine the star rotation via the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect. The results obtained from this determination are presented in this communication. The results are compared to those resulting from other determinations.

Tidal evolution in co-orbital configurations

We study the orbital evolution of a two co-orbital planet system which undergo tidal interactions with the central star. Our main goal is to investigate the final outcome of a system originally evolving in a 1:1 resonant configuration when the tidal effect acts to change the orbital elements. Preliminary results of the numerical simulations of the exact equations of motions indicate that, at least for equal mass planets, the combined effect of resonant motion and tidal interaction leads the system to orbital instability, including collisions between the planets. We discuss the cases of two hot super-Earths and two hot-Saturn planets, comparing with the results of dynamical maps.

Integrated analisis of building and users: a way to reduce energy consuption

In many countries buildings are responsible for a substantial part of the energy consumption, nd it varies according to their energetic and environmental performances. The potential for major reductions in buildings consumption have bee well documented in Brazil. Opportunities have been identified throughout the life cycle of the buildings, due of projects in diverse locations without the proper adjustments. This article offers a reflection about project processes and how its understanding can be conducted in an integrated way, favoring the use of natural resources and lowering energy consumption. It concludes by indicating that the longest phase in the life cycle of a building is also the phase responsible for its largest energy consumption, not only because of its duration but also for the interaction with the end user. Therefore, in order to harvest the energy cost reduction potential from future buildings designers need a holistic view of the surrounding, end users, materials and methodologies.