Photo-induced toxicity of anthracene in the Antarctic shallow water amphipod, Gondogeneia antarctica

The photo-induced toxicity of anthracene was investigated as the mortality in Antarctic shallow water amphipod, Gondogeneia antarctica, at different concentrations of anthracene and different periods of exposure to natural sunlight and artificial UVA and UVB radiations. When exposed to natural sunlight, animals contaminated in the dark and placed in clean water or in anthracene solutions showed different degrees of mortality, dose-time dependent. Effects were even more evident when these animals were exposed to artificial UVA or UVB radiations. Depuration seemed to be a slow process. The effects of UV radiation and anthracene alone and the effects of the interactions of these two stressors implied that solar radiation is an important parameter that deserves consideration in the environmental assessment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in Antarctic coastal waters. G. antarctica proved to be a good bioindicator for the phototoxicity of anthracene in Antarctic shallow waters.

Brazilian exchange rate complexity: Financial crisis effects

With the financial market globalization, foreign investments became vital for the economies, mainly in emerging countries. In the last decades, Brazilian exchange rates appeared as a good indicator to measure either investors' confidence or risk aversion. Here, some events of global or national financial crisis are analyzed, trying to understand how they influenced the "dollar-real" rate evolution. The theoretical tool to be used is the Lopez-Mancini-Calbet (LMC) complexity measure that, applied to real exchange rate data, has shown good fitness between critical events and measured patterns. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.