News from Latin America

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 21-Dec-2025 13:11 ET (21-Dec-2025 18:11 GMT/UTC)

26-Jun-2009

New guide to tropical seedlings: Essential to climate change research

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Book Announcement

The enormous trees forming rainforest canopies bear little resemblance to their seedlings, many described for the first time in the new field guide, "Seedlings of Barro Colorado Island and the Neotropics," published in July 2009 by Cornell University Press.

26-Jun-2009

A new plan for Panama's Coiba National Park and World Heritage site

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Business Announcement

New management plan for Panama's Coiba National Park will ensure that endemic wildlife and Pacific marine corridor will be conserved.

Funder

UNESCO, Conservation International, United Nations Foundation

8-Jun-2009

Fossil teeth of browsing horse found in Panama Canal earthworks

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Rushing to salvage fossils from the Panama Canal earthworks, Aldo Rincon, paleontology intern at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, unearthed a set of fossil teeth. Bruce J. MacFadden, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida in Gainesville, describes the fossil as Anchitherium clarencei, a three-toed browsing horse, in the May 2009 issue of the Journal of Paleontology.

Journal

Journal of Paleontology

Funder

University of Florida, Panama Canal Authority, National Science Foundation

1-Jun-2009

Temporary infidelity may contribute to the stability of ancient relationships

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Partner switching between fungus farming ants and their fungal clones during nest establishment may contribute to the stability of this long-term mutualistic relationship.

Journal

Evolution

Funder

National Science Foundation, Lundbeck Foundation, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Danish National Research Foundation

14-May-2009

Andes Mountains are older than previously believed

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Much is known about the rise of the central Andes mountains, but a new study of the eastern Andes in Colombia indicates that mountain building began much earlier there.

Journal

Geological Society of America Bulletin

Funder

Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, German Academic Exchange Service, Instituto Colombiano de Petroleo, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Potsdam University

14-May-2009

Genital stimulation opens door for cryptic female choice in tsetse flies

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Manipulation of male and/or female genitalia results in a suite of changes in female reproductive behavior in tsetse flies, carriers of African sleeping sickness.

Journal

Journal of Evolutionary Biology

Funder

International Atomic Energy Agency, University of Costa Rica, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute

4-May-2009

First jaguar photo taken at Smithsonian Research Station in Panama

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Business Announcement

The first photo of a jaguar on Barro Colorado Island in Panama, home of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute's premier tropical biology research station was taken on April 20, 2009.

20-Apr-2009

Live-in domestics: Mites as maids in tropical rainforest sweat bee nests

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Mites not only inhabit the dust bunnies under your bed, they also occupy the nests of tropical sweat bees where they keep fungi in check. Bees and their young are healthier when mites live-in, report researchers from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama and the University of Texas at Austin.

2-Apr-2009

Food security for leaf-cutting ants: Workers and their fungus garden reject endophyte invaders

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

New diseases affect human survival and food security, especially as population density climbs. Leaf-cutting ants, one of a few groups of social insects to cultivate crops and live in dense colonies, harvest plant material to fertilize underground fungal gardens. New results from the Smithsonian show that both the ants and their fungal crop actively combat fungi coming into the nest inside leaves.

Funder

National Science Foundation, American Association of University Women, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, World Cacao Foundation

24-Mar-2009

Smithsonian scientist warns that palm oil development may threaten Amazon

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Oil palm cultivation drives forest destruction across Southeast Asia. Proposed change in Brazil's legislation, new infrastructure and the influence of foreign agro-industrial firms in the region, may create a similar situation in the Amazon.

Journal

Tropical Conservation Science