Matrix composed of various indicators used to evaluate school performance Five cities in inland São Paulo State are using a method capable of flagging inequalities across their public education networks with simplified indication of schools posting outstanding performance and those in need of attention and interventions created by the Sérgio Henrique Ferreira Chair of the Institute of Advanced Studies at the University of São Paulo (IEA-USP) is based on a matrix of indicators that reflect different dimensions of pedagogical development age-year distortion (number of students two or more years older than that expected for each school year) and their performance in mathematics and Portuguese language these measures demonstrate whether or not municipal public schools are overcoming the learning challenges and problems arising from the socioeconomic situation around them produced georeferenced maps of the cities of Ribeirão Preto in which schools are represented in these municipalities by colors summarizing their performance; from red (indicators requiring attention) “The aim is to improve the efficiency of educational management The methodology is based on statistical modeling and data science to inform education departments and administrators and facilitate the decision-making process,” explains chemical engineer Mozart Neves Ramos and incumbent of the Sérgio Henrique Ferreira Chair which seeks out ways to contribute to public policies in medium-sized cities The method has been used since last year to assess students in the 5th and 9th year of elementary education (6–15 years) and enabled comparison between performance evolution at the schools between 2017 and 2019 helping administrators to identify issues and their causes the chair’s data analysis group coordinator says that one of the differentials of this method is the focus on small and medium-sized municipalities and the use of statistics to analyze the relationship between different educational indicators “The aim is to gauge the inequality of performance in a network,” he explains The next step in the initiative will be to apply the methodology for the first time in a big city — the São Paulo municipal education network — providing a more accurate diagnosis of educational inequalities across the 13 administrative regions of the municipality A partnership agreement has been signed between the chair and the São Paulo Municipal Education Department the diagnosis also helps to assess whether the causes of poor performance come from within or outside the school “When a school is located in a community with high rates of violence or drug use The children live under stress,” he states Ramos goes on to emphasize that these solutions are not necessarily simple “The diagnosis allows the department to assess whether there is a management problem problems are frequently associated with a scarcity of teachers qualified in certain subjects math teachers have to give physics and chemistry classes.” Chair researchers analyzed data from the network of 109 municipal schools in Ribeirão Preto a city in the northeast of São Paulo State with a population of more than 700,000 a drop in the performance of one of these units when comparing indicators from 2017 and 2019 The percentage of students with satisfactory learning in the Portuguese language plummeted from 93% to 77% The researchers visited the college and found that during this time frame Portuguese and math teachers had been moved into management roles and replaced by other less experienced teachers Another important factor was that in this period the school did not run an enrollment selection process taking on local students at different learning levels 57 km from the São Paulo state capital and with a population of 423,000 a municipal school network of 104 schools and 38,000 students improvements were seen in performance across the educational facilities attributed to a public policy developed over the two most recent mayoral terms This is down to the “school unwalling” method aimed at adapting elementary-level education curricula to get students outside the classroom and closer to nature and the city in which they live in addition to using digital technologies to put them in virtual contact with museum collections from other countries this methodology has helped to demonstrate how much each school has been able to draw on the pedagogical proposal “It was a nice surprise to see a school that had an average external assessment score below 7 (on a scale of 1 to 10) improve and score 8 after they started to work with the unwalling methodology,” says the secretary “When I ask a school’s management what happened they very clearly respond that they put the children to work with aspects of nature to improve their scientific repertoire using recreational strategies to improve their level of writing and held monthly meetings with teachers to address issues at the school and monitor the performance of each pupil,” she explains Ferrari goes on to say that at schools that underwent internal changes where the methodology was still in the implementation phase she witnessed a shift in the performance measured using the IEA-USP Chair method such as the retirement of experienced teachers and their replacement by younger ones where it is not always possible to reproduce strategies already in place,” she says is to spread the word on the solutions and innovations adopted successfully among schools experiencing difficulties “This knowledge needs to be shared across the whole network and data- and evidence-based methodology gives a solid basis to show what is working well.” the methodology has become a tool for monitoring the performance of 14 elementary education units The school network has also benefited from a supplementary initiative by the Sérgio Henrique Ferreira Chair in the form of an introductory course in educational data analysis for school principals and managers instructing on how to obtain and interpret information and use it in decision-making “Managers are not generally prepared to analyze data Our primary education coordinator took the course and immediately began to apply the knowledge to our network,” explains Cordeirópolis education secretary Angelita Ortolan today we can run very specific evaluations and analyze the difficulties experienced by each school enabled 33 managers from across 10 municipalities and an in-person edition last year in Ribeirão Preto qualified 29 people from 17 towns and cities “We want our managers to independently obtain and analyze the data The idea behind this type of training is to spread a data-analysis culture,” says Ruggiero who coordinates the offer of these courses for the Chair The strategy is now enshrined in municipal legislation in Cordeirópolis and Batatais the two city halls approved laws instituting public evidence-based education policies in their municipal systems “A law of this kind is essential for the municipality to implement educational actions based on scientific research and studies and reducing educational inequalities,” says Victor Hugo Junqueira whose educational network covers 4,500 students across eleven schools and nine crèches is that consolidated research groups can help to improve the quality of education “If managers don’t support those dealing with the numbers everything ends up being based on guesswork and the children don’t learn,” says Mozart Ramos an aficionado of data use in the formulation of educational policies since his time as executive president of the movement Todos pela Educação (All for Education); Ramos is currently a member of the FAPESP Board of Trustees Lira says that the strategy was born of efforts to understand why the performance of Brazilian students in math generally becomes stagnant or declines during the final years of middle-level education and during high school contrary to what happens with other subjects “Our student assessments revealed that the low levels of consolidation in certain basic knowledge areas such as how to deal with arithmetic operations Another finding is that failings in teacher qualification contribute to the issue — not all have instructional mathematics tools to help the students After identifying the basic knowledge areas presenting difficulties for students the teachers collaborate to formulate didactic sequences to resume and review content “We produce structured materials that can be adapted to the different learning pathways and offer suggestions on how to implement them.” The outcome of this strategy based on assessment of over 300,000 pupils from the three years of high school education there was no drop in performance in math among state-network students during social isolation and exams demonstrated that bottlenecks currently faced by students are related to more complex high school education content and no longer to those at primary/middle level — a notable qualitative improvement,” concludes Lira The story above was published with the title “The educational inequality map” in issue 342 of august/2024 © Revista Pesquisa FAPESP - All rights reserved Research reveals origin and genetic diversity of citrus LÉO RAMOSFor habitual consumers of oranges the Sylvio Moreira Citriculture Center may hold a pleasant surprise Its greenhouses of saplings and vast orchard of mature plants in the city of Cordeirópolis are home to 1,700 different types of citrus That includes almost 700 varieties of sweet oranges – those suitable for juicing or in natura consumption – and nearly 300 types of mandarins Tasting the fruit of different trees at the Citriculture Center will reveal an astonishing wealth of flavors and textures The research center is affiliated with the Campinas Institute of Agronomy (IAC) an agency within the São Paulo State Department of Agriculture “All of the material used by the Brazilian citrus industry has passed through here at some point,” summarizes agronomist Marcos Machado researcher at the Citriculture Center and coordinator of the National Institute of Science and Technology of Genomics for Citrus Improvement (INCT Citros) Throughout the center’s 85-year history researchers have crossbred different varieties mainly in search of disease-resistant plants similar to the ones that resulted in the varieties of citrus sold in markets since their species were domesticated the center has gradually enriched its arsenal of techniques as genetic information became available this knowledge has focused primarily on the use of molecular markers to characterize different crosses determining which descendants of a cross between two varieties (or species) had received the genetic material targeted by the researchers But genomics has now come to the Citriculture Center LÉO RAMOSGrafting scar: mandarin lime serves as rootstock for orange trees LÉO RAMOS which resulted in a paper published on the Nature Biotechnology website in June 2014 included some unexpected discoveries about the origin of present-day oranges and mandarins Researchers already knew that citrus fruits are not natural species but rather hybrids perfected by thousands of years of natural interbreeding But there is no historical record of this Citrus domestication but we had no details,” says biologist Marco Takita The researchers were surprised to discover that the genomes of some types of mandarin thought to be variants of the ancestral species C actually contain several genetic segments from C Takita explains that the pummelo resembles a giant orange weighs up to a kilogram (about 2.2 pounds) The species is used as a source of genetic diversity in plant breeding programs and it took part in the hybridizations that gave rise to the Ponkan mandarin Because of the fruit’s commercial success in Brazil the Ponkan genome was sequenced by the Citriculture Center with financial support from INCT Citros which is funded by FAPESP and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) “It is important to know that the pummelo served as a genetic source,” says the researcher The study also produced another unexpected finding The Chinese mandarin variety known as Mangshan thought to have the same origin as other mandarins and tangerines which appears to be distantly related to C Surprising new knowledge was also brought to light regarding the sweet orange most commonly sold in Brazilian markets as laranja-pera and much of their genome is genetically similar to mandarins like the Ponkan The results revealed a very low level of genetic differentiation between sweet and mandarin oranges after branching off from their common ancestor “The challenge now is to understand such things as why they are so genetically alike LÉO RAMOSGermplasm bank houses a wide variety of citrusLÉO RAMOS is also a hybrid of the species that gave rise to pummelos and mandarins As if recreating the story from back to front genomic research has enabled researchers to conclude that citrus fruits appeared in nature in Southeast Asia a few thousand years ago A consortium of citrus genome researchers began to be formed in 2005 with active participation from the researchers at the Citriculture Center during which the Center made progress in the sequencing of a Spanish clementine (a type of mandarin) a Chinese research group scored a coup and published the sweet orange genome in the journal Nature the international group decided to expand the study “We sequenced an additional six genomes and produced a more elaborate discussion that actually questions some aspects of the Chinese study,” says Machado The results showed why the boundaries between citrus species are getting increasingly fuzzy while others identify no more than 16,” says the researcher referring to the 18th-century Swedish naturalist known as the father of taxonomy and creator of the binomial nomenclature system Breeding for improvement Based on the available information Machado believes that the genomic approach is a way of “aiming high while staying grounded” By sequencing the genome of the Rangpur or mandarin lime the Brazilian group has started studying the genealogy of limes The species was not selected at random: the mandarin lime can withstand drier environments and therefore is used as root stock in 85% of all orange and mandarin plantations in the state of São Paulo “The northern part of the state has the best characteristics for growing juice oranges but its drier climate would require impracticable amounts of irrigation,” Machado explains Genomic research may help identify the genetic basis for the mandarin lime’s drought resistance and pinpoint the genes associated with certain characteristics This information could serve as a guideline for breeding decisions and it might even help researchers achieve gene transfer in the laboratory Experts call the gene transfer process cisgenics (which differs from transgenics in that it involves same-group species that can generate natural hybrids) LÉO RAMOSGermination in the laboratory: controlled genetic variationLÉO RAMOS these studies are essential not only to meet the demands of the market and steer the search for new fruit varieties with improved flavor and other qualities Two good examples of such afflictions for oranges are citrus variegated chlorosis (CVC) caused by the bacterium Xylella fastidiosa first detected in Brazil 10 years ago and now a threat to this country’s citrus orchards but susceptible to huanglongbing and Alternaria brown spot a fungal disease that discolors leaves and fruit and causes leaf loss The genetic homogeneity highlighted in the study published in Nature Biotechnology clearly shows why citrus are easy prey for crop-infesting microorganisms: if one tree falls victim to a disease the Citriculture Center focuses much of its effort on producing varieties that can resist these diseases “Some hybrids of mandarin species produce fruit that have no direct value for consumers but generate important genetic variability,” explains agricultural engineer Mariângela Cristofani-Yaly The results of the Citriculture Center researchers’ attempts to create new root stock and fruit varieties are described in recent publications such as their papers published in the Journal of Agricultural Science and in Bragantia respectively in 2013 and 2014 and then we resumed our focus on fruit quality,” says the researcher To assess potential breeding options for producing new varieties of citrus used to make juice or eaten in natura everyone at the Citriculture Center – researchers and employees – serves as guinea pigs by taking part in sensory evaluation experiments to judge such characteristics as color as described in the Journal of Agricultural Science paper published in 2013 The plants are also categorized by productivity Academic achievement is just one side of this research center in inland São Paulo State Its other mission is contributing to the improvement of citrus an industry in which Brazil stands out as the world’s leading producer of oranges and third largest supplier of mandarins China is the global leader in overall citrus production we can combine basic and applied knowledge create a platform for new things,” says Machado But the Brazilian market is also a constraint Much of the country’s orange harvest is used for making juice concentrate which means that the industry has control over production Its main objectives are to get more juice out of each fruit and to pay less for them; this has triggered a crisis among orange growers about 10,000 citrus growers abandoned the business in the past decade But he believes that the crisis may ultimately have positive consequences for consumers If the researchers in Cordeirópolis are right more citrus growers will agree to try planting the new varieties developed by the research center and markets may start offering a wider variety of citrus meant for eating in natura Scientific article WU, G. A. et al. Sequencing of diverse mandarin, pummelo and orange genomes reveals complex history of admixture during citrus domestication © Revista Pesquisa FAPESP - All rights reserved. Researchers produce first transgenic orange plant resistant to Xylella fastidiosa ALESSANDRA ALVES DE SOUZA/IAC Genetically modified plant (left) is less severely affected by Xylella infection than normal orange trees (right)ALESSANDRA ALVES DE SOUZA/IAC 2 LÉO RAMOS CHAVES Healthy fruit: with proper management the number of orange groves in São Paulo State infected with Xylella dropped from 43% in 2008 to 3% in 20172 LÉO RAMOS CHAVES agricultural engineer Francisco Alves Mourão Filho’s team has been working for roughly 20 years on producing genetically modified orange trees that are resistant to disease The team also included agricultural engineer Beatriz Mendes Their most promising results were orange trees with greater resistance to Xanthomonas The plants received a gene from the moth Trichoplusia ni but already are showing milder symptoms of the disease the production of transgenic varieties needs to be accompanied by other management measures that help control the disease in the field there is still a long road ahead before the modified oranges at the IAC can leave the greenhouses and move into the fields is to file a request for Planned Release into the Environment with the Brazilian National Technical Commission for Biosecurity (CNTBIO) the agency responsible for assessing the safety of genetically modified organisms in Brazil the new variety may be on the market as early as 2022 Project Interaction between Xylella fastidiosa/insect vector/host plant and approaches to controlling citrus variegated chlorosis and citrus canker (No. 13/10957-0); Grant Mechanism Thematic Project; Principal Investigator Alessandra Alves de Souza (IAC); Investment R$1,246,847.60 Scientific article CASERTA, R. et al. Ectopic expression of Xylella fastidiosa rpfF conferring production of diffusible signal factor in transgenic tobacco and citrus alters pathogen behavior and reduces disease severity Startup incubated at Campinas Institute of Agriculture launches innovative treatment for citrus disease Developed at laboratories at the Campinas Institute of Agriculture’s (IAC) Sylvio Moreira Citrus Center, in Cordeirópolis, São Paulo State, NAC was tested in 2014 against CVC in citrus groves owned by Citrosuco, a globally leading producer of orange juice concentrate, in Matão (SP). The results were encouraging. “The first experiments were done at advanced stages of the disease. After two harvests we found that diseased plants had partially recovered,” says Picchi. Crop productivity improved, with both the number and diameter of fruits increasing—including on healthy citrus trees. The reason, Picchi explains, is that NAC not only prevents the proliferation of bacteria, but also helps to reduce oxidative stress, improving plant resistance to disease and environmental stressors such as heat, ultraviolet radiation, and too much or too little water and nutrients. Experiments have also been done on citrus canker. In a screen house, the use of the product alone or in combination with copper (the substance conventionally used against citrus canker) reduced disease incidence by 30% and disease severity by 23%, while the application of copper alone reduced incidence and severity by 20% and 15%, respectively. In curative field tests (performed when the plant already has disease symptoms), NAC reduced citrus canker in orange groves by 10% more than with copper. The company has created two different formulations of the product—NACsolution, for spraying on leaves, and NACagri, for application on the soil as fertilizer. Because both products are still in late-stage development, the startup has partnered with fertilizer manufacturer Amazon Agro-Sciences, in São Carlos (SP), to accelerate product launch. Amazon will market a liquid fertilizer containing the NAC molecule, called Gran Black, under CiaCamp’s supervision. Léo Ramos Chaves A laboratory at the Sylvio Moreira Citrus Center supported close collaboration between CiaCamp and IAC researchersLéo Ramos Chaves Drawing on genome project data The discovery that the antioxidant molecule N-acetylcysteine ​​could fight plant pathogens resulted from a combination of inspiration and years of research effort It all started in 2007 when biologist Alessandra Alves de Souza was treating her child’s cough with an acetylcysteine-based expectorant It occurred to her to test whether the substance could also be used to break up bacterial biofilms on citrus trees Biofilm bacteria cling together and behave as a single organism these bacterial biofilms adhere to the xylem—a vascular tissue that transports water and nutrients from a plant’s roots to its crown—clogging its vessels “I was reading the package insert and learned that the expectorant worked by breaking up bacterial aggregates just like the ones formed on citrus trees infected with Xylella fastidiosa,” de Souza recalls She was then investigating the biological characteristics of Xylella and the resistance of biofilms to antimicrobial compounds she had previously studied the pathogenicity of this bacterium and the formation of biofilms during her doctoral research Because treating plant disease with acetylcysteine ​​had never been done before de Souza decided her research effort would initially be modest a biological sciences student at São Paulo State University (UNESP) to join her in a scientific initiation program in which the molecule was applied directly on the bacterium The substance was then tested on plants at the laboratory’s greenhouse during Muranaka’s master’s program between 2008 and 2010 Their early studies drew on robust data from the X fastidiosa genome project that FAPESP had launched in the late 1990s “Sequencing the Xylella bacterium allowed us to identify its genes and potential targets that could be used to control the pathogen,” says de Souza “This led us to possible targets by which NAC could act on Xylella.” The journey from research to commercial product began in 2010 Simone Picchi started a postdoctoral fellowship at the IAC’s Citrus Center under de Souza to test NAC on citrus canker de Souza encouraged her to start a business and apply for funding via FAPESP’s Technological Innovation in Small Businesses (PIPE) program “It can be difficult in Brazil to get large companies to market a product developed in academia so setting up a startup seemed to be the best option,” recalls de Souza and CiaCamp secured an exclusive license to the NAC patent—which was owned by IAC and other members of her team—for use in agriculture The patent application had been filed at the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) in 2011 CiaCamp used the IAC’s laboratories to develop the project but we were for all practical purposes the first startup to be incubated there The collaboration between the IAC researchers and CiaCamp was very fruitful,” says Picchi “We would discuss new tests and their results and ways to improve application methods and reduce costs,” says de Souza who will receive royalties from product sales as one of the inventors named in the patent These discussions led to new research ideas such as using the product on other plants subject to Xylella infection When these trees have early symptoms of the disease There are currently no products available that can kill plant pathogens when already inside the plant Global applications According to citrus experts the market is eager for solutions to important crop pests “There are no products available that can kill plant pathogens when already inside the plant,” says José Belasque Junior a crop scientist in the Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture (ESALQ) at the University of São Paulo (USP) Growers use preventive crop management techniques against infection a disease caused by Candidatus Liberibacter americanus and Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus farmers apply insecticides to reduce populations of the psyllid Diaphorina citri which is transmitted by 11 species of leafhopper a disease caused by the bacterium Xanthomonas citri subsp The copper remains on the leaves and the bacterium dies on contact with the substance,” says Belasque and eliminating diseased plants are other approaches used to control CVC Belasque is hoping the product developed by the IAC researchers will prove to be an economical alternative to the use of insecticides and copper which can cause environmental contamination He believes if CiaCamp can develop a substance that will not volatilize when exposed to sunlight or be washed off by rainwater “Greening affects citrus groves across the Americas as well as in Asia and South Africa,” he says CiaCamp’s product has a bright future ahead of it.” Léo Ramos Chaves Orange tree leaves infected by the citrus canker bacteriumLéo Ramos Chaves accounting for 61% of global orange juice production The two biggest threats are citrus greening—the world’s most devastating citrus disease which in Brazil increased by 8.5% between 2017 and 2018 and now affects 18% of citrus groves—and citrus canker infecting almost 12% of citrus trees in the state of São Paulo which in 2009 affected 42% of citrus trees is now confined to 1.3% of citrus groves thanks to crop management practices such as planting healthy seedlings under protective screens and using insecticides