According to a UNal Pharmacy Department research project an almizclillo extract could be used as a natural source against hypertension and with cardioprotective effects. Also known as Croton schiedeanus Schltd, almizclillo has a popular tradition in Colombia, mostly in regions such as the municipality of Tocaima, in the Province of Cundinamarca, where it is commonly used for high blood pressure.

Between November 2011 and January 2012, the most important oceanography research ship in the world, the Joides Resolution, sailed through Gulf of Cádiz and the coast situated in the South of Portugal searching for marine sediments which could help to explain the history of water exchanges between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean through the Strait of Gibraltar, a phenomenon with numerous implications in the study of climate. Since then, scientists have been analyzing data and, as a result, the magazine Science publishes this expedition’s first results, in which José Abel Flores and Francisco Sierro, researchers of the University of Salamanca participated.

Danish, Chinese and Saudi researchers have sequenced the genome of two spider species: the Brazilian one called tarantula with “white knees” Acanthoscurria geniculado and the African spider called terciopelo Stegodyphus mimosarum. The data have contributed with information about genes and proteins related to venom and silk production, information which could be applied in the pharmacological field in the case of venom and in the biomaterials field in the case of silk.

Since she was child, Katia Silvera would hike the remote forests of Panama and collect plants with her father, Gaspar, who operates a small orchid company. On one such hike about eight years ago, the father-daughter team collected an orchid that turned out to be new to science. It was just named in their honor.