Insects are the most abundant and diverse terrestrial animals on the planet, yet few are capable of surviving in Antarctica's inhospitable climate. Genetic evidence indicates that Antarctic insects, as well as other terrestrial arthropods, have persisted throughout the repeated glaciation events of the Pleistocene and earlier. Thus, these species are ideal test cases for modeling the biogeography of terrestrial Antarctica and evolutionary responses to changing environments. The midge Belgica antarctica is perhaps the best studied Antarctic terrestrial arthropod in terms of physiology and genetics. This species is the southernmost free-living insect, and we recently participated in sequencing the genome and transcriptome of this species. However, a lack of information from closely related species has hindered our ability to pinpoint the precise evolutionary mechanisms that permit survival in Antarctica. In this proposal, we establish an international collaboration with scientists from the US, UK, France, and Chile to expand physiological and genomic research of Antarctic and sub-Antarctic midges. In addition to B. antarctica, our project focuses on Eretmoptera murphyi, a sub-Antarctic endemic that has invaded the maritime Antarctic, Halirytus magellanicus, a strictly Magellanic sub-Antarctic species endemic to Tierra del Fuego, and B. albipes, a sub-Antarctic species found on Crozet Island in the Indian Ocean. These four species are closely related and span an environmental gradient from sub-Antarctic to Antarctic habitats. Our central hypothesis is that shared mechanisms drive both population-level adaptation to local environmental conditions and macroevolutionary changes that permit a select few insects to tolerate Antarctic climates. Our Specific Aims are 1) Characterize conserved and species-specific adaptations to extreme environments through comparative physiology and transcriptomics, 2) Comparative genomics of Antarctic and sub-Antarctic midges to identify macroevolutionary signatures of Antarctic adaptation, and 3) Investigate patterns of diversification and location adaptation using population genomics. Our Broader Impacts include deploying an education professional with our research team to coordinate outreach and continuing our partnership with a Kentucky non-profit focused on K-12 STEM programming.

Democratisation of HE in LA has helped to ensure a growing trend of increasing enrolment of students with disability, although it is still not significant enough in terms of potential numbers (Mexico: disabled people access in HE lower than 5%, Chile: 6,6% from which, only 2,66% complete their studies, Argentina: disabled students represents 0,08% of the students population). The adaptation of HE to cater for disability is of major importance from an economic, political and social point of view. Only through this can the employability of disabled persons be enhanced, and public policies focusing on the promotion of work, income security, poverty prevention and social exclusion can be supported. In this context, Chile, Argentina and Mexico goverments and HEIs have taken some measures to provide the necessary legal frameworks for the inclusion of disabled students within society however there are enormous voids between the law, public policies, and actual practices.The MUSE project proposal “Disability and Modernity: Ensuring Quality Education for Disabled Students” is an ambitious initiative with a wide range of stakeholders, activities and operational goals to cope with complex challenges. Taking into account the substantial expertise and advancement in this domain in recent years by European universities, the project aims to raise awareness on inclusive education through exchange of good-practices between EU and LA HEIs. The main objective constitutes the development of a sustainable knowledge base and support structure allowing for a coherent implementation of disability initiatives, and directional strategic plans in LA HEIs. A network will engage stakeholders in an educational and social discussion for the inclusion of disabled students in HEIs and a new external relation framework will be created to facilitate their economic integration.

LATWORK project aims to create innovative research structures and Research Centres in the field of informal jobs and informal economy in Latin American HEIs.Latin American HEI, and particularly research staff, are requiring better resources and methodologies to develop research capacities to go forward in the analysis and knowledge of the endogenous phenome of informality in the labour market.There are several scientific and social motivations that are currently drawing the attention of HEI to the matter of informal in the labour market:(1) the multidisciplinary character of the topic, (2) the scientific motivation to overcome the difficulties to capture the informal labour market situations due to the lack of accurate methodologies (3) regular failures of small research efforts & statistical operators in definition, capturing and measuring the extent of informal jobs(4) the growing academic interest demonstrated from several knowledge areas of social science(5) the effects of this type of “labour relations”, far away from decent work definitions, on people livesHowever, research staff at Latin American HEI are dealing day to day with the barriers and limitations that mean the lacks of research resources, networking inputs, innovation capacity to create projects, and sources of high quality data, that keep down any capacity to lead research and analyses in the field of informal jobs and informal economy. As a result, the leadership of the majority of the research initiatives in this field are always dipped to external research operators no always qualified in the multidisciplinary scope and scientific culture.LATWORK is targeted at the development of the HEI innovation and research capacities to:Upgrade the research leadership role of HEI in the field of informal jobs and informal economy.Transfer high quality of research outputs in this field.Raise de commitment of researchers, academics and policy makers with the research on informal labour market.

Montane forests in the Andes and the South-eastern Brazilian Mountain Range host the highest plant biodiversity on Earth. Current rates of warming in the Andes are three times higher than elsewhere in S. America, and higher than average warming of 5-6oC is predicted by the end of this century. Hence, the (sub)tropical mountain ranges in Latin America form a high-priority area in which to study the response of tropical trees under future environmental change. Tropical forests also play a crucial role in the global carbon budget, accounting for more than half of terrestrial net primary production and storing around 40% of plant biomass. Uncertainty in the response of tropical forests to global warming is responsible for a large uncertainty in atmospheric CO2 concentrations under any given scenario of anthropogenic CO2 emissions. However, the current generation of Dynamic Global Vegetation and Earth System Models do not include a representation of montane forest functioning, which stems from a lack of empirical understanding, leading to a consideration of only lowland tropical forests in models. We intend to address this knowledge gap by initiating a Latin America-wide network of tropical montane forest sites to gather existing understanding in order to model the contribution of these forests to the regional and global carbon and water cycles, under current and future climate change. This will be achieved via a dedicated workshop at the Uni-Campinas, Brazil, hosted by PP-FAPESP Nagy, with the participation of empirical experts across the network together with DGVM and ESM modellers.

CAMINOS deepened the Latin American Higher Education Space by improving the capacity of universities, associations and networks to enhance, promote and manage regional Latin American student and staff mobility. Specifically, the project developed a common mobility management model (defined by a Handbook) to this effect, premised upon and linking existing Latin American bi/multi-lateral mobility programmes and providing guidance on managing mobility. The project had three essential phases:1)A research phase for mapping a) existing Latin American mobility schemes and their management practices and rules, b) the actors and universities that participate in them and manage them2)A development phase for generating a Handbook that provided concrete advice to universities and networks/associations on how to enhance and promote mobility in the region. Focus groups on topics such as mobility management, credit transfer, recognition, institutional partnerships and joint degrees were organised to help draft the Handbook. In addition, study visits of Latin American partners to European universities were organised, to look at institutional case studies on these topics. 3)A pilot phase, whereby the Handbook was applied by both the partner associations/networks and the partner universities. Each partner implemented a pilot project that corresponded to at least one aspect of a mobility management ‘process’ listed in the Handbook. This included building a website for promoting mobility in the region, installing a new database for mobility, organizing international internships and summer schools in the LA region, etc. Coaching was provided by European partners to support the pilots. The project responded to the fact that LA regional mobility is a growing priority as it fosters academic cooperation and regional harmonisation. CAMINOS also reflected the interest to better promote ‘structured’ mobility and staff mobility. The project involved universities from Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Ecuador, as well as university associations from these countries. Additional actors and related E+ projects were involved in project activities to ensure wider ownership and synergies. A final project conference was positioned as a larger event for generating ‘clustering’ and synergies between beneficiaries of E+ projects in LA, dealing with themes related to internationalisation, mobility, recognition and joint programmes. The project has a direct impact in the LA partner universities in terms of their ability to manage mobility and generate awareness for the importance of regional mobility. In addition, the associations in the project were able to launch and and conduct a first assessment of a regional programme for mobility – ‘PILA’ – which allows for mutual exchange between Argentina, Colombia and Mexico, and should be expanded to other countries in the near future.