The coronavirus pandemic has seriously affected human health, although some improvements on environmental indexes have temporarily occurred, due to changes on socio-cultural and economic standards. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impacts of the coronavirus and the influence of the lockdown associated with rainfall on the water quality of the Capibaribe and Tejipió rivers, Recife, Northeast Brazil, using cloud remote sensing on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform. The study was carried out based on eight representative images from Sentinel-2. Among the selected images, two refer to the year 2019 (before the pandemic), three refer to 2020 (during a pandemic), two from the lockdown period (2020), and one for the year 2021. The land use and land cover (LULC) and slope of the study region were determined and classified. Water turbidity data were subjected to descriptive and multivariate statistics. When analyzing the data on LULC for the riparian margin of the Capibaribe and Tejipió rivers, a low permanent preservation area was found, with a predominance of almost 100% of the urban area to which the deposition of soil particles in rivers are minimal. The results indicated that turbidity values in the water bodies varied from 6 mg. L up to 40 mg. L. Overall, the reduction in human-based activities generated by the lockdown enabled improvements in water quality of these urban rivers.

Rare remains of predominantly deep-water sharks of the families Hexanchidae, Squalidae, Dalatiidae, Centrophoridae, and Squatinidae are described from the Eocene La Meseta Formation, Seymour Island, Antarctic Peninsula, which has yielded the most abundant chondrichthyan assemblage from the Southern Hemisphere to date. Previously described representatives of sp., , , sp., and sp. are confirmed and dental variations are documented. Although the teeth of sp. differ from other Palaeogene squatinid species, we refrain from introducing a new species. A new dalatiid taxon, gen. et sp. nov. is described. This new material not only increases the diversity of Eocene Antarctic elasmobranchs but also allows assuming that favourable deep-water habitats were available in the Eocene Antarctic Ocean off Antarctica in the Eocene. The occurrences of deep-water inhabitants in shallow, near-coastal waters of the Antarctic Peninsula agrees well with extant distribution patterns.

Western Amazonia's landscape and biota were shaped by an enormous wetland during the Miocene epoch. Among the most discussed topics of this ecosystem range the question on the transitory influx of marine waters. Inter alia the occurrence of typically brackish water associated ostracods is repeatedly consulted to infer elevated salinities or even marine ingressions. The taxonomical investigation of ostracod faunas derived from the upper part of the Solimões Formation (Eirunepé; W-Brazil) documents a moderately diverse assemblage (19 species). A wealth of freshwater ostracods (mainly , ) was found co-occurring with taxa (chiefly ) usually related to marginal marine settings today. The observed faunal compositions as well as constantly very light δO- and δC-values obtained by measuring both, the freshwater and brackish water ostracod group, refer to entirely freshwater conditions. These results corroborate with previous sedimentological and palaeontological observations, which proposed a fluvial depositional system for this part of western Amazonia during the Late Miocene. We demonstrate that some endemic, "brackish" water ostracods (i.e., ) have been effectively adapted to freshwater conditions. Thus, their occurrence is no univocal evidence for the influence of brackish or marine waters in western Amazonia during the Miocene.

In Miocene times a vast wetland existed in Western Amazonia. Whereas the general development of this amazing ecosystem is well established, many questions remain open on sedimentary environments, stratigraphical correlations as well as its palaeogeographical configuration. Several outcrops located in a barely studied region around Eirunepé (SW Amazonas state, Brazil) were investigated to obtain basic sedimentological data. The observed deposits belong to the upper part of the Solimões Formation and are biostratigraphically dated to the Late Miocene. Vertically as well as laterally highly variable fine-grained clastic successions were recorded. Based on the lithofacies assemblages, these sediments represent fluvial deposits, possibly of an anastomosing river system. Sand bodies formed within active channels and dominant overbank fines are described (levees, crevasse splays/channels/deltas, abandoned channels, backswamps, floodplain paleosols). Lacustrine environments are restricted to local floodplain ponds/lakes. The mollusc and ostracod content as well as very light δO and δC values, measured on ostracod valves, refer to exclusively freshwater conditions. Based on palaeontological and geological results the existence of a long-lived lake ("Lake Pebas") or any influx of marine waters can be excluded for that region during the Late Miocene.