Lara’s work is part of a research field called the history of science, which is closely linked to the history of health. These are \u201csubdivisions\u201d of history that focus on analyzing the historical characteristics that form what we know today as science.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the history of health, historians seek to understand the interrelated cultural, political, social, and scientific processes behind the history of diseases, doctors, patients, vaccination campaigns, hospitals, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Brazil, as in the rest of the world, viruses were studied even before the existence of the consolidated discipline known as \u201cvirology.\u201d Smallpox and yellow fever were the main diseases of viral origin studied in this context between the end of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The nation\u2019s expertise on these biological entities was then developed throughout the twentieth century, with a greater focus after the 1950s in response to several epidemics of infectious diseases. And it changed with the emergence of certain scientific techniques and instruments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Institutional and political factors and milestones, such as the 1964 military coup and the country\u2019s redemocratization in 1985, also played a major role. All these processes directly affected the formation of research groups and the careers of many scientists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus, when dengue appeared in 1986, although virology labs such as the Evandro Chagas Institute in Par\u00e1 and the Oswaldo Cruz Institute already had extensive experience in studying viruses, dengue\u2019s novelty and the challenge of understanding the mechanisms of a newly circulating virus, especially as a complex arbovirus (transmitted by arthropods), resulted in much new research in virology. This led to the development of new tools for the scientific discipline, including increased funding and visibility and dedicated departments and research groups.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Brazilian Society of Virology (SBV) was created that same year of 1986, as was the Flavivirus Laboratory at FIOCRUZ\u2019s Virology Department, where the dengue virus was isolated and continues to be systematically studied to this day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn this sense, I would say that dengue gave Brazilian virology significant experience, having become one of the main topics studied in the field alongside other arboviruses, as well as providing an excellent model for the study of other viruses,\u201d says Lara, who is currently writing his doctoral thesis on the applications of radioisotopes in Brazilian biology research in the second half of the twentieth century.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New article describes the role of virological studies in understanding the disease\u2019s evolution in Brazil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1971,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[85],"tags":[],"autor":[98],"temas":[],"chapeu":[193],"class_list":["post-2042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","autor-ricardo-muniz-2","chapeu-virology"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n