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Even in the remote central Brazilian region of Chapada dos Veadeiros, a mountainous land of towering waterfalls and occasional jaguar sightings, science is heavily dependent on people interacting. In ‘normal’ times, Raísa Vieira, an ecologist at the International Institute for Sustainability in Rio de Janeiro, would regularly visit the residents, known as Kalungas, to help encourage farming practices that could feed communities without imperilling jaguars, tapirs, maned wolves or other wildlife.