Brazil may best be known for Carnival celebrations, golden-sand beaches and soccer players who go by one name — but research into disease therapeutics is now also starting to put the country on the scientific map.

The number of biomedical publications with at least one Brazil-based author nearly tripled over the past decade, from around 4,500 papers in 2000 to close to 13,000 last year, according to data compiled for Nature Medicine by the University of São Paulo’s André Frazão Helene. And even though the country churns out only a little over 2% of the world’s biomedical output at present, that small number belies a larger trend toward innovative drug development and translational science.

This month, we have a seven-page special news section highlighting some of the strengths of Brazilian biomedicine and many of the challenges that lie ahead.

• Laws hinder drug development inspired by Amazonian biodiversity

• Brazilian drug companies hope to benefit from foreign investment

• New framework needed to thwart Brazil’s crippling bureaucracy

• In Brazil, basic stem cell research lags behind clinical trials

• Brazilians lured back home with research funding and stability

• After years of neglect, Brazil takes aim at Chagas disease

• Hopes build that new infrastructure can aid drug discovery

• Hard line take on public health gives Brazil soft political power