Scientists from 40 countries met in December in Mar del Plata, a city 400 km south of the Argentine capital, to compare studies about the effects of rising ultraviolet radiation on plants, animals and humans. The national conference on stratospheric processes and their influence on climate furthered knowledge about the dynamic of the sun's ultraviolet rays and their impact on the earth's areas that are most exposed as a result of the diminishing of the ozone layer, especially in the Southern Hemisphere.

Slovenian physicist Sasha Madronic, member of the US-based Center for Atmospheric Studies, warned that for every five-percent increase in ultraviolet radiation there as a 10 percent rise in the incidence of skin cancer.