ASU earns grant for Amazon biology research

SAN ANGELO, Texas ( Concho Valley Homepage ) — Angelo State University has been awarded thousands of dollars through a three-year grant from the National Science Foundation for biology research in part of the Amazon rainforest.

The award totals $71,973 and is to be used to fund the collection and study of animal specimens that inhabit the Marajo Island in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest. The grant came through a sub-award offered by the California State Polytechnic University in Humboldt for a joint project titled “BRC-BIO Marajo: The Origin and Evolution of Vertebrate Diversity in the Planet’s Largest Fluvial Island.”

The total NSF grant funding for the project is $463,000. The California State Polytechnic University in Humboldt received a larger share of the grant. However, the funds will still benefit Abreu and his students as all fieldwork expenses and costs for DNA sequencing will come from the California university’s project budget.

The research project will involve collecting specimens from different groups of small vertebrates at four locations on Marajo Island and acquiring genomic data for specimens of the target species from across the Amazon Basin. The genomic data will come from the collected samples and from historical material available at various natural history museums.

ASU’s efforts in the project will be led by Dr. Edson Abreu, assistant professor of biology and curator of mammals for the Angelo State Natural History Collections . He will also mentor ASU undergraduate and graduate students through their participation in the project.

“The project will build research and training capacity for the faculty involved,” Abreu said.
It will also achieve broader impact by creating training opportunities for field sampling in the tropics, genomic data acquisition and analytical approaches for ASU undergraduate and graduate students from various socio-economic backgrounds. These types of hands-on experiences are invaluable when the students prepare to start their careers or apply to graduate school.”

The project is being undertaken because basic information on species composition, distribution and evolutionary history remains fragmentary for vast portions of the planet, including the Amazon. Information on evolutionary history and the dynamics of species occupation in different environments can also advance the understanding of how groups of species can adapt to global change, facilitating the management of biodiversity and conservation strategies.

“We will perform phylogenetic inferences, population genetic analyses and demographic and migration tests to understand how and when vertebrate species colonized the Marajo Island – and how their populations are currently structured among its different landscapes,” Abreu said.

The project will also foster the establishment of a Historical DNA Lab at the California State Polytechnic University in Humboldt and provide additional specimen samples for the ASNHC. These resources will be utilized in current and future research and education projects that explore biodiversity locally and abroad as well as to showcase the importance of such collections for science and society.

The project will also be a continuation of work in the Amazon for Abreu. He and Aramide Oladiran, an ASU biology student from Midland, completed a month-long research trip along the Purus River in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest this summer, collecting specimens of rare animals as part of a 14-member expedition that also included faculty and researchers from several Brazilian universities and research institutes.

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