This award from the U.S.-Argentina Cooperative Science Program supports research in ecology to be conducted by Drs. Michael A. Bell and Axel Meyer of the State University of New York, Stonybrook and Dr. Alberto Espinach Ros of the Instituto Nacional de Investigaciones y Desarrollo Pesesquero (INIDEP) at Buenos Aires, Argentina. The project focuses on the study of the commercially important characiform fishes of the genera Prochilodus and Salminus that inhabit the Paraguay-Parana-Uruguay basin.. The main objective will be to assess the phylogenetic relationships and geographic structure of their populations in order to understand the evolutionary processes that have affected them. The aim of the project will be to use mitochondrial DNA sequences to identify different populations of characiform fish in the Paraguay-Parana-Uruguay river basin, to quantify the amount of intraspecific differentiation and gene flow. Further, the geographic population of the two taxa Prochilodus and Salminus will be related to resource management. The data will also be used to formulate historical biogeographical hypotheses based on the phylogenetic analyses and distribution patterns observed for both taxa. The expertise in field work possessed by the INIDEP team will be synergistic with the expertise in genetics residing in the group at Stonybrook.
