Continental Aquatic Environments Ecology Graduate Program

The Continental Aquatic Environments Ecology Graduate Program (Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ecologia de Ambientes Aquáticos Continentais (PEA) aims to develop professionals to treat environmental issues integrally, so they can work preserving and monitoring ecosystems, assuming an holistic point of view. The program has a score of 6 according to the Brazilian Government’s Agency, CAPES (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel). Projects supported by funding agencies allow the group to research the same geographic area (rivers, streams, flooding planes and reservoirs of Alto Paraná river basin). For Alto Paraná river’s flooding place (last stretch of the river free of reservoirs inside Brazilian territory), the knowledge gathered served as a touchstone to create the Paraná River’s Islands and Margins Environmental Protection Area (Área de Proteção Ambiental das Ilhas e Várzeas do Rio Paraná), helping set the limits to Ilha Grande’s National Park (Parque Nacional de Ilha Grande) and Ivinhema’s State Park (Parque Estadual do Ivinhema). Thus, PEA aims to offer all graduates a wide-ranging education, enabling them to work on biodiversity conservation and handling of continental aquatic environments.