Proyecto Alto Purús is a four-year inventory (2008 - 2011) of freshwater animals in the Alto Purús National Park, a vast region (27,000 km2) of moist tropical lowland forest located in southeastern Peru. Regional species richness in aquatic ecosystems reaches a zenith in tropical freshwaters, which with less than 0.1% of the world's water includes more than half its aquatic vertebrate species. This pattern is especially true for Neotropical fishes, which with about 5,700 known species represents over half of the world’s c. 10,000 freshwater fishes, and perhaps 10% of all known vertebrate species. Despite increasing research efforts over the past 20 years, however, the aquatic resources of lowland Amazonia remain poorly known. In particular, the species richness and taxonomic composition of fishes and other aquatic animals of the Alto Purús region are almost entirely undocumented.

     Proyecto Alto Purús represents a unique combination of expertise in systematic Neotropical zoology, involving principal scientists from Brazil, Mexico, Peru, Spain, and USA, and numerous taxonomic consultants from throughout Latin America, North America, and Europe. The aquatic fauna of the Alto Purús is targeted for intensive study as an area of exceptional species-richness and endemism. The emerging detailed species-level inventories and resulting phylogenetic and biogeographic data directly address hypotheses on the origins and maintenance of species-rich tropical aquatic faunas, and help illuminate the structure of Amazonian aquatic diversity. The unique geological setting of the Alto Purús provides opportunities for studying the timing of basin separation and the isolation of aquatic taxa in lowland aquatic Amazonian ecosystems. Comparisons of taxa restricted to one or more headwater tributaries provide biogeographic and phylogeographic tests for the generality of models on the formation of regional species pools.

     Proyecto Alto Purús was prompted by invitations from leading Peruvian governmental and university scientists and is designed to match priorities established by the Peruvian Ministry of the Environment and international scientific and conservation communities in terms of focus, scale, and urgency. The project coordinates efforts of scientists from North and South America and Europe, providing multiple opportunities for study of biodiversity in a region with rich but threatened biological resources. Students at institutions in Brazil, Peru, Spain and the USA are being mentored for advanced training in molecular and morphological systematics. These students participate in both laboratory and field aspects of the research, international exchanges, and present data at conferences and in publications. This project also provides baseline information for future monitoring of the aquatic resources of the Alto Purús region. This research has financial support from the National Science Foundation program in Biotic Surveys and Inventories (award DEB 0741450), and is being conducted in cooperation with the Museo De Historia Natural de la Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos (MUSM), the Peruvian Ministry of the Environment (Instituto Nacional de Recursos Naturales).