📋 Tender Overview
With funding from PROCIENCIA, researchers will evaluate the taxonomic and functional diversity of fish in six tributaries of the Mayo River basin using eDNA.The Peruvian Amazon Research Institute (IIAP), an entity attached to the Ministry of the Environment, launched a project to evaluate how deforestation and agricultural expansion have changed the structure of fish communities in the tributaries of the Mayo River, in San Martin. To do this, environmental DNA metabarcoding (eDNA) will be applied for the first time in that basin: a technique that identifies species based on the genetic material that fish release into the water during their biological activities, without the need to capture them.
The project is financed by the National Fund for Scientific, Technological and Technological Innovation Development (PROCIENCIA) in the SEMILLA 2026 call.
Unlike traditional capture-based inventory methods, eDNA offers a non-invasive and sensitive alternative to complement existing knowledge on fish fauna. This tool can expand the detection capacity of species present in the environment, including those of low abundance, evasive behavior or difficult to record using conventional fishing gear.
The study will be carried out in six representative tributaries of the Mayo River basin. Sampling stations will be established in each river where water samples will be collected for eDNA analysis, physicochemical variables will be measured, and riverside vegetation cover will be evaluated using remote sensing tools and geographic information systems.
The results of the project will serve three specific purposes. First, they will generate the updated baseline of the Mayo River ichthyofauna, with comparable and reproducible data. Second, they will validate eDNA as a complementary tool to traditional inventories in Andean-Amazonian basins. Third, they will produce useful scientific evidence to guide conservation actions, restoration of marginal strips, environmental surveillance and integrated water management in the San Martin region.
In addition to the species inventory, the project analyzes the functional diversity of fish communities: what types of fish predominate according to their diet, size, migratory behavior and tolerance to environmental degradation. This approach allows us to know not only how many species there are, but also what ecological role each one plays. In this way, researchers will be able to determine whether the best conserved areas maintain a greater diversity of ecological functions, which may be associated with more stable ecosystems.
The project is led by Jose Eduardo Mejia de Loayza, technical manager of the IIAP San Martin, with the participation of Guillain Estivals, Julio Miguel Grandez Rios, Tony Vizcarra Bentos and Juan Jose Palacios Vega, researchers at the IIAP. Likewise, it has the scientific collaboration of Nicolas Hubert, from the Institut de Recherche pour le Developpement (IRD) in France. The collaboration with the IRD incorporates consolidated experience in metabarcoding of tropical fish faunas.
Currently, the Mayo River basin is accumulating decades of pressure on its aquatic ecosystems. The deforestation of marginal strips, the occupation of riparian zones, agricultural expansion and the discharge of domestic and agricultural effluents have deteriorated the quality of water in its main tributaries. These pressures can reduce the presence of sensitive species and favor generalist species that are more tolerant to pollution, although until now there is no systematic and standardized evaluation that confirms this. The IIAP project seeks precisely to understand these changes and contribute with modern monitoring tools for the conservation of Amazonian aquatic biodiversity.
