The Postgraduate Program in Biodiversity and Conservation – PPGBC is the newest strictu sensu postgraduate course in the Biodiversity subject area, from Northeastern Brazil, whose proposal was approved by CAPES (i.e., Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel from the Brazilian Ministry of Education) in 2019.

The PPGBC stands out for: (1) being the first and only one linked to the CAPES Biodiversity area in the State of Piauí; (2) inexistence of other courses in the same CAPES area in nearby locations (i.e., less than 400km); (3) being able to attend the existing demand in the state of Piauí and surrounding regions; (4) having its head office at the Campus Amílcar Ferreira Sobral, in the municipality of Floriano; and, therefore, be located far from UFPI´s main Campus, decentralizing the formation of qualified human resources; (5) have a physical structure compatible with the activities developed in a Program of this type; and (6) be composed by qualified, skilled, productive and committed teachers with the formation of human resources and with the investigation of the regional biodiversity.

Concentration area and research lines

The Postgraduate Program in Biodiversity and Conservation – PPGBC has only one area of concentration: Biodiversity and Conservation. This area aims to train professionals at the master's level, in two major research lines: (1) "Biodiversity Knowledge" and (2) "Biodiversity Use and Conservation". The PPGBC has its headquarters in the interior of the State of Piauí, one of the poorest states and with one of the largest scientific shortfalls, in Brazil.

Thus, the Program will offer disciplines that enable and encourage its students to carry out projects and research aimed, for example, at proposing estimates and impacts on biodiversity, the description of biodiversity, as well as the investigation of phylogenetic relationships between living beings. This knowledge, traditionally classified as basic, is important and necessary to allow investigations on how biodiversity is used by human populations, as well as to allow the development of actions for its conservation and sustainable use.

Research line "Biodiversity Knowledge":

In this research line, projects and researches that aim to provide basic biodiversity data will be developed, based on the description of new taxa, taxonomic reviews, phylogenetic analyzes with morphological and/or molecular data, studies on the organism morphology, histology, phylogeography, biogeography, evolution, systematics, behavior, natural history and ecology of populations, communities and ecosystems.

Research line "Biodiversity Use and Conservation":

In this research line, projects will be developed to understand how human populations use the biodiversity around them, as well as research that allows proposing strategies to guarantee the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. These researches includes, for example, analysis of the genetic diversity of organisms using molecular markers, ethnozoology, ethnobotany, ethnobiology, recovery of degraded areas, environmental impacts, epidemiology, parasitology, agricultural entomology, animal reproduction and agroecology.