From 2011-2016, the Panama Canal was expanded on a scale not seen since the original excavations one hundred years ago. During this most current expansion, important new Neogene fossiliferous deposits were being uncovered.
The mission of the Panama Canal Project (PCP) PIRE was to advance knowledge of the extinct faunas and floras of the ancient Neotropics based on the new fossil discoveries along the Canal. Consistent with NSF’s PIRE program objectives, university students (undergraduate and graduate), postdocs, and faculty fully engaged in PCP paleontological, geological, and biological research and Broader Impacts outreach.
This website was initiated and developed as a group class project during the Fall 2010 PCP PIRE graduate seminar at the University of Florida and served as a repository for news, blogs, discoveries, events and more during the life of the grant.
PCP PIRE (Partnerships for International Research and Education) was supported by the U.S. NSF (National Science Foundation) grant 0966884 (OISE, EAR, DRL)
News & Announcements
- PCP PIRE featured in Spring 2014 UF Explore Magazine
- PCP PIRE researchers have recently published their discovery of the first North American fossil monkey in the journal Nature! See what NSF had to say about it in their press release.
- The Fossils of Panama is an initiative of the Florida Museum of Natural History Fossils in the Cloud Project – an effort to digitize the museum’s paleontological collections.
Voices from the Field
