Fuentes graduated from University of California, Berkeley with a B.A. in Anthropology and Zoology, as well as an M.A. and PhD in Anthropology, and has since been researching his main interests in the fields of biological anthropology and primatology.
His book Among Orangutans: Red Apes and the Rise of Human Culture tells the story of his discovery of a group of orangutans in northern Sumatra and the challenge their tool use and sociality pose to theories of primatology and the insights they offer into key moments in human evolution.
Junichiro Itani (1926–2001), anthropologist and founder of Japanese primatology
Ayres' doctorate in primatology at Cambridge, in 1986, was for his thesis Uakaris and Amazonian flooded forest, the field work for which was undertaken on the upper Amazon River floodplain, near Tefé.
Publications in the journal are on Physical Anthropology, Palaeolithic Archaeology, Primatology, Geochronology, Palaeoecology, and Palaeoecological and palaeogeographical models for primate and human evolution.
Well-known scientists currently based at the institute include Svante Pääbo (genetics), Bernard Comrie (linguistics), Michael Tomasello (psychology), Christophe Boesch (primatology), and Jean-Jacques Hublin (evolution).