Published Date: 21/08/2024
Scientists are developing a machine learning tool that can identify individual animals from their footprints, revolutionizing wildlife tracking and conservation efforts. "Namibia's brown hyenas are notoriously difficult to study. They live in small clans, travel and hunt alone, and are mostly active at night. But a new AI-powered tool could change that.
Marie Lemerle, a researcher with the Brown Hyena Research Project, has been working with the US-based nonprofit WildTrack to develop an automated hyena identification system. The tool uses machine learning to analyze footprint size and shape, and can identify individual animals with remarkable accuracy.
For the past five months, Lemerle has been building up a reference library of hyena tracks for WildTrack's training data sets. She takes photographs of the footprints with a footlong ruler beside them, which the WildTrack team then analyzes in intricate detail. The machine learning software breaks each print into 120 different measurements, which it can compare with others in the database to look for a match.
Q: What is the goal of WildTrack's AI-powered tool?
A: The goal of WildTrack's AI-powered tool is to identify individual animals from pictures of their footprints, revolutionizing wildlife tracking and conservation efforts.
Q: How does the tool work?
A: The tool uses machine learning to analyze footprint size and shape, breaking each print into 120 different measurements which it can compare with others in the database to look for a match.
Q: What are the potential applications of the tool?
A: The tool could be used to monitor populations, track movements, and even prevent human-wildlife conflict.
Q: How many brown hyenas are there in Namibia?
A: Fewer than 3,000 adult brown hyenas reside in Namibia, out of fewer than 10,000 across southern Africa.
Q: What is the conservation status of brown hyenas?
A: Brown hyenas are considered near threatened, with the species suffering from collisions with vehicles and revenge killings by livestock farmers.