Biology

Researchers combine citizen support and cutting-edge technology to track biodiversity

Tardigrades have become an invasive pest, threatening fruit and vegetable crops in Europe. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Researchers are using new technologies such as AI and the contributions of citizen scientists to improve the way we monitor and protect increasingly threatened habitats and species across Europe.

In 1998, an insect woke up in a new world in a small park in Zurich, Switzerland. The bricks on the roof of a local garden had been imported from China and were bringing with them a hidden guest: the green stink bug.

Fast forward to 2024, and this species, Halymorpha halys, has become an invasive pest, threatening fruit and vegetable crops in Europe.

Thanks to researchers and citizen scientists across Europe, we now have a clear picture of the stink bug’s whereabouts. This includes countries such as Italy, France, and Spain. Citizen scientists are ordinary people who voluntarily participate in the scientific process.

Dr. Vincent Kalkman of the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, who works with citizen scientists across Europe, can track how far this bug has spread with just a few clicks.

Kalkman’s research is partially funded by a four-year EU-led research project called MAMBO. Launched in 2022, the project is dedicated to providing “knowledge, tools and infrastructure” to monitor biodiversity, including the use of cutting-edge technologies that rely on acoustics, vision and AI. There is.

And there are pressing reasons to monitor biodiversity.

The European Environment Agency’s December 2024 report warned that “Europe’s biodiversity continues to decline at an alarming rate.” The report cited intensive agriculture and forestry, urbanization, hunting, invasive species and pollution as the main threats.

Researchers on the project, which will run from 2022 to 2026, are experimenting with tools such as drones, cameras and sensors to collect detailed data on a variety of species, but Kalkman said online The focus is on research.

He uses Observation.org, a global biodiversity platform where people post photos of animals and plants and help identify and monitor them.

“If you want to know where a species lives, you could hire people to search everywhere, but that would be nearly impossible and very expensive,” he says.

Instead, he and his colleagues are building AI species identification models to rapidly identify species through images. The 2023 model, rolled out in the first year of the project, already supports Observation.org.

“The number of images people are posting has increased dramatically,” he explained. “We need to consider all of that, and these models help us do that.”

Improved species and habitat monitoring

Dr. Toke Høye, professor at the Department of Ecological Sciences at Aarhus University in Denmark, who coordinates MAMBO, explained that MAMBO has two main objectives.

One is to improve the way we monitor species, especially invertebrates like bees and beetles. Another is to focus on habitat monitoring.

“We want to study how well the habitats around Europe are actually protected,” Høie said.

There are currently 1,840 protected species and 230 protected habitats in the EU. However, at EU level, only 15% of habitats are in good conservation status, with the majority classified as poor or degraded.

Hoe’s team is developing and implementing new tools to monitor protected species and habitats. These include voice recognition-based AI, high-resolution habitat maps, and site-specific habitat condition indicators.

MAMBO is also creating a virtual lab to efficiently compute huge data streams.

This will significantly improve ecological monitoring in Europe and the rest of the world and contribute to the EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030. This strategy is a key part of the European Green Deal, a long-term plan to protect nature and reverse ecosystem degradation.

In 2024, the MAMBO research team began setting up the system at demonstration sites across Europe.

For example, in the Netherlands, researchers use camera traps to count how many insects of a particular species are present in an area. In France, scientists are using drones and satellite data to 3D map nature reserves and track how they change over time.

“Our goal is to create a map each year that shows whether habitat is shrinking or expanding,” Hoie said.

With this data, MAMBO has the potential to change the way scientists and environmental agencies monitor Europe’s ecological situation.

The resulting maps and insights could guide policy makers and regulators in implementing the EU Biodiversity Strategy.

Consider the environmental impact of new technology

The infrastructure that MAMBO scientists are developing relies heavily on advanced technology. But while innovation and AI tools are essential to speeding up conservation science, we must also consider the environmental impact of these efforts.

Your AI footprint matters. Data centers that host AI servers generate waste, consume large amounts of water, and require large amounts of electricity.

Hoe recognizes this and stresses that the impact of AI will be assessed.

“Later in the project, we’re going to spend time understanding the cost of the tools we’re using,” he said. “We consider not only the hardware and energy usage, but also the environmental footprint of the AI ​​model itself.”

Kalkman shares this concern, but remains optimistic about technology’s role in connecting people with nature.

“It’s not just that we’re getting more data from citizen scientists,” he says. “More data means more people are interacting with nature, which is a huge positive.”

Horizon Provided by: EU Research & Innovation Magazine

Citation: Researchers combine citizen support and cutting-edge technology to track biodiversity (January 17, 2025) https://phys.org/news/2025-01-combine-citizens-edge-tech Retrieved January 17, 2025 from -track. html

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