On Wed, Oct 7, 2015 at 5:54 PM, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
Hi Eliot,
as you may know, Sharks, as apex predators, are vital to maintaining healthy marine ecosystems, and at the same time, their populations are plummeting due to human actions. It is estimated for example that the population of pelagic oceanic white tip sharks is reducing by 17% per year [1] and I've heard (can't find a reference) that populations in the eastern indian/western pacific are at 1% of normal levels. Such reductions in populations create "trophic cascades" that produce wide-ranging changes in populations of different species all the way down the food chain [2]. And the marine ecosystem is a key source of human nutrition; it comprises between 13% and 17% of global human protein intake [3].
Recently, I talk with some people from my research institute who are working on Shark behavior modeling in the CHARC program : http://www.la-reunion.ird.fr/le-programme-charc Sorry this is in French only They use acoustic marks on sharks in order to locate them thanks to a surveillance network. The idea is not only to manage the risks regarding sharks but also to use them to have information about ocean's environment parameters. I start to discuss a little bit with them in order to model sharks behavior.
As you may also know, there is currently a shark attack crisis in New South Wales [4]. While most people in the region oppose killing sharks in response to the crisis, existing solutions, netting and culling reduce those same threatened populations of sharks upon which the sustainability of marine food supply d ecosystems depend [5], and are arguably ineffective [6]. Apparently the most successful approach at avoiding attacks is the use of human spotters, as used in Cape Town, where people in tall towers scan the sea close to shore [6].
But please watch this Youtube video [7] from Pismo Beach, California. The shark is spotted at about 1:20 into the video. This drone, a phantom 3, is sending live video back to the operators, who are using remote control. What we can see from this video is that the point of view of drones is far superior to that of spotters.
My first thought is that autonomous drones could provide a cheap and scalable solution to patrolling beaches to prevent shark attacks. I expect that processors like the Pi 2 have easily enough processing power to both plan and execute search patterns along beaches, and perform the image recognition necessary to reliably detect potentially dangerous sharks. A drone might also be able autonomously to visit surfers and swimmers near to the shark and warn them, either by some signal such as flashing red LEDs or an audible message (language issues notwithstanding). The drone would have to be able to identify swimmers and surfers in the water (not easy; sharks confuse seals and surfers all the time), but computing an optimal route to visit suspected swimmers should be relatively easy :-).
I imagine that sooner or later it will be possible to construct cheap rugged solar powered docking/charging shelters that drones could depart from and return to, to charge and shelter from the elements after patrols. Satellite communications could provide status reports for maintenance.
This is a really interesting project. My lab is also interested by using drones for environmental surveillance. I can talk with my colleagues working on sharks if this is something that they envision for the future. Another idea is to use marine drones. Regards -- Serge Stinckwich UCBN & UMI UMMISCO 209 (IRD/UPMC) Every DSL ends up being Smalltalk http://www.doesnotunderstand.org/