Ultra low-power processors designed by Microsoft may revolutionize wildlife research

By Kelly Hodgkins November 11, 2015

microsoft wildlife scent dispenser — Robert Long/Woodland Park Zoo.

Wildlife biologists have a difficult task in the winter as they try to track elusive species such as wolverines, lynxes, and other animals that are active during the cold and snowy season. Researchers monitor these animal populations using remote cameras and scent dispensers that attract the animals to survey sites. This system provides a non-invasive way of monitoring animal populations, but the sites are difficult to maintain as the scent dispenser units need to be refilled every few weeks. A walk in the woods may be enjoyable during the summer, but the same trek becomes an arduous task in the winter when deep snow and avalanches hinder travel.

Dr. Robert Long, a senior conservation fellow in the Field Conservation Department at Washington’s Woodland Park Zoo, struggled with how to minimize trips to the survey stations by making the scents last through the winter. He reached out to Joel Sauder, a wildlife biologist for Idaho Fish and Game, and Mike Sinclair from Microsoft Research to work on an electronic device that would allow them to place a large amount of scent in the field and dispense it slowly over a long period of time.

Working with the high school students in his STEM program, Sinclair developed an ultra-low power processor powered by lithium batteries that would control the release of scent. The processing boards were integrated into a liquid pump system and then installed in bear-proof containers. The boards were designed to withstand the extreme cold and also meet the unique power requirements necessary for a system that remains idle for a long period of time and then spikes when more scent is needed.

The team built 65 total units, which are being deployed in Washington State and in North Central Idaho. 35 of the units are headed to the North Cascades as part of an ongoing wolverine study while another 20 are being used in Idaho to study forest carnivores. The last 10 units are extras. The wildlife biologists are hoping these maintenance-free dispensers will help them study wildlife in areas that are difficult to access in the winter. If successful, the dispensers could have a far-reaching impact on wildlife research projects worldwide.

Topics

Contributor

Kelly's been writing online for ten years, working at Gizmodo, TUAW, and BGR among others. Living near the White Mountains of…

News

Digital Trends’ Top Tech of CES 2023 Awards

Best of CES 2023 Awards Our Top Tech from the Show Feature

Let there be no doubt: CES isn’t just alive in 2023; it’s thriving. Take one glance at the taxi gridlock outside the Las Vegas Convention Center and it’s evident that two quiet COVID years didn’t kill the world’s desire for an overcrowded in-person tech extravaganza -- they just built up a ravenous demand.

From VR to AI, eVTOLs and QD-OLED, the acronyms were flying and fresh technologies populated every corner of the show floor, and even the parking lot. So naturally, we poked, prodded, and tried on everything we could. They weren’t all revolutionary. But they didn’t have to be. We’ve watched enough waves of “game-changing” technologies that never quite arrive to know that sometimes it’s the little tweaks that really count.

News

Digital Trends’ Tech For Change CES 2023 Awards

Digital Trends CES 2023 Tech For Change Award Winners Feature

CES is more than just a neon-drenched show-and-tell session for the world’s biggest tech manufacturers. More and more, it’s also a place where companies showcase innovations that could truly make the world a better place — and at CES 2023, this type of tech was on full display. We saw everything from accessibility-minded PS5 controllers to pedal-powered smart desks. But of all the amazing innovations on display this year, these three impressed us the most:

Samsung's Relumino Mode
Across the globe, roughly 300 million people suffer from moderate to severe vision loss, and generally speaking, most TVs don’t take that into account. So in an effort to make television more accessible and enjoyable for those millions of people suffering from impaired vision, Samsung is adding a new picture mode to many of its new TVs.
[CES 2023] Relumino Mode: Innovation for every need | Samsung
Relumino Mode, as it’s called, works by adding a bunch of different visual filters to the picture simultaneously. Outlines of people and objects on screen are highlighted, the contrast and brightness of the overall picture are cranked up, and extra sharpness is applied to everything. The resulting video would likely look strange to people with normal vision, but for folks with low vision, it should look clearer and closer to "normal" than it otherwise would.
Excitingly, since Relumino Mode is ultimately just a clever software trick, this technology could theoretically be pushed out via a software update and installed on millions of existing Samsung TVs -- not just new and recently purchased ones.

Entertainment

AI turned Breaking Bad into an anime — and it’s terrifying

Split image of Breaking Bad anime characters.

These days, it seems like there's nothing AI programs can't do. Thanks to advancements in artificial intelligence, deepfakes have done digital "face-offs" with Hollywood celebrities in films and TV shows, VFX artists can de-age actors almost instantly, and ChatGPT has learned how to write big-budget screenplays in the blink of an eye. Pretty soon, AI will probably decide who wins at the Oscars.

Within the past year, AI has also been used to generate beautiful works of art in seconds, creating a viral new trend and causing a boon for fan artists everywhere. TikTok user @cyborgism recently broke the internet by posting a clip featuring many AI-generated pictures of Breaking Bad. The theme here is that the characters are depicted as anime characters straight out of the 1980s, and the result is concerning to say the least. Depending on your viewpoint, Breaking Bad AI (my unofficial name for it) shows how technology can either threaten the integrity of original works of art or nurture artistic expression.
What if AI created Breaking Bad as a 1980s anime?
Playing over Metro Boomin's rap remix of the famous "I am the one who knocks" monologue, the video features images of the cast that range from shockingly realistic to full-on exaggerated. The clip currently has over 65,000 likes on TikTok alone, and many other users have shared their thoughts on the art. One user wrote, "Regardless of the repercussions on the entertainment industry, I can't wait for AI to be advanced enough to animate the whole show like this."