BioacAI - Bioacoustic AI for wildlife protection
From 01-10-2023 to 30-09-2027
Description
The biodiversity crisis is coming into sharp focus. The World Economic Forum ranked biodiversity loss as one of the top 5 global risks, both in impact and likelihood, for the first time in 2020 and again in 2021. Continental-scale assessments warn of population declines in major taxa such as birds and insects. Yet data for monitoring biodiversity change remain incomplete - spatially, temporally and taxonomically. Changes are further driven by humanity's changing actions: biodiversity is affected by climate, but even more strongly by land-use changes, including land-use changes intended as climate mitigations - as recently highlighted in a joint report by the UN panels IPBES and IPCC. To stabilise biodiversity trends and assess ecosystem restoration interventions, it is crucial to monitor the world's wildlife better, faster, and to provide rapid intelligence that can enable us to manage these risks.
Sound recording is a cheap, rapid and powerful way to monitor many key animal species, and modern machine learning can radically improve its scale and precision. However, there are two barriers: AI-enhanced tools for bioacoustic monitoring are at a low readiness level, with few end-to-end solutions available; and there is a big skills gap - no current training programme produces experts with skills spanning acoustics, artificial intelligence (AI) and zoology/ecology.
The BioacAI doctoral network is designed to address exactly these issues. Our research programme develops new AI methods directly within the context of acoustic wildlife monitoring, using devices from leading European bioacoustics companies, in active wildlife monitoring deployments. Our training programme provides "full stack" bioacoustic AI skills and targeted research experience, to build the next generation of professionals - the people who innovate with technology to monitor and understand animals at unprecedented global scale and detail.
Team
- Toon van Waterschoot, Co-promoter
Financing
Funding: EU Funding - European Funding
Program/Grant Type: MSCA ITN - Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions International Training Networks
Events
2/09/2024:
PhD defense - Martijn Oldenhof
Machine Learning for Advanced Chemical Analysis and Structure Recognition in Drug Discovery
3/09/2024:
Meet the Jury Igor Tetko on Advanced Machine Learning in Drug Discovery
12/09/2024:
Multimodal analysis of cell-free DNA for sensitive cancer detection in low-coverage and low-sample settings
Seminar by Antoine Passemiers
News
STADIUS Alumni Herman Verrelst – new CEO of Biocartis
08 June 2017
Herman Verrelst, the founder of KU Leuven spin-off Cartagenia, who has been working in Silicon Valley, US for the last few years will be returning to Belgium to follow the steps of Rudi Pauwels as CEO of the Belgian diagnostic company, Biocartis.
Supporting healthcare policymaking via machine learning – batteries included!
29 May 2017
STADIUS takes the lead in the data analytics efforts in an ambitious European Project MIDAS.
Marc Claesen gives an interview about his PhD for the magazine of the Faculty of Engineering Sciences "Geniaal"
10 February 2017
Did you know that in Belgium approximately one third of type 2 diabetes patients are unaware of their condition?
Joos Vandewalle is nieuwe voorzitter KVAB
09 October 2016
Op 5 oktober 2016 heeft de Algemene Vergadering van de Academie KVAB Joos Vandewalle verkozen tot voorzitter van de KVAB.