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Acoustic monitoring is one of our biggest and most active groups, with members collecting, analysing, and interpreting acoustic data from across species, ecosystems, and applications, from animal vocalizations to sounds from our natural and built environment

careers

Research Assistants in Kitzes Lab

Justin Kitzes

16 February 2023 4:12pm

Our group once again has openings for Research Assistants to work with us on our bioacoustics projects. A job ad and description of how to apply are below - please feel free to get in touch with any questions!

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discussion

Cleaning audiomoth circuit board

Robin Sandfort

17 January 2023 11:42am

Hi everyone,unfortunatly I got quite a few audiomoth boards with different levels of water damage.I removed the battery holder and plan on cleaning the boards. Do you have any...

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Akiba

28 January 2023 5:40am

I'd also add that if the boards are just dirty or dusty, you can just remove all batteries, then wash with a toothbrush and water. Air dry (or use compressed air which speeds things up greatly) and then spot clean areas that need solvent with isopropanol as Harold mentioned. Also if you don't have access to conformal coating, you can also use a non-conductive clear lacquer.  The conformal coating covers all the components and prevents short circuits due to conductive water (ie: salt water) or other contaminants. However if you do use a conformal coating, make sure all cables are connected first and the device is in the exact state that it will be deployed in. Also don't conformal coat the battery connectors since you'll want to change out batteries periodically.

Robin Sandfort

2 February 2023 8:13am

Hi Akiba, 
thanks for your this great advice! I used the conformal coating on parts
of the PCB with exposed metal but was has hesitent using it on the "backside" with 
 all the resistors and transistors. Also what about the "back" of the microfon. Might this side be coated?
Do you have any experience with coatings @alex_rogers 

Greetings,
Robin  

 

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discussion

Commercially available connected audio sensors

geoffc

2 February 2023 3:08pm

Hi - can anyone advise if there is a commercially made passive audio recorder that can be powered by solar/battery and have 3g/4g connectivity - ideally with compression on the...

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Lars Holst Hansen

2 February 2023 3:55pm

Hi!

I am not aware of any such connected loggers/recorders but they would be nice. 

The AudioMoths have been revolutionary in providing audologging at a low cost but they take a lot of "data muling" (carrying SD cards in and out of the field sites) and swapping of batteries.

Cheers,

 

geoffc

2 February 2023 7:50pm

Hi Lars, thanks for the response. We are using lots of Song Meter Micro's atm and they have proved to be resilient. Just need something which doesn't involve going on site regularly - but get the data off. 

Carly Batist

3 February 2023 7:04pm

Rainforest Connection's (RFCx) Guardian devices may be of interest. They are solar-powered and have connectivity options for Wifi, GSM and satellite transfer. They've previously been used for detecting e.g., gunshots or chainsaws (using edge computing) and then sending positive detections/alerts to folks on the ground. RFCx also hosts Arbimon, a free, no-code software platform that facilitates analysis of audio data as well. Happy to chat more if you'd like to talk further about it! 

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event

AI for Forest Elephants Challenge

Tjomme Dooper

25 January 2023 3:34pm

FruitPunch AI is hosting the AI for Forest Elephants Challenge. Together with 50+ AI enthusiasts and experts from all over the globe, we will apply AI to detect gunshots and elephant rumbles on sound monitoring...

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discussion

Potential collaboration: integrating acoustics and NASA airborne remote sensing to monitor animal and habitat biodiversity

Antonio Ferraz

30 November 2022 1:17am

Hi everyone. I’m looking for an ecologist/ornithologist with experience in bioacoustics to collaborate on a project integrating on-the-ground acoustics with synchronous NASA...

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Chris Nicholas

10 December 2022 6:18am

Although not a professor, I know a fair number through long-term association with scgis.org, and personally am using Audiomoths in collaboration with the UC System at the Blue Oak Reserve. 

I've developed a fair bit of scripts to automatically crunch things using 'Birdnet', as per: 

I can certainly facilitate dialogue with the Cornell Ornithology lab if you do not have those connections already.  

My own background is in remote sensing (SAR, etc) and currently working in machine learning (albeit for health care currently..) this project sounds fascinating!



Are you already working with Audubon, and/or people in the UC System?

Chris Nicholas

10 December 2022 6:22am

I'll also note that I'm planning to work with a few parks in the DRC/Congo basin to deploy Audiomoths alongside their camera traps. 

Christos Astaras

13 January 2023 12:24pm

Dear Antonio,

It is a long-shot, but this may be relevant to what you are looking for? I have collected across 4 seasons (2022) 8-10 days/season acoustic data from 11 stations located at pine forests of different post-fire regeneration stage (>20 years since last burn, burnt in 2001, 2009, 2018) in Greece. These are typical Mediterranean forest pine landscapes - but certainly not in California or South Africa. We did not have plans at present to continue collecting data - since we got all seasons of one year, but may be the existing data or future data from these or similar areas here in Greece would be relevant to what you wish to accomplish with the airborne measurements?

Feel free to drop me a line.

All the best,

Christos

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discussion

Unifying acoustic metadata

Jamie Macaulay

2 November 2022 10:21am

Let's be honest, there are only a few of us that get super excited about metadata standards. However, it's perhaps ironic that the highly technical (and perhaps boring to some)...

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Liz Ferguson

4 November 2022 3:47pm

Hi Jamie, this is super exciting! I had not realized that PAMGuard integration was going to be part of the plan for Tethys - so thrilling! 

One quick question - when processing large datasets, often I end up with a series of binary/database files (e.g., separate runs for separate frequency bands). Does Tethys accommodate the multiple file scenario? 

Would love to give it a whirl when appropriate. 

Jamie Macaulay

7 November 2022 12:32pm

Yeah, it's an exciting project. Also will be a great excuse to improve PAMGuard documentation - something sorely needed. Python libraries also on the way as part of this.

As for Tethys, yes it will accommodate the multiple configuration file scenario - ideally the end game will be that any configuration you use in PAMGuard will be directly exportable to a Tethys database. If you use multiple configurations, then each is a separate Tethys database, however, when these are exported they can be amalgamated into one because the Tethys is clever enough to know these are the same data processed in different ways. 

"Would love to give it a whirl when appropriate. " - might be a while but noted! :-)

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