Indicator Bats Program: A System for the Global Acoustic Monitoring of Bats

Bats are an important component of mammalian biodiversity and fill such a wide array of ecological niches that they may offer an important multisensory bioindicator role in assessing ecosystem health. There is a need to monitor population trends of bats for their own sake because many populations face numerous environmental threats related to climate change, habitat loss, fragmentation, hunting, and emerging diseases. To be able to establish bat ultrasonic biodiversity trends as a reliable indicator, it is important to standardize monitoring protocols, data management, and analyses. This chapter discusses the main issues to be considered in developing a bat ultrasonic indicator. It focuses on the results from indicator bats program (iBats), a system for the global acoustic monitoring of bats, in Eastern Europe. Finally, the chapter reviews the strengths and weaknesses of the Program and considers the opportunities and threats that it may face in the future.

Living with Fire

Dr Ian Weir appears on ABC Televisions WA Statewide program to discuss the H House (featured) and the cost savings associated with taking an integrated approach to building in bushfire prone areas.

Automated sensory data alignment for environmental and epidermal change monitoring

In this paper we present research adapting a state of the art condition-invariant robotic place recognition algorithm to the role of automated inter- and intra-image alignment of sensor observations of environmental and skin change over time. The approach involves inverting the typical criteria placed upon navigation algorithms in robotics; we exploit rather than attempt to fix the limited camera viewpoint invariance of such algorithms, showing that approximate viewpoint repetition is realistic in a wide range of environments and medical applications. We demonstrate the algorithms automatically aligning challenging visual data from a range of real-world applications: ecological monitoring of environmental change, aerial observation of natural disasters including flooding, tsunamis and bushfires and tracking wound recovery and sun damage over time and present a prototype active guidance system for enforcing viewpoint repetition. We hope to provide an interesting case study for how traditional research criteria in robotics can be inverted to provide useful outcomes in applied situations.

An updated analysis of death data during the Morwell mine fire

An updated analysis of the previous analysis available here: http://eprints.qut.edu.au/76230/

Remote monitoring of underwater objects

A system for monitoring conditions in a remote environment. The system comprising a data transmission network including a plurality of data sensing nodes. Each data sensing node includes an environment sensing means for periodically sensing the environment around node, a transmission means for periodic wireless transmission of sensed data to adjacent data sensing nodes. These adjacent data sensing nodes combining their sensed data with the received data from other data sensing nodes and on transmit the combined data.

Challenges in field monitoring of energy performance of air conditioners

Experimental work could be conducted in either laboratory or at field site. Generally, the laboratory experiments are carried out in an artificial setting and with a highly controlled environment. By contrast, the field experiments often take place in a natural setting, subject to the influences of many uncontrolled factors. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully assess the possible limitations and appropriateness of an experiment before embarking on it. In this paper, a case study of field monitoring of the energy performance of air conditioners is presented. Significant challenges facing the experimental work are described. Lessons learnt from this case study are also discussed. In particular, it was found that on-going analysis of the monitoring data and the correction of abnormal issues are two of the keys for a successful field test program. It was also shown that the installation of monitoring systems could have a significant impact on the accuracy of the data being collected. Before monitoring system was set up to collect monitoring data, it is recommended that an initial analysis of sample monitored data should be conducted to make sure that the monitoring data can achieve the expected precision. In the case where inevitable inherent errors were induced from the installation of field monitoring systems, appropriate remediation may need to be developed and implemented for the improved accuracy of the estimation of results. On-going analysis of monitoring data and correction of any abnormal issues would be the key to a successful field test program.

Autonomous vehicle path planning for persistence monitoring under uncertainty using Gaussian based Markov decision process

One of the main challenges facing online and offline path planners is the uncertainty in the magnitude and direction of the environmental energy because it is dynamic, changeable with time, and hard to forecast. This thesis develops an artificial intelligence for a mobile robot to learn from historical or forecasted data of environmental energy available in the area of interest which will help for a persistence monitoring under uncertainty using the developed algorithm.

Development and parameterization of a rain- and fire-driven model for exploring elephant effects in African savannas

We describe the development and parameterization of a grid-based model of African savanna vegetation processes. The model was developed with the objective of exploring elephant effects on the diversity of savanna species and structure, and in this formulation concentrates on the relative cover of grass and woody plants, the vertical structure of the woody plant community, and the distribution of these over space. Grid cells are linked by seed dispersal and fire, and environmental variability is included in the form of stochastic rainfall and fire events. The model was parameterized from an extensive review of the African savanna literature; when available, parameter values varied widely. The most plausible set of parameters produced long-term coexistence between woody plants and grass, with the tree-grass balance being more sensitive to changes in parameters influencing demographic processes and drought incidence and response, while less sensitive to fire regime. There was considerable diversity in the woody structure of savanna systems within the range of uncertainty in tree growth rate parameters. Thus, given the paucity of height growth data regarding woody plant species in southern African savannas, managers of natural areas should be cognizant of different tree species growth and damage response attributes when considering whether to act on perceived elephant threats to vegetation. © 2007 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.

A model-framed evaluation of elephant effects on tree and fire dynamics in African savannas

There is a concern that high densities of elephants in southern Africa could lead to the overall reduction of other forms of biodiversity. We present a grid-based model of elephant-savanna dynamics, which differs from previous elephant-vegetation models by accounting for woody plant demographics, tree-grass interactions, stochastic environmental variables (fire and rainfall), and spatial contagion of fire and tree recruitment. The model projects changes in height structure and spatial pattern of trees over periods of centuries. The vegetation component of the model produces long-term tree-grass coexistence, and the emergent fire frequencies match those reported for southern African savannas. Including elephants in the savanna model had the expected effect of reducing woody plant cover, mainly via increased adult tree mortality, although at an elephant density of 1.0 elephant/km2, woody plants still persisted for over a century. We tested three different scenarios in addition to our default assumptions. (1) Reducing mortality of adult trees after elephant use, mimicking a more browsing-tolerant tree species, mitigated the detrimental effect of elephants on the woody population. (2) Coupling germination success (increased seedling recruitment) to elephant browsing further increased tree persistence, and (3) a faster growing woody component allowed some woody plant persistence for at least a century at a density of 3 elephants/km2. Quantitative models of the kind presented here provide a valuable tool for exploring the consequences of management decisions involving the manipulation of elephant population densities. © 2005 by the Ecological Society of America.

Monitoring does not always count

The gross under-resourcing of conservation endeavours has placed an increasing emphasis on spending accountability. Increased accountability has led to monitoring forming a central element of conservation programs. Although there is little doubt that information obtained from monitoring can improve management of biodiversity, the cost (in time and/or money) of gaining this knowledge is rarely considered when making decisions about allocation of resources to monitoring. We present a simple framework allowing managers and policy advisors to make decisions about when to invest in monitoring to improve management. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd.

Should we implement monitoring or research for conservation?

[Letter to editor, brief commentary or brief communication ]