A team from the University of Exeter is bringing A.I. into the fight against Asian hornets, which prey on native species, threatening agriculture. Researcher Thomas O'Shea-Wheller says unlike traditional trapping, the AI system is a monitoring station which identifies the species with more accuracy and without harm.

Exeter

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A research team at the University of Exeter is incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) in the battle against invasive Asian hornets, which pose a significant threat to native species and agriculture. The Asian hornets are notorious for preying on indigenous species, thereby creating an imbalance in the ecosystem and potentially harming agricultural productivity. The team, including researcher Thomas O'Shea-Wheller, is deploying an AI-based monitoring station specifically designed to identify these invasive hornets more accurately.

Unlike traditional methods of combating invasive species, which often involve trapping and potentially harming non-target species, this AI solution aims to identify Asian hornets without causing damage to other species. The technology focuses on precise identification, thus minimizing the impact on the environment and native wildlife. This innovation represents a significant step forward in the use of technology for environmental protection and agricultural safety.



A.I. joins the fight against invasive Asian hornets

This is the invasive Asian hornet, but would you be able to idea it from a glance? The species has been wreaking havoc across the globe, preying on native pollinators like honeybees. And they've been getting away with it because they're often misidentified for other species. That's where the University of Exeter's new AI-driven system comes in. It allows users to spot the hornets with remarkable accuracy, and helps save local species along the way. The system is called VESP-AI. The way VESP-AI works is, it's not so much a trap as it is a sort of passive bait or monitoring station. Thomas O'Shea Weller is one of the researchers behind it. It has this liquid hornet attractant, which is made with sugar and fermented fruit compounds, which attracts hornets, wasps, and there's even a camera mounted above it, which takes images of these insects so that then the AI can watch all of these images and identify what insects it's seeing with a specific lookout for Asian hornets. Once the hornet is identified, whoever is operating the system is sent an email or text alert. The team says catching the hornet's arrival early is crucial to prevent an invasion. If this narrow window is missed, the production of new queens can occur, and a population will likely establish. Currently, the UK relies on the public to report Asian hornets. It's a laborious and limited method. Agencies have to manually validate thousands of images each year, most of which are misidentified. Traditional hornet trapping also ends up killing a lot of native insects. Hornet traps, although they're designed to attract hornets, tend to kill more native pollinators than they do catch hornets, whereas VespAI is just a camera and some food, so it's not harming anything and having no ecological impact as it searches for the hornets. So far, VespAI has been tested on the island of Jersey off the coast of France, where it's successfully distinguished between Asian and European hornets, as well as other insects. As more and more sightings in the UK occur, the team says they plan on deploying additional prototypes. So what we're trying to do with the VespAI system is really bring a completely automated process, so a monitor that can be awake the whole time, vigilant the whole time, and that doesn't require human input to be constantly checking for incursions of the hornets.

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