Protecting the unseen; conservation technology solutions to preserve secluded ecosystems

Emperor penguins breed through the dark Antarctic winter on sea ice, in one of Earth’s most extreme environments, making them difficult to monitor yet invaluable as indicators of Southern Ocean health. Our program follows penguins across their lives and vast ocean areas by combining long-term field observations with electronic tagging, animal-borne sensors, robotics, and satellite data, linking what happens to individual animals with large-scale ecosystem change. We extend the same approach to whales through Whalespotter, using stabilized thermal cameras, AI, and expert verification to detect whales up to seven kilometers away ??" day or night ??" and cut the risk of deadly ship strikes by over ninety percent. Like penguins, whales are sentinels of ocean health. Together, these efforts show how one integrated toolkit can turn iconic species into partners in observation, providing crucial knowledge to monitor and protect Antarctica and the wider ocean in a rapidly changing world.

Speaker: Daniel Zitterbart, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

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