Seabird surveillance: combining CCTV and artificial intelligence for monitoring and research

Ecological research and monitoring need to be able to rapidly convey information that can form the basis of scientifically sound management. Automated sensor systems, especially if combined with artificial intelligence, can contribute to such rapid high-resolution data retrieval. Here, we explore the prospects of automated methods to generate insights for seabirds, which are often monitored for their high conservation value and for being sentinels for marine ecosystem changes. We have developed a system of video surveillance combined with automated image processing, which we apply to common murres Uria aalge. The system uses a deep learning algorithm for object detection (YOLOv5) that has been trained on annotated images of adult birds, chicks and eggs, and outputs time, location, size and confidence level of all detections, frame-by-frame, in the supplied video material. A total of 144 million bird detections were generated from a breeding cliff over three complete breeding seasons (2019–2021). We demonstrate how object detection can be used to accurately monitor breeding phenology and chick growth. Our automated monitoring approach can also identify and quantify rare events that are easily missed in traditional monitoring, such as disturbances from predators. Further, combining automated video analysis with continuous measurements from a temperature logger allows us to study impacts of heat waves on nest attendance in high detail. Our automated system thus produces comparable, and in several cases significantly more detailed, data than those generated from observational field studies. By running in real time on the camera streams, it has the potential to supply researchers and managers with high-resolution up-to-date information on seabird population status. We describe how the system can be modified to fit various types of ecological research and monitoring goals and thereby provide up-to-date support for conservation and ecosystem management

New precision era of experiments on strong interaction with strangeness at DAFNE/LNF-INFN

The strong-interaction shifts and widths of kaonic hydrogen, deuterium, 3He, and 4He were measured in the SIDDHARTA experiment. The most precise values of the shift and width of the kaonic hydrogen 1s state were determined to be ϵ1s = −283 ± 36(stat)±6(syst) eV and Γ1s = 541±89(stat)±22(syst) eV. The upper limit of the kaonic deuterium Kα yield was found to be ≤ 0.39%. In addition, the shifts and widths of the kaonic 3He and 4He 2p states were determined to be ϵ2p(3He) = −2 ± 2(stat) ± 4(syst) eV and Γ2p(3He) = 6 ± 6(stat) ± 7(syst) eV; ϵ2p(4He) = +5 ± 3(stat) ± 4(syst) eV and Γ2p(4He) = 14 ± 8(stat) ± 5(syst) eV. These values are important for the constraints of the low-energy K¯N$\bar KN$ interaction in theoretical approaches

Environmental Stability and Infectivity of Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) in Different Human Body Fluids.

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a hepatotropic, blood-borne virus, but in up to one-third of infections of the transmission route remained unidentified. Viral genome copies of HCV have been identified in several body fluids, however, non-parental transmission upon exposure to contaminated body fluids seems to be rare. Several body fluids, e.g., tears and saliva, are renowned for their antimicrobial and antiviral properties, nevertheless, HCV stability has never been systematically analyzed in those fluids. We used state of the art infectious HCV cell culture techniques to investigate the stability of HCV in different body fluids to estimate the potential risk of transmission via patient body fluid material. In addition, we mimicked a potential contamination of HCV in tear fluid and analyzed which impact commercially available contact lens solutions might have in such a scenario. We could demonstrate that HCV remains infectious over several days in body fluids like tears, saliva, semen, and cerebrospinal fluid. Only hydrogen-peroxide contact lens solutions were able to efficiently inactivate HCV in a suspension test. These results indicate that HCV, once it is present in various body fluids of infected patients, remains infective and could potentially contribute to transmission upon direct contact