Suffolk Reporter

A team of researchers from Stony Brook University has developed a new method to analyze tourist photos for tracking ecological changes in Antarctica. The study, published in PLOS One, utilizes images of penguins taken by tourists to identify their locations over time, providing insights into the factors affecting their abundance and distribution.

Heather Lynch, lead investigator and Endowed Professor of Ecology & Evolution at Stony Brook University, has focused her research on penguin populations in Antarctica. She explains that the numerous tourist photos available online can be a valuable resource for monitoring these populations. "There are far more tourists in Antarctica than scientists, and virtually everybody has a camera in their pocket and many take photos of penguins," says Lynch.

The researchers used satellite imagery and 3D computerization methods to determine the location and orientation of cameras when the photos were taken. This data was combined with a tool called the Segment Anything Model to delineate penguin colony boundaries within the photographs. The technique involves two main challenges: segmentation to identify colony edges and georeferencing to pinpoint geographic coordinates.

Lynch notes that segmentation is difficult due to gradual boundaries where penguins nest at lower densities near edges. Georeferencing is also challenging because Antarctica lacks static features commonly used for matching images in other environments.

By creating a 3D model using satellite images overlaid on digital elevation models, researchers could locate camera positions accurately. They then applied boundary data from the Segment Anything Model onto this 3D model to extract precise colony boundaries.

"In theory, this information gathered by the computational technique can be compared to other similarly processed images of the Antarctic to see how penguin colonies are changing over time," says Lynch.

While traditional methods like satellite images or aerial photography are common for monitoring changes in Antarctica, they may not always be available. Tourist photos offer an alternative source for long-term environmental data collection.

The study highlights promising results but acknowledges challenges such as image quality variations and dynamic landscapes. Researchers believe this approach could extend beyond monitoring penguins to applications like observing glacial retreat.

This interdisciplinary project involved collaboration among ecologists, computer scientists, mathematicians, and geologists from Stony Brook University's Lynch Lab and Dimitris Samaras’ lab in the Department of Computer Science.