Asian elephant (Elephas maximus)

Mohamed bin Zayed Species project number 212526804

Elephant AID: Conserving elephants by mitigating human-wildlife conflict with infrasound early warning system

The overall objective of this project is to help reduce human-elephant interaction in one of the conflict hotspots of the Western Ghats. By developing an automated early-warning system that uses low-frequency microphones and on-board processing of acoustic signals, we will be able to detect elephant presence and movement and send alerts to the relevant authorities and the local communities. Our aims are: 1. Design the Elephant – Automated Infrasonic Device (Elephant-AID): Our device will use a low-frequency microphone with a wide frequency response (10 Hz - 15 kHz). The signal will be processed on-board to detect elephants using a machine-learning approach. Alerts will be sent as text messages, detailing the elephant location and probability of a threat. In areas with limited connectivity, LoRa devices will be used to connect to the nearest cellular network. 2. Test Elephant-AID’s efficiency: The efficiency of the system will be tested in both controlled and real-life on-ground situations by a) quantifying accuracy (false positive and false negative detections), and b) measuring the rate of human-elephant conflict in deployment and control areas. While reducing false negatives is our immediate goal, lowering ‘false alarms’ is crucial for the long-term success of the project.