UK'S Shabana Mahmood appointed new interior minister
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer carried out a major cabinet reshuffle on Friday (September 5), appointing new deputies as well as foreign and inte...
Google has open sourced SpeciesNet, an artificial intelligence model designed to automatically identify animal species from photos captured by camera traps.
The new tool is expected to accelerate wildlife research by dramatically reducing the time it takes to sift through the massive volumes of data generated by these devices.
Camera traps—digital cameras equipped with infrared sensors—are widely used by researchers around the world to monitor wildlife populations. However, the sheer quantity of images they produce can delay data analysis by days or even weeks. SpeciesNet addresses this challenge by classifying images into more than 2,000 labels, ranging from specific animal species and broader taxa such as “mammalian” or “Felidae” to non-animal objects like vehicles.
The model is a key component of Google’s Wildlife Insights platform, an initiative launched about six years ago under the Google Earth Outreach philanthropy program. Wildlife Insights enables researchers to share, identify, and analyze wildlife images online, fostering collaboration to speed up data processing. SpeciesNet was trained on over 65 million publicly available images, supplemented by data from organizations such as the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, the Wildlife Conservation Society, the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, and the Zoological Society of London.
In a blog post published Monday, Google stated, “The SpeciesNet AI model release will enable tool developers, academics, and biodiversity-related startups to scale monitoring of biodiversity in natural areas.” The model is now available on GitHub under an Apache 2.0 license, allowing commercial use with minimal restrictions.
While Google’s release is not the only open-source solution for automating camera trap analysis—Microsoft’s AI for Good Lab has developed PyTorch Wildlife, an AI framework for animal detection and classification—SpeciesNet marks a significant step in democratizing access to advanced AI tools for wildlife research.
By streamlining the analysis of camera trap data, SpeciesNet is poised to support conservation efforts and provide deeper insights into global biodiversity, ultimately aiding researchers in monitoring and protecting ecosystems more effectively.
AnewZ has learned that India has once again blocked Azerbaijan’s application for full membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, while Pakistan’s recent decision to consider diplomatic relations with Armenia has been coordinated with Baku as part of Azerbaijan’s peace agenda.
A powerful eruption at Japan’s Shinmoedake volcano sent an ash plume more than 3,000 metres high on Sunday morning, prompting safety warnings from authorities.
A day of mourning has been declared in Portugal to pay respect to victims who lost their lives in the Lisbon Funicular crash which happened on Wednesday evening.
The UK is gearing up for Exercise Pegasus 2025, its largest pandemic readiness test since COVID-19. Running from September to November, this full-scale simulation will challenge the country's response to a fast-moving respiratory outbreak.
A Polish Air Force pilot was killed on Thursday when an F-16 fighter jet crashed during a training flight ahead of the 2025 Radom International Air Show.
U.S. President Donald Trump will host more than two dozen technology and business leaders on Thursday for a dinner in the newly renovated White House Rose Garden, a White House official said.
SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft successfully completed an initial test Wednesday to demonstrate a new capability that helps maintain the International Space Station’s (ISS) orbital altitude.
A Chinese research team has unveiled a prototype washing machine designed for use in space, joining a growing international push to solve one of the more mundane but pressing challenges of long-duration missions: laundry.
The world’s seven largest technology companies – Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Nvidia and Tesla – collectively reported a net profit of $143 billion in the second quarter, representing a 27.6% increase year-on-year, according to their financial statements.
Billionaire Elon Musk filed a motion on Thursday seeking to dismiss a civil lawsuit brought by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which accused him of waiting too long in 2022 to disclose a significant stake in social media platform Twitter, later renamed X.
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