VOA标准英语2013--New Software Tells Who's in the Forest and Who Isn't

 

New Software Tells Who's in the Forest and Who Isn't

If you listen closely to a recording¹ of a rainforest in Puerto Rico, you probably will not be able to count how many frogs you hear.  Unfortunately, one of those frogs - the one with the really high-pitched chirps², like tapping on glass - is called a Plains Coqui, and it is endangered.

Scientists struggle with this problem every day. Thousands of species die out each year, and they want to know how climate change and habitat destruction are affecting animals like the Plains Coqui. But how can scientists know if they’re dying out if they don’t even know how many there are?

That’s where the Automated³ Remote Biodiversity Monitoring Network, or ARBIMON, comes in.

“It’s a generic⁴ system to monitor biodiversity," said Mitchell Aide of the University of Puerto Rico, who is one of the leaders of the ARBIMON team. The team has developed new technology that could help conservationists monitor biodiversity worldwide.

"The software is set up for the user to use it for whatever species they’re interested in, it could be snapping shrimp⁵, or whales, or it could be frogs or insects or monkeys,” Aide added.  

Researchers place small, inexpensive sound recorders - often reprogrammed iPods - in the rainforest, where they take short sound samples every 10 minutes around the clock. The recordings⁶ are sent in real time to a central computer.

The scientists program the computer to recognize the sounds of different animals in the recordings, and then they let the software run. It can analyze⁷ tens of thousands of recordings in less than an hour, and tell researchers which animals are in the rainforest, which aren’t, who’s making sounds when and who’s not.

For example, when researchers looked at five years of recordings in Puerto Rico, they noticed that the endangered frog called less and less over four years. This could be cause for alarm, but in the fifth year the frog's appearance in the samples bounced back to its original levels. This information about what appears to be the frog population's natural rhythm would not have been available without long-term data.

The team now has recording stations in Hawaii, Arizona, Costa Rica, Brazil and many other locations. Over months or even years, Aide says scientists can build a sound picture of the landscape, and what lives there.

“We’re creating a permanent record," he said. "In a sense, each recording is the equivalent of a specimen⁸ in a museum. We’re going to archive these recordings so anybody can have access to them today, or in five years, or in 20 years, and go back and say, ‘What were the sounds like in this forest, in this city, on this island, 15, 20 years ago?’”

The ARBIMON software and its archive of sound is freely available to everyone, scientists and citizens alike, at arbimon.com.

1 recording   

n.录音，记录

参考例句：

• How long will the recording of the song take?录下这首歌得花多少时间？
• I want to play you a recording of the rehearsal.我想给你放一下彩排的录像。

2 chirps   

鸟叫，虫鸣( chirp的第三人称单数 )； 啾； 啾啾

参考例句：

• The linnet chirps her vernal song. 红雀吱喳鸣叫着她春天的歌。
• She heard nothing but the chirps and whirrs of insects. 除了虫的鸣叫声外，她什么也没听见。

3 automated   

a.自动化的

参考例句：

• The entire manufacturing process has been automated. 整个生产过程已自动化。
• Automated Highway System (AHS) is recently regarded as one subsystem of Intelligent Transport System (ITS). 近年来自动公路系统(Automated Highway System,AHS)，作为智能运输系统的子系统之一越来越受到重视。

4 generic   

adj.一般的，普通的，共有的

参考例句：

• I usually buy generic clothes instead of name brands.我通常买普通的衣服，不买名牌。
• The generic woman appears to have an extraordinary faculty for swallowing the individual.一般妇女在婚后似乎有特别突出的抑制个性的能力。

5 shrimp   

n.虾，小虾；矮小的人

参考例句：

• When the shrimp farm is built it will block the stream.一旦养虾场建起来，将会截断这条河流。
• When it comes to seafood,I like shrimp the best.说到海鲜，我最喜欢虾。

6 recordings   

n.记录( recording的名词复数 )；录音；录像；唱片

参考例句：

• a boxed set of original recordings 一套盒装原声录音带
• old jazz recordings reissued on CD 以激光唱片重新发行的老爵士乐

7 analyze   

vt.分析，解析 (=analyse)

参考例句：

• We should analyze the cause and effect of this event.我们应该分析这场事变的因果。
• The teacher tried to analyze the cause of our failure.老师设法分析我们失败的原因。

8 specimen   

n.样本，标本

参考例句：

• You'll need tweezers to hold up the specimen.你要用镊子来夹这标本。
• This specimen is richly variegated in colour.这件标本上有很多颜色。