Delafield-based artificial intelligence startup Synthetaic and its flagship product, the Rapid Automatic Image Detection tool, have helped scientists working for The Nature Conservancy discover two species of seabird previously thought to be locally extinct.
Arlington County, Virginia-based TNC, a global nonprofit dedicated to conservation efforts in more than 70 countries, was using the RAIC platform to detect seabirds in the Palmyra Atoll, just south of the Hawaiian Islands. RAIC was able to locate a blue noddy and a wedge-tailed shearwater.
Both birds were believed to have been extirpated, or made locally extinct, during World War II. TNC believes this was likely due to disturbances to their habitat and the introduction of predatory, invasive rats.
;
