In the lush expanses of China’s Qinling Mountains, endangered golden snub-nosed monkeys are getting a high-tech helping hand. Researchers have harnessed artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance conservation efforts, offering new hope for these rare primates and other vulnerable species.
June marks the peak time to monitor newborn golden snub-nosed monkeys. At the national scientific observation and research station in Foping County, Shaanxi Province, a team from the College of Life Sciences at Northwest University is diligently collecting data on approximately 100 monkeys across eight families.
Led by Professor Guo Songtao, the research team has developed an AI-powered identification system. “Our AI system can recognize individual monkeys like Xiaoxiaoqing, providing detailed information such as name, genetic data, and social group,” Guo explained. The algorithm was trained using hundreds of thousands of single frames extracted from hours of video footage, allowing precise identification of each monkey.
Graduate students like Zhang Jinbang and Liu Hongying are integral to the project, engaging in tasks such as weighing the monkeys each season. “We’ll use the data in future studies to understand how factors like nutrition affect their weight,” Liu noted.
The innovative AI technology isn’t limited to primates; it’s also being applied to observe takins, another vulnerable species in the region. The Qinling Mountains, covering over 50,000 square kilometers, are a biodiversity hotspot, home to a myriad of plants and animals including giant pandas and crested ibises—all under national first-class protection.
As a natural boundary between China’s north and south, the Qinling Mountains are often referred to as China’s gene bank of wild biology. The integration of AI into wildlife conservation here signifies a promising advancement in protecting the nation’s unique and treasured fauna.
