From UC Berkeley News
Using AI and iNaturalist, scientists build one of the highest resolution maps yet of California plants
By Robert Sanders
With the help of deep learning, University of California, Berkeley, scientists have leveraged citizen science data from the app iNaturalist to create the highest resolution maps yet of plant distributions throughout California.
iNaturalist is a widely-used cellphone app, originally developed by UC Berkeley students [at the School of Information], that allows people to upload photos and the location data of plants, animals or any other life they encounter and then crowdsource their identity. The app currently has more than 8 million users worldwide who collectively have uploaded more than 200 million observations.
The researchers used a type of artificial intelligence called a convolutional neural network, which is a deep learning model, to correlate the citizen science data for plants in California with high-resolution remote-sensing satellite or airplane images of the state. The network discovered correlations that were then used to predict the current range of 2,221 plant species throughout California, down to scales of a few square meters...
iNaturalist was conceived by MIMS alumni Jessica Kline Ken-ichi Ueda, and Nathan Agrin as a 2008 final project. The project is still run by Ueda and recently received the Heinz Award.
