SC Connecticut News

The Map of Life Rapid Assessments (MOLRA) team, based at Yale University, has been awarded a $2 million prize in the XPRIZE Rainforest competition. This global contest aims to discover innovative technologies for exploring Earth's biodiversity. The MOLRA team secured second place in this five-year competition, which began in 2019 with 300 teams from around the world.

Led by Walter Jetz, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Yale, the MOLRA team uses unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to collect biodiversity data in remote areas. "We are immensely excited about this recognition," said Jetz. "In the face of rapid biodiversity loss, more accessible and effective tools to measure and plan for biodiversity are urgently needed."

The competition's final round took place near Manaus, Brazil, where teams were tasked with surveying 100 hectares of tropical rainforest within 24 hours and producing real-time insights within 48 hours. The MOLRA team recorded 225 species using their UAVs, which collected over 4,000 photos and numerous audio recordings and environmental DNA samples.

The team's success is attributed to several factors: leveraging the Map of Life database to predict species presence, operating autonomously without specialists on site, and combining artificial intelligence with human expertise for accurate species identification.

With support from Yale Ventures and other partners like Esri and Sony Group Corporation, MOLRA plans to use its prize money to expand its work globally. Nigel Pitman from the Field Museum highlighted the goal of delivering scalable biodiversity assessment solutions that empower local stakeholders.

"The technological advances and automation of biodiversity surveys is a major step towards being able to catalog the distribution of Earth's biodiversity efficiently," said Izeni Farias from the Federal University of Amazonas.