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About Illinois Valley news. (Cave City, Oregon) 1937-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 8, 2003)
Illinois Valley News, Cave Junction, OR Wednesday, October 8, 2003 Technology to identify insects OSU experts’ goal A team of experts at Oregon State University (OSU) at Corvallis hopes to bring the powerful tools of artificial intelligence to the world of ecology and environmental protection, with a new $1.7 million grant from the National Science Foundation to cre- ate technology that can identify insects. This application of “machine learning” could expand the frontiers of a computer science field known as pattern recogni- tion, such as the systems that now use computers to identify fingerprints. Fingerprints are easy, however, compared to identifying insects -- flexi- ble, three-dimensional ob- jects that come in many shapes, sizes, colors and configurations. And there are a lot of them. In Ore- gon, a square meter of soil can contain from 100,000 to 300,000 individuals rep- resenting two to 200 spe- cies. But if the challenge is huge, so is the potential environmental payoff, said OSU. “When we perfect a low-cost, efficient method to use computers to moni- tor insect populations, it will revolutionize water quality monitoring, which will be one of the first ap- plications,” said Tom Diet- terich, an OSU professor of computer science. “And in forest management, ecolo- gists are hampered by lack of a way to easily measure insect populations and bio- diversity. We might be able to speed up that proc- ess about 1,000 times.” What is needed is a system that can collect, manipulate, photograph and identify small insects, quite quickly, accurately and in large numbers. And a long-term goal, the re- searchers say, is to create machine and computer sys- tems that can be “retrained” for application to different sets of insects or a broad range of other pattern recognition prob- lems. One of the first insects the scientists will try to identify is stonefly larvae, which are known to be a sensitive indicator of stream health and water quality. Changes in water qual- ity over time can be tracked by monitoring changes in the composition of aquatic insect communi- ties, providing more impor- tant information than a check on water at any one point in time. Researchers have known for some time the value of such monitoring, but the cost of collecting, counting and identifying the insects with highly- trained and often scarce experts is prohibitive. A computer system that could do so would be of enormous value, even if only for this one applica- tion. And the broad fields of stream and terrestrial ecology, agriculture, for- estry and many other areas could ultimately provide a myriad of uses for technol- ogy that could identify small, irregular objects quickly and accurately. To expand the field of pattern recognition, scien- tists hope for advances in two areas -- the use of “feature” dictionaries in which a computer can find, identify and use thousands of visual features from an object to determine its identity; and “relational appearance” methods, in which computers figure out what objects might look like under a wide variety of viewing angles and light- ing conditions. The con- (541) 476-2127 Elementary Schools Menu Sponsored by ‘Illinois Valley News’ 592-2541 321 S. Redwood Hwy. THURSDAY, OCT. 9 *Cheese stix, cheeseburger, pepperoni pizza, super sub sandwich, fiesta salad FRIDAY, OCT. 10 *Statewide In Service Day - no classes MONDAY, OCT. 13 *Chicken nuggets, hamburger, cheese pizza, PB&J sandwich, chef salad TUESDAY, OCT. 14 *Beef & bean burrito, cheeseburger, pepperoni pizza, ham & cheese sandwich, garden salad, jungle crackers WEDNESDAY, OCT. 15 *Corn dog, hamburger, cheese pizza, tuna salad sandwich, cobb salad cept of “machine learning” or artificial intelligence implies that the computer systems, by themselves, will help decide which fea- tures and which views can be of the most help in mak- ing accurate identifica- tions. There may be fewer than a dozen taxonomic specialists in all of North America with the expertise to perform all of the needed analyses, the re- searchers said. OSU is in an ideal po- sition for this type of inter- disciplinary research, the scientists say, because it can combine the skills of experts in a variety of computer science, natural resource and engineering fields. They will employ a large number of under- graduate and graduate stu- dents, and the project di- rectors also hope to inte- grate some of the experi- ments used in the work to train middle school and high school teachers. Commercial spin-offs and new start-up compa- nies using the technology that emerges from this re- search are also likely, he said. Sunday, Sept. 28 *3:23 p.m., grass fire, 19700 block Redwood Hwy. Tuesday, Sept. 30 *7:53 a.m., motor ve- hicle accident, 33000 block Redwood Hwy. *9:23 a.m., medical standby, 681 Caves Hwy. *1:02 p.m., motor ve- hicle accident, mile post 34.5 Redwood Hwy. Wednesday, Oct. 1 *9:04 a.m., electrical fire, 400 block Walters Drive. *5:44 p.m., medical assist, 6400 block Deer Creek Road *9:59 p.m., medical assist, 400 block S. Red- wood Hwy. *10:10 p.m., structure fire, 100 block Forest Creek Road. Thursday, Oct. 2 *12:11 a.m., medical assist, 200 block E. River St. *4:56 a.m., vehicle fire, 100 block School St. *8:08 a.m., public as- sist, 100 block Forest Creek *2:09 p.m., illegal burn, 200 block Schumacher *2:47 p.m., motor ve- hicle accident, Redwood Hwy. and Reeves Creek Road. *6:20 p.m., medical assist, 600 block E. River St. *9:10 a.m., medical assist, 400 block Aquarias Way. Saturday, Oct. 4 *8:34 a.m., motor ve- hicle accident, 4200 block Takilma Road *4:42 p.m., medical assist, 400 block Addison Lane *5:21 p.m., smoke in- vestigation, Reeves Creek Road and Lakeshore Drive *7:22 p.m. medical assist, 200 block Forest Creek *7:33 p.m., medical assist, 300 block Caves Hwy. Sunday, Oct. 5 *11:31 a.m., medical assist, 472 O’Brien Road *5:16 p.m., explosion, 300 block Cricket Lane *8:06 p.m., grass fire, 1100 block Lone Mountain Road Monday, Oct. 6 *1:55 a.m., medical assist, 200 block Ollis Road No. 57. Page 13 GP man shares secret to making the perfect taco A new invention called the Taco Bender has been specially created to provide an easier and more effi- cient method of frying the folded tortillas. Its unique design prevents the tortillas from collapsing or closing and there fore frying in that form. Additionally, it al- lows individuals to make taco shells as fast as they can fry them. The inventor, Larry Walker, from Grants Pass, began developing the idea in June. Frustrated from having numerous shells collapse as he fried them, Walker conceived the Taco Bender for every taco lover’s benefit. This origi- nal idea is now being made available for licensing to manufacturers interested in new product development, especially in the taco uten- sils industry. Walker is hoping to have Taco Bender in full production and available to the public in the near future. Florida-based Inven- tion Technologies, Inc. is handling the publicity and public relations for Taco Bender.