Thousands of emperor penguins waddling around Antarctica have a stalker: A yellow rover tracking their every move. ECHO is a remote-controlled ground robot that silently spies on the emperor penguin colony in Atka Bay. The robot is being monitored by the Single Penguin Observation and Tracking (SPOT) observatory. Both the SPOT observatory, which is also remote-operated through a satellite link, and the ECHO robot capture photographs and videos of animal population in the Arctic.
The research is part of the Marine Animal Remote Sensing Lab (MARE), designed to measure the health of the Antarctic marine ecosystem. The project, funded by the independent nonprofit Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, focuses on emperor penguins' place on the food chain. In the Antarctic the food chain is relatively small and any change to a species that is lower in the food chain could impact the health of the emperor penguin (a predator). The team is hoping to learn more about how climate change might be impacting the animals that live in the Antarctic.
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https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/05/06/robot-with-antarctica-penguins/9585536002/
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