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Systems for tracking animals and measuring behaviour

Country of Origin: Italy
Reference Number: TOIT20160414001
Publication Date: 14 April 2016

Summary

The Italian company is specialized in the development and production of miniature GPS loggers, accelerometers, and TDRs (time depth recorder), which can be deployed for tracking birds, mammals and wildlife in general.
The company is looking for research cooperation agreements and/or technological cooperation agreements.

Description

The company was launched years ago by field biologists and engineers with many years of experience with tracking wildlife in a variety of habitats.  The company is now developing new products for animal traking  - miniature GPS loggers, accelerometers, and TDRs (time depth recorder). 

Their  GPS data-loggers can be used to record the trajectories of the animals (mostly birds) at an elevated spatial and temporal resolution. GPS data can be used to distinguish different types of movements: flying, soaring, roosting, running, walking, resting, plunge diving, floating, etc… and can be used for studies on variety of topics. For example, to study the homing behavior, the flight dynamics (including precise speed and altitude), to estimate the energy costs, to investigate conservation issues, etc...

The company also produces accelerometers that measure the acceleration of the body along three axes and allow to characterize different behavioral patterns. Accelerometers can give detailed temporal profile of the individual activity and can collect data continuously. Another interesting instrument developed by the company is a TDR (time depth recorder) coupled with accelerometer and temperature sensor. The device is waterproof and can be attached on marine birds and mammals to record their activity underwater .



The Italian company is looking for research cooperation agreements and/or technological cooperation agreements with scientists, research groups or other companies to share knowledge and expertise for the development of new instruments for monitoring animal movements and behavior, or for detecting environmental pollution using sensors for attachment on animals. The capabilities shared in the framework of the international partnership will help and drive the production and trade of innovative loggers for monitoring wildlife.

Advantages and Innovations

In the new era of bio-logging, the company offers a wide gamma of advanced instruments to record animal movements with highly detailed temporal and spatial resolution. 

The company has been the first to attach a GPS on a bird and the first also to deploy GPS on marine birds. Furthermore, it has developed the smallest accelerometers ever deployed on birds and the first to integrate several instruments on the same device. 

Now the company gives the opportunity to track and record behavioural activity from small animals, thus widening new horizons in the research and conservation of wildlife.

Particularly, the company has developed new instruments with the integration of various apparatuses (GPS, accelerometer, thermometers, pressure sensors, etc.) synchronised and characterised by extremely low power consumption which would allow a new range of animal behavioural studies.

The products are especially designed to meet the needs of wildlife biologists, that require easily configurable instruments, with extremely low power consumption and reliable performances. The products therefore, are very small and have accurate energy management to ensure longer duration of the recording sessions for a given battery.

Stage Of Development

Already on the market

Requested partner

The company is interested in research cooperation agreement and in technical cooperation agreement.

The desired partner should be an University or a research group which promotes activities and conducts studies on the biology and animal behaviour and makes use of advanced technology for improving the knowledge in these fields. The partner is expected to collaborate with the Italian SME and share his technological expertise to develop new miniaturized sensors that can be attached on animals for the detection of environmental pollutants. Exploratory research and testing sessions are envisaged for the development of a new marketable product.

The company is also looking for other small companies or research groups (from universities or private centers) willing to participate to international project calls within the framework of the available European actions (Horizon 2020, smart cities etc). The Italian SME will be happy to participate proactively in the partnership by submitting some of its ideas for products and services or to take part with its expertise at the development of products and ideas suggested by others.