License to Krill: the project that seeks to manage ecosystems with machine learning, which shone at Ocean Hackaton® 2023
December 2023. A machine learning model that predicts krill volume in the Antarctic zone, thereby preventing targeted exploitation: this is the project of an interdisciplinary team of students composed of Cristian Cofré, Master of Computer Science; Dantes Arduam, Bachelor of Science with a minor in Physics; Danilo Astorga, Marine Biology, and Yanara Morgunovsky, Marine Biology, all from the Universidad Austral de Chile (UACh), together with Octavio Mercado, oceanographer at the UACh's Laboratory of Coupled and Biophysical Processes, and Matilde Rivas, Master of Science with a major in Computing from the University of Chile and student at Millennium Institute Foundational Research on Data.
The project won second place worldwide at Ocean Hackaton® 2023, the international competition of French origin that brings together actors from the scientific and technological ecosystem to develop digital solutions related to the oceans and the maritime community through prototypes designed in 48 hours.
We wanted to predict krill because it is a fundamental species in the Antarctic ecosystem; many other species feed on it. It also sequesters carbon, meaning it "absorbs" CO2 from the atmosphere, making it vital for preventing further global warming. We are interested in discovering where krill live at different stages of their life cycle in order to suggest new conservation areas based on science, as the Antarctic Peninsula is an area where there is a lot of krill fishing. We realized that by using machine learning, we can project krill abundance in the Antarctic Peninsula for different global warming scenarios, which will be useful for taking adaptation measures," explains Matilde Rivas, the IMFD student who is part of the "License to Krill" project team .
The prototype uses a biogeophysical artificial intelligence model to manage biological resource ecosystems in the South Shetland Islands, located about 120 km from the Antarctic Peninsula. In the competition, the national team had to refine their prototype and pitch to convince an international jury in a six-minute presentation and five minutes to answer questions, which you can see in this video. With this achievement, they secured €3,000 in funding for the project.
The data processed through machine learning can be visualized on an interactive map, and the information being collected benefits three entities: the scientific community in terms of opening up knowledge; the industry, as it allows them to improve krill capture and diversify fishing areas; and decision-makers, as it leads to the creation of new marine ecosystem protection areas, according to Dantes Arduan's explanation to BioBioChile.
The eventbrought together more than 600 participants and over 200 coaches divided into 79 teams from different countries, with the aim of bringing together talent from different areas of knowledge who can devise solutions to current problems facing the oceans. The other winning teams in the competition, which has been held since 2019, were those representing France and Malaysia. At the national level, the competition took place in different stages throughout 2023 and was organized by the French Embassy in Chile, the French Institute in Chile, and the French Institute for Research in Digital Science and Technology (Inria).
"We are extremely pleased and proud of this achievement. We have been working on this for several months and are generally very satisfied with the results. It was a difficult competition, not only at the local stage in Concepción, but also here at the world championship, but we succeeded, we managed to win and put Chile in a good position," said Dantes Arduam.
The international final of the event—which awarded €9,500 in prizes for the development of initiatives—was opened by Michel Gourtay, President of Technopôle Brest-Iroise, and presented by Rob Gwinner, English Apart.
Krill are small crustaceans, similar to shrimp, that play a fundamental role in the food chain of marine ecosystems. In fact, they are food for predators such as penguins, seals, sea lions, whales, and fish.
But beyond the food chain, this tiny creature plays a key role in mitigating climate change, as it captures and removes carbon from the Antarctic Ocean.
Despite this, its existence is threatened by global warming and industrial fishing. Although its capture is regulated, the lack of data on krill abundance and projections limits understanding of this activity in the Antarctic Peninsula.