Postdoc in Computer Vision: video monitoring of pollinators
Remi Megret
An USDA/NIFA-funded postdoctoral position is available in the laboratory of Dr. Rémi Mégret in the Department of Computer Science of the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus.
As a team member of Dr. Mégret’s laboratory, the Post-doctoral fellow will contribute with quality research outputs and conceptual support to develop new Computer Vision methods for the automated video monitoring of insect pollinators and their interactions with flowers. This work will build upon the existing models and system developed by the team as part of NSF project “Large-Scale Multi-Parameter Analysis of Honeybee Behavior in their Natural Habitat” that enabled automatic foraging and pollen intake monitoring at the entrance of a honeybee colony. We expect to expand significantly the scale at which we can analyze the population and foraging behavior of both honeybees and wild pollinator in the field. It will involve new machine learning models (including Deep Neural Network architectures) that will push the state-of-the art for videos collected in an open environment. More specifically, the Post-doctoral fellow will:
- Develop and validate new models for detection, identification and behavior analysis from video
- Integrate them into a system for automatic analysis of insect-flower interaction
- Take an active role in the DeepPollinator project, working with Biology and Ecology collaborators to apply the developed technology to research in population dynamics and foraging behavior of honeybees and wild pollinators
- Publish the results in appropriate conferences and journals
- Mentor graduate and undergraduate students involved in the research
- Participate in the writing of proposals to seek external
funds to sustain and extend the research