The role of artificial intelligence and laser repellers in preventing disease transmission

Agriculture, particularly intensive animal production, is an important part of the Australian economy and for providing a sustained source of protein. Maintaining our high animal health status will help ensure that animals and humans are safe. However, commercial animal housing, feed mills, and especially conventional and free-range poultry farms are continuously at risk of significant pathogen introduction. This can lead to the introduction of emergency animal diseases (EAD) such as avian influenza (AI), particularly from wild waterfowl and, as recently discovered, from shorebirds. Wild birds can carry and spread the virus between and across continents during their seasonal migrations.

Certain strains of AI, continuously circulating in the wild bird populations, can evolve from low pathogenicity AI to high pathogenicity AI (HPAI) once they infect intensively produced poultry, resulting in a serious and often deadly form of the disease. HPAI poses a significant threat to the global poultry industry, leading to severe economic impacts due to increased mortality, culling of infected flocks and the closing of export markets. It can also potentially have serious consequences for wild animal populations, and some will affect other domestic animals and even humans. The ability of AI to spread between species increases the risk of a potential influenza pandemic.

To address this issue, some national and international industry stakeholders have started to adopt the use of Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation (LASER) associated with artificial intelligence as a preventive measure to mitigate the risk of transmission of AI to livestock. These systems have proven effective in repelling birds from intensive animal facilities, feed mills, dairy feed pads, and particularly free-range poultry farms.

How does this technology work? A camera facing the production area captures images of the wild birds. Then, an artificial intelligence interface recognises the birds and points a laser beam towards them, which scares and disperses the wild birds away from the sheds.

Incorporating artificial intelligence in laser-repeller systems improves the efficiency of deterring wild birds from feed mills and intensive animal facilities, particularly in poultry farms. Artificial intelligence enables real-time monitoring and data recording for improved and accurate decision-making. These AI-controlled laser repellers can identify and track specific physical and behavioural characteristics of the target bird and continuously self-adjust in real time as a dynamic learning process. This enhances the system’s ability to recognise and respond quickly and precisely to target birds, minimising the unintended impact on farmed animals.

AI-controlled laser repellers do not cause pain or suffering to birds and have no negative impact on the environment, making them a more humane option for reducing the introduction of exotic diseases from wild birds, especially compared to traditional methods such as physical barriers, nets, bird spikes, trapping, shooting, and baiting.

Continued and development will help establish artificial intelligence-controlled laser repeller systems as valuable, sustainable, and humane tools for efficient wild bird control.

Information sourced from Scolexia Pty Ltd