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Browsing by Author "Hockings, Kimberley J."

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  • Automated audiovisual behavior recognition in wild primates
    Publication . Bain, Max; Nagrani, Arsha; Schofield, Daniel; Berdugo, Sophie; Bessa, Joana; Owen, Jake; Hockings, Kimberley J.; Matsuzawa, Tetsuro; Hayashi, Misato; Biro, Dora; Carvalho, Susana; Zisserman, Andrew
    The field of ethology seeks to understand animal behavior from both mechanistic and functional perspectives and to identify the various genetic, developmental, ecological, and social drivers of behavioral variation in the wild (1). It is increasingly becoming a data-rich science: Technological advances in data collection, including biologgers, camera traps, and audio recorders, now allow us to capture animal behavior in an unprecedented level of detail (2). In particular, large data archives including both audio and visual information have immense potential to measure individual- and population-level variation as well as ontogenetic and cultural changes in behavior that may span large temporal and spatial scales. However, this potential often goes untapped: The training and human effort required to process large volumes of video data continue to limit the scale and depth at which behavior can be analyzed. Automating the measurement of behavior can transform ethological research, open up large-scale video archives for detailed interrogation, and be a powerful tool to monitor and protect threatened species in the wild. With rapid advances in deep learning, the novel field of computational ethology is quickly emerging at the intersection of computer science, engineering, and biology, using computer vision algorithms to process large volumes of data (3).
    2021-11Journal article Open access Show more
  • Tools to tipple: ethanol ingestion by wild chimpanzees using leaf-sponges
    Publication . Hockings, Kimberley J.; Bryson-Morrison, Nicola; Carvalho, Susana; Fujisawa, Michiko; Humle, Tatyana; McGrew, William C.; Nakamura, Miho; Ohashi, Gaku; Yamanashi, Yumi; Yamakoshi, Gen; Matsuzawa, Tetsuro
    African apes and humans share a genetic mutation that enables them to effectively metabolize ethanol. However, voluntary ethanol consumption in this evolutionary radiation is documented only inmodern humans. Here, we report evidence of the long-term and recurrent ingestion of ethanol from the raffia palm (Raphia hookeri, Arecaceae) by wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) at Bossou in Guinea, West Africa, from 1995 to 2012. Chimpanzees at Bossou ingest this alcoholic beverage, often in large quantities, despite an average presence of ethanol of 3.1% alcohol by volume (ABV) and up to 6.9% ABV. Local people tap raffia palms and the sap collects in plastic containers, and chimpanzees use elementary technology-a leafy tool-to obtain this fermenting sap. These data show that ethanol does not act as a deterrent to feeding in this community of wild apes, supporting the idea that the last common ancestor of living African apes and modern humans was not averse to ingesting foods containing ethanol.
    2015-06Journal article Open access Show more