Famed chimpanzee researcher Dr. Jane
Goodall, DBE, founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and a UN
Messenger of Peace, visited the University of Minnesota campus March
20 to hear about the interdisciplinary work of University ecologists
and computer scientists on chimpanzee data through the Jane Goodall
Institute’s Center for Primate Studies (JGI-CPS). CSE Professors
Dr. Shashi Shekhar and Dr. Jaideep Srivastava are both involved in the
project.
(From
left to right) CSE Professor Shashi Shekhar, CSE doctoral student Mete
Celik, Dr. Jane Goodall, CSE Professor Jaideep Srivastava. Photo credit:
Robyn White
As part of the University project, researchers have been analyzing
and digitally organizing more than 46 years of data collected by
Goodall and her research team at Gombe National Park in Tanzania.
The data focus on chimpanzee behavior and habitat, and include
paper-based maps plotting chimpanzee travel, geographical data, and
hand-written check sheets and notes. Video and satellite images are
now being incorporated into the project as well.
Researchers are working to organize more than 600 hours of
chimpanzee video footage from JGI Videographer Bill Wallauer into a
database housed in the University’s Digital Technology Center.
They have developed a database prototype in which a chimpanzee’s
name and behavior can be entered to retrieve the corresponding
video clips. Another project developed data mining techniques to
extract patterns in female ranging and association patterns from
the long-term behavioral database.
Professors Shekhar and Srivastava said they have been amazed at the
information gleaned from the data so far. For example, Srivastava
said they’ve discovered patterns in female chimpanzee
relationships and location behavior that reveal the importance of
dominance rank. “To me personally, it’s fascinating,”
Srivastava said. “I learned how similar chimpanzee behavior is to
human behavior.”
“Because chimpanzees are our closest relatives, we’re always
thinking about their similarities and differences,” said Dr. Anne
Pusey, director of the JGI-CPS and University professor in the
Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior. She added that
computer scientists have proved helpful in both organizing the data
and analyzing it. “Computer Science can bring interesting new ways
of understanding factors that control group composition and size
and even disease transmission,” Pusey said.
For more information about the Jane Goodall Institute’s Center for
Primate Studies at the University of Minnesota, visit
www.discoverchimpanzees.org.
