THE PROBLEM
Dr. Martin Wikelski strives to understand factors affecting biological diversity in the tropics. At his research site on Barro Colorado Island in the Republic of Panama, Dr. Wikelski and his team use their automated telemetry system to conduct pioneering work through automated radio-tracking of tagged animals, a feat never before accomplished on a large scale in a tropical forest. Through this cutting edge telemetry system, Dr. Wikelski’s team currently tracks the locations of 20 animals on a 24-hour, 7-day a week basis. They work to understand animal population dynamics in the wild to gain insight into important issues such as disease and dispersal, spatial ecology, species interaction, physiology, and activity cycles.

The telemetry system plots the bearing data for each animal from 0 – 360° on a second-by-second basis and stores it in a data base. The system then triangulates the bearing information to identify the exact location of each animal. The telemetry system can produce faulty bearing information at times when, for example, a taxicab driver is driving on the outskirts of the study area, and the driver’s 2-way radio causes interference with the readings. Dr. Wikelski therefore must examine the data for these types of anomalies. The large amount of data makes manual examination virtually impossible - sifting through masses of spreadsheet data would be prohibitive.

THE SOLUTION
To visually identify the faulty data from the telemetry towers, Dr. Wikelski began using PV-WAVE from Visual Numerics. PV-WAVE made it possible to process the massive amount of bearing and time data and also allowed Dr. Wikelski to visually examine and smooth out the discrepancies. Specifically, PV-WAVE plots the data with the date/times on the x axis and the degree location on the y axis. Through array manipulation and indexing, PV-WAVE allows Dr. Wikelski to use a mouse to manipulate the data, such as by smoothing the anomalies. Dr. Wikelski puts tremendous value on this human examination: “There is no substitute for the human eye’s ability to see unrealistic situations in the data. If an animal is in one location at a point in time, it’s unrealistic for it to be a mile away in the next instance. These discrepancies cannot be identified by software, but can be quickly and easily identified by the human brain with the help of PV-WAVE.” Dr. Wikelski uses a PC to run PV-WAVE and conduct the visual data analysis. So instead of hypothesizing about how animals might interact, they now have a clear view of how the 20 animals actually interact with each other and other environmental factors. Having an accurate picture of where the animals are at any point in time gives the team insights into important ecological relationships, such as how ocelots eat agoutis (tropical rodents) or how toucans transport seeds around the region and what changes occur in animals when they are affected by disease.

The findings from the animal tagging research can have further implications into other ecological studies and even bioterrorism. Dr. Wikelski believes that the findings from Barro Colorado Island could become an integral part of the National Ecological Observatory Network (www.NEONinc.org), the first national ecological measurement and observation system with an interdisciplinary approach to answer regional and continental-scale questions. Gaining a clearer understanding of how living things respond to disease could help drive procedures for responding to bioterrorism attacks too. More about Dr. Wikelski’s research can be found at www.princeton.edu/~wikelski/research/biology.htm"

RETURN ON INVESTMENT
Using PV-WAVE takes approximately 1/100th the time of examining the data manually, according to Dr. Wikelski. It is entirely possible that the amount of collected data is so massive that manual analysis would have been impossible. In this way, PV-WAVE along with the automated radio telemetry system is equipping Dr. Wikelski and his team to present their findings with greater confidence and greater credibility.

WORLD CLASS PRODUCTS, SERVICES, AND SUPPORT
Visual Numerics has provided technical software solutions for numerical analysis and visualization for over three decades. The company's software products help users understand complex data from a variety of sources and build business-critical applications. Visual Numerics offers two product lines: the IMSL™ Numerical Libraries for powerful mathematical and statistical analysis and the PV-WAVE® visual data analysis development environment. Visual Numerics also offers customized professional services for applications that involve mathematical, statistical, or visual data analysis to meet today’s business analytical needs.