COTSbot was the world’s first robot designed to seek out and control the Great Barrier Reef’s crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS), which is responsible for an estimated 40 per cent of the reef’s total decline in coral cover.
Integrating state-of-the-art robotic vision and classification algorithms with experience in, and technologies for, shallow coastal water robotic monitoring, COTSbot also provided a flexible tool that empowered a range of stakeholders to scale current eradication programs and protection of reefs such as the Great Barrier Reef.
The key features of COTSbot include real-time and on-board automated image-based detection of COTS, autonomous injection of bile salts into detected COTS, and autonomous navigation within shallow coral reefs.
Lead Researchers: Professor Matthew Dunbabin and Dr Feras Dayoub