Browsing by Author "Ferreira, Miguel"
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- Perspectives and progress of ecology and conservation science in the Azores: the possible contribution of Artificial IntelligencePublication . Borges, Paulo A. V.; Cardoso, Pedro; Guerreiro, Orlando; Rigal, François; Florencio, Margarita; Amorim, Isabel R.; Borda-de-Água, Luís; Cascalho, José Manuel; Ferreira, MiguelThere is an urgent need of new methodologies in ecological and conservation science to deal with increasingly complex problems. We introduce four emerging research areas in ecology in which Artificial Intelligence may be explored as a tool to tackle unsolved issues in island ecosystems: (1) modeling abundance of plant and animal species in space and time; (2) modeling spread of invasive species; (3) estimating species richness based on incomplete sampling and (4) modeling speciation and diversification in insular habitats.
- Threats and conservation status of Common and Roseate terns Sterna hirundo/S. dougallii in the Azores : A case study for Terceira IslandPublication . Lamelas-López, Lucas; Pietrzak, Malgorzata; Ferreira, Miguel; Neves, Verónica C.The Azores Archipelago holds the second most important population of Roseate Terns in the North Atlantic. However, the size of the population has been decreasing. In this study, we used remote-sensing cameras and visits to the main colonies of Common Terns Sterna hirundo and Roseate Terns S. dougallii on Terceira Island to identify the causes of breeding failure. Nest depredation by introduced mammals, particularly rats and cats, was the main cause of breeding failure, leading, in some cases, to the complete destruction of the colony. Additional threats included nest disturbance by humans and dogs, which caused the destruction of some nests. Measures aimed at mitigating depredation were tested but in the case of rodents, control plans proved difficult to achieve. This is probably because rodents are widespread in the Azores, they are not limited by food resources, and/or trapping methods are ineffective.
- Towards an agent based modeling: The prediction and prevention of the spread of the drywood termite Cryptotermes brevisPublication . Guerreiro, Orlando; Ferreira, Miguel; Cascalho, José Manuel; Borges, Paulo A. V.We present initial efforts made to model the spread of the drywood termite in Angra do Heroísmo, Azores, using an agent based modeling approach. First we describe how a simple Cellular Automata (CA) model was created in Netlogo to simulate the spread of the species based on simple assumptions concerning the ecology of the species. A second step was taken by increasing the complexity of the initial CA approach, adding new specific characteristics to each cell, based again on ecology of the species and its behavior towards the environment. Finally, we add agents to the model in order to simulate the human intervention in fighting back the pest. This new model has become a two-level Agent-Based model. We also evaluated the costs of this intervention. These efforts were supported by field research which allowed a continuous cross-checking of the results obtained in the model with the field data.