Neal Digre, ‘16, was part of a 52-person team that won the $10 million XPRIZE: Rainforest competition, a global competition to develop innovative ways of surveying biodiversity in hopes of preserving some of the world’s most important ecosystems: rainforests.
The organizers of the XPRIZE hope that if the world knows the true value of the Amazon, people will work harder to preserve it instead of rapidly destroying it. Key to valuing the rainforest’s rare ecosystem is fully understanding its biodiversity.
Digre, who completed WWU bachelor’s degrees in both computer science and linguistics, brought his specialized expertise in natural language processing to the winning team, Team Limelight.
Digre built a computer model that could analyze the sounds of birds, insects and other rainforest critters and discern the individual calls, cries, hoots, and chirps to identify the species emitting those noises.
The sounds were collected in the team’s namesake technology, the Limelight, a remote-sensing platform delivered by drone to the top of the jungle canopy, where it used lights to attract and listen in on birds, insects and tree-dwelling animals.
Of the total of $10 million in prize money from the contest, the winning team gets $5 million to split among its members. But the five-year competition was never about the money for Digre, he says, adding that he’s “overwhelmed with joy, pride and gratitude” that his team took the top prize.
“Our win reaffirms the importance of applying innovative technology and collaboration to global challenges," he says. ”For me, it’s also a personal reminder of how collective effort and determination can lead to extraordinary achievements.”
