Assess soil pollution with a completely natural method, that is, observing the behavior of some organisms that populate it, i.e. earth pigs: this is the objective of the researchers at the University of Milan-Bicocca who have launched the crowdfunding campaign “Many Little Pigs!” to develop an instrumental prototype to recognize healthy soil from contaminated soil, combining the behavioral responses of piglets and the most sophisticated artificial intelligence tools. Earth pigs are the only crustaceans to have colonized the mainland starting from the Lower Carboniferous, between 359.2 and 318.1 million years ago: these ancient animals had to adapt to a new environment, compensating, first of all, for dehydration . As? Through a particular gregarious behavior: wood pigs tend to stay together, because this reduces the contact surface of the individual animals with the air. Under conditions of stress induced by contaminated soil, the group fragments.
“The first step to counteract the effects of soil pollution is precisely to monitor the state of contamination. To do this we have created a rapid, economical and non-invasive method, as well as respectful towards animals”, explains Lorenzo Federico, manager of the project and PhD student at the Department of Environmental and Earth Sciences of the University of Milan-Bicocca. “Thanks to crowdfunding we will develop a better observation method for the gregarious behavior of wood pigs when exposed to soils and we will quantify their responses thanks to algorithms developed within our team. In other words, by studying how little pigs react we will be able to understand whether a soil is polluted or not, and to what level.”
Specifically, the state of aggregation will be monitored using a device that combines a detector (infrared micro-camera) and a Plexiglas arena, inside which the soil to be monitored and ten little pigs will be placed. A few hours will be enough for the contaminants, if present, to cause easily quantifiable behavioral changes. “Our final goal is to develop a prototype that uses the automatic analysis procedure already patented by Elisabetta Fersini, professor of Computer Science at our university, to quantify the aggregation state of piglets when exposed to contaminated soil”, explains Sara Villa, professor of Ecology at the Milan-Bicocca University and member of the team.”This self-learning will be useful to reduce the time of analysis and preparation of an environmental quality report“.
To develop a first experimental prototype, 10,000 euros must be raised through the fundraising campaign active on Ideaginger.it, the crowdfunding platform with the highest success rate in Italy. The project “Many Little Pigs!” – among those of the VI edition of BiUniCrowd, the initiative of the University of Milan-Bicocca which allows the university community’s projects to obtain support and visibility from the outside – was selected by A2A, which will co-finance the crowdfunding campaign. Support “Many Little Pigs!” It’s easy: just connect to the project page and make a donation by choosing your preferred payment method. Among the rewards for supporters there is also the opportunity to have the soil of their vegetable garden or garden analyzed to check its health.