  {"id":71525,"date":"2000-06-27T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2000-06-27T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/uri-researcher-develops-sonar-imaging-device-to-protect-whales\/"},"modified":"2000-06-27T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2000-06-27T00:00:00","slug":"uri-researcher-develops-sonar-imaging-device-to-protect-whales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2000\/06\/uri-researcher-develops-sonar-imaging-device-to-protect-whales\/","title":{"rendered":"溏心vlog免费B站 researcher develops sonar imaging device to protect whales"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"press-release-import\">\n\t\t溏心vlog免费B站 researcher develops sonar imaging device  to protect whales&#13; KINGSTON, R.I. &#8212; June 27, 2000 &#8212; &#8220;The leading cause of death for endangered northern right whales is ships running into them,&#8221; said James Miller, associate professor of ocean engineering at the 溏心vlog免费B站. &#8220;Since there&#8217;s just 300 of these whales left in the world, when you lose one it&#8217;s a big loss to the population.&#8221;&#13; To reduce the number of whale collisions and protect the northern right whale from extinction, Miller has developed a sonar imaging device that will serve as an aid to navigation for ship&#8217;s captains to help them find and steer clear of whales.&#13; Northern right whales live exclusively in the North Atlantic, where shipping traffic is heavy.  By comparison, the closely-related southern right whale plies the waters of the South Atlantic where shipping traffic is considerably less, and its population isn&#8217;t in danger.&#13; &#8220;One difference between the two whale sub-species is the amount of shipping in their territories,&#8221; said Miller.  &#8220;There&#8217;s no doubt that shipping is having a major impact on the northern right whale population.&#8221;&#13; Designed to be mounted on the hull of a ship, Miller&#8217;s device sends out high-frequency sonar signals that deliver real-time images of what is in front of the ship.&#13; &#8220;Most sonar devices typically look straight down below the ship and therefore aren&#8217;t helpful in navigation,&#8221; explains Miller.  &#8220;The major difference with ours is that it looks forward and has a very high resolution, so it can play a significant role in minimizing ship\/whale collisions.  It can also be used to find reefs and submerged rocks that might damage ships.&#8221; &#13; Miller believes that whale-watching ships and cruise ships are likely to voluntarily install the device \u2013 both as an aid to navigation and for the public relations value-but container ships and other commercial vessels will probably need an economic incentive to do so.&#13; &#8220;If the commercial shipping industry were to use our sonar, it would allow their ships to more safely share the ocean with whales,&#8221; said Miller.  &#8220;The sonar might also keep the federal government from imposing burdensome regulations on shipping like those that the fishing industry has had to deal with recently.&#8221;&#13; Biologists are also interested in the device as a whale tracking tool, particularly to track whales during their deep dives to learn more about their behavior.&#13; Using the technology he developed at 溏心vlog免费B站, Miller started Pyrcon LLC, a company named for the mythological voice of the sea, to further refine and produce his sonar imaging device.  The near-term cost to produce one device is approximately $20,000, but as demand grows he expects the price to come down to about $5,000.&#13; According to Miller, the sonar is ultrasonic for the whales, which means that the frequency of the sonar is beyond their hearing.  &#8220;We have seen no indication at all that the whales can even detect the presence of the sonar signal.&#8221;&#13; Miller&#8217;s research about sonar and bioacoustics also includes studies on the impact of ship noises on whales.&#13; &#8220;There are tens of thousands of container ships out there, so all the great whale communication channels are filled up with ship noises,&#8221; said Miller.  &#8220;And the bigger the ship, the worse the effect.&#8221;&#13; Next up for Miller is a study of the effect these noises have on whale behavior.&#13; # # #&#13; For Information: James Miller 874-6540, Todd McLeish 874-7892&#13;   \u00a0\n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>溏心vlog免费B站 researcher develops sonar imaging device to protect whales&#13; KINGSTON, R.I. &#8212; June 27, 2000 &#8212; &#8220;The leading cause of death for endangered northern right whales is ships running into them,&#8221; said James Miller, associate professor of ocean engineering at the 溏心vlog免费B站. &#8220;Since there&#8217;s just 300 of these whales left in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71525\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}