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Duncan J Irschick

@duncanirschick.bsky.social

160 followers 120 following 27 posts

Professor @UMASSAmherst; Director Digital Life Project (digitallife3d.org) #ecology#evolution #sharks #seaturtles #marinemammals #reptiles #amphibians

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Environmental science 42%

Agriculture 19%

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Jun 21

Great article written by Joel Gayford & @physiologyfish.bsky.social on our recent paper in Royal Society Open Science Journal using #3D models to study shark scaling. Credit also to co-authors Johnson Martin & Andrew Chin as well.
theconversation.com/sharks-come-...

Sharks come in many different shapes and sizes. But they all follow a centuries-old mathematical rule

A new study proves for the first time that the ‘two-thirds scaling law’ applies to large animals as well as small ones, offering key lessons for conversation.

theconversation.com

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · May 27

A question - I realize that there may not be a good answer - is NSF still accepting proposals for Ecology/Evolution work, & does anyone know any awards are being given out? I'm working on an NSF grant with a colleague, and it's not clear from the outside what exactly is happening on the ground. TY!

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · May 23

W/Laurens Howle (Duke) & Frank Fish (Westchester), we are releasing 3 3D models of marine mammals (Gray whale, Common Dolphin & Humpback whale). Johnson Martin created the models - funding by BOEM

Common Dolphin
skfb.ly/pxvuw
Gray Whale
skfb.ly/pxvus
Juvenile Humpback whale
skfb.ly/pxvuu

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Apr 14

New 3D model release! In collab w/Vienna Museum of Natural History, we retopologized and animated their 3D scan of an adult male Komodo dragon - Thanks to Mohammed Al Zubaidi and Josh Medina for CG work, and Viola Winkler for working with us! 😆🦎

3D model link
skfb.ly/pvWts

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Apr 2

Not sure - I'll see if there is a livecast and will let everyone know

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Apr 2

Very excited to give a seminar on our 3D work, and also a 3D photogrammetry workshop at Union college on April 29th! Special thanks to my amazing colleague Kate Feller for organizing this event! Details in the below link and poster 😃🐼🐬🐧

www.union.edu/templeton/ev...

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 24

Thank you @physiologyfish.bsky.social and Joel for organizing this trip - it was pretty amazing to come to JCU and to see your lab and Queensland!

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Reposted by Duncan J. Irschick

Professor Jodie Rummer @physiologyfish.bsky.social · Mar 22

One of my amazing PhD students (Joel Gayford) - grateful we can have a week of brainstorming with his secondary supervisor - @duncanirschick.bsky.social - nature therapy for the win!

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 21

That was an amazing time! I especially enjoyed the incredible, thoughtful and curious students I met. Thanks to the incredible rockstar @physiologyfish.bsky.social for arranging this and to JCU for hosting me!

Reposted by Duncan J. Irschick

Professor Jodie Rummer @physiologyfish.bsky.social · Mar 20

Huge success… seminar and interactive workshop at JCU, full house for both!!!

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 20

Thanks Jodie! Being host by incredible scientists like you means a lot! JCU has a lot of first class faculty, students and staff!

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 16

Very excited to be giving a seminar and workshop at James Cook University in Australia this Wed, March 19th and Th, March 20th! Special thx to @physiologyfish.bsky.social and Joel Gayford for facilitating this seminar!

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 14

Thank you! I remember that paper :) Your kind words mean a lot coming from a really important - and classy - organization :}

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 11

and finally - here is the link to the paper

zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Automated extraction of right whale morphometric data from drone aerial photographs

Aerial photogrammetry is a popular non-invasive method for measuring marine mammal body size, body morphometrics, and body condition, but processing large datasets efficiently remains challenging. We....

zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 10

Special thanks to collaborators Chhandak Bagchi (lead author), Fredrik Christiansen, Subhransu Maji, and Josh Medina. Thx also to the Center for Data Science at UMASS Amherst and various undergrads and CS students who helped with the project! 😀🦎

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 10

Results show that our model accurately tracks seasonal body condition changes. This automation can significantly reduce the time needed to calculate body conditions, enabling faster, large-scale whale health assessments. 🧵

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 10

Trained on 468 annotated images, the model processes 8,958 drone images with 99.2% success. It estimates body length with 0.85% error and volume with 6.88% error, significantly speeding up body condition estimation while maintaining accuracy. 🧵

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 10

New paper with colleagues! Bagchi et al published work in Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation 😃

This ML model automatically extracts whale body length & volume from aerial images! Using Mask R-CNN, it detects whales, traces their body shape, and estimates the body axis. 🧵

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 4

I want to thank Aaron Olsen, who did the bulk of the 3D reconstruction of Emma - a large (size unknown, ~14 foot female) Tiger Shark from the Bahamas. Johnson Martin also helped Aaron. Both were rock stars in this work! And thanks to Neil Hammerschlag, who provided images/video (like below)

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 4

I also want to acknowledge Aaron Olsen - who did the bulk of the 3D reconstruction on Emma the tiger shark - and Johnson Martin, who worked with Aaron. Thank you both! 😀

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 3

Special thanks to the following students for their amazing hard work on reconstructing 3D meshes from gopro footage

Will Nguyen (UMASS), Isabel French Luce (Amherst High), Liam Barry (Williston), and Josh Medina (UMASS). Special thanks also to Neil Hammerschlag for providing footage of Emma

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 3

Here are download links

Tiger shark
skfb.ly/puv8u
Epaulette Shark
skfb.ly/puv8x
Sand Tiger shark
skfb.ly/puv8x
Zebra shark
sketchfab.com/3d-models/mo...

Model 112 - Tiger Shark Mesh (Emma) - Mesh only - Download Free 3D model by DigitalLife3D

This is a 3D mesh of an adult female Tiger shark (Galeocerdo cuvier, Emma), estimated length about 4.3 m) from the Bahamas. The 3D mesh was reconstructed using Blender from publically available image...

skfb.ly

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Mar 3

New 3D model release! W/Mystic aquarium, the Digital Life Project is releasing four 3D shark meshes (Epaulette shark, Sand Tiger Shark, & zebra shark), along w/tiger shark (Emma). We thank Gayle Sirpenski & the Mystic aquarium staff for their assistance. More info and download links below! :)😀👍

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Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Feb 27

New paper with colleagues! Zotos et al. used triaxial accelerometers, 3D modelling of live lizards, and behavioral analysis to build a new paradigm of reptile movement. Check out paper below!🦎

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/GVMA63...

Reposted by Duncan J. Irschick

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Feb 7

In collab/ w/San Diego Zoo, I'm pleased to release our 3D model of an adult male polar bear (Kalluk, 2.44 m length) that we scanned. Thx to Megan Owen and the Zoo for guiding and funding the work. CG artist Jer Bot was instrumental in completing the work. #Free 3D model is below

skfb.ly/p9CMt

Duncan J Irschick @duncanirschick.bsky.social · Jan 2

Looking forward to coming again to #SICB in Atlanta tomorrow! I'll be talking about our recent 3D work with a wide variety of animals - and the implications for scaling, energetics and body condition - among others!

Reposted by Duncan J. Irschick