Communication is a fundamental principle in the animal world and is comprised of both the emission and capture of acoustics. This research investigates monitoring systems and the associated cyber-infrastructure to measure and assess change of biological diversity in animal communities through their acoustic signaling. The development of cyberinfrastructure to automate acoustic sampling and their interpretation can yield significant scientific breakthroughs in quantification of biological survey information and will lead to on-line species identification from real time acoustic signals delivered to the desktop. The objectives were to:

• Monitor, archive and analyze automated acoustic observations from a range of habitats associated with MSU Inland Lake
• Develop new sensor technology to automate the collection of environmental acoustics and telemeter the observations over wireless networks to remote servers
• Deploy and field test Habitat Sensor Platforms and Habitat Servers to collect environmental acoustics and telemeter the observations over wireless networks to remote servers