Restor, part of ETH BiodivX, is an XPRIZE Rainforest finalist

Restor is thrilled to announce that, as a member of ETH BiodivX, it has qualified as a finalist in the $10M XPRIZE Rainforest Competition using cutting-edge technology, community engagement, and innovative scientific research to understand rainforest biodiversity. This five-year competition, organized by XPRIZE Foundation, a US non-profit organization, promotes technological innovation in biodiversity research. Protection of rainforests - home to thousands of species and a wealth of biodiversity - is crucial in addressing the biodiversity crisis. This competition couldn’t be more needed.

The ETH BiodivX team is at the forefront of this mission to protect and restore biodiversity, and Restor, a geospatial platform hosting the largest community-led restoration projects and an ETH Zürich spin-off, is proud to contribute to ETH BiodivX efforts as they advance to the final stage of the competition.

Restor and ETH BiodivX: Solving the technical and environmental challenges of our time

The ETH BiodivX team, led by ETH Zürich, is an interdisciplinary team of brilliant minds working together to advance the understanding and preservation of the Amazon rainforest using patented and modified drones to collect samples of forest data in the form of environmental DNA (eDNA), images, and sounds. The collected data is then analyzed using “backpack lab” technology, and together with the knowledge from local communities, they can identify and monitor rainforest biodiversity.

To support the finalist team, Restor is enhancing BiodivX's in-house algorithms to detect individual tree crowns in closed-canopy tropical forests, a task traditionally considered difficult. These algorithms are designed to analyze drone imagery collected from the field, processed both on the Google Cloud Platform for high performance and offline. The identification of individual tree crowns helps in creating useful outputs such as tree density maps, canopy spectral variability analyses, and other ecological studies that further the understanding of the rainforest environment.

Additionally, Restor has also shared all public data layers for scientific analysis including carbon, biodiversity, land cover, water, and environment for the finalists to use during the last step of the competition expected to take place in July.

This is an important moment for Restor. As the largest collection of community-led nature restoration projects, Restor can offer researchers near real-time insights about biodiversity. The data that we provide can not only inform real and immediate action, but empower all restoration stewards - the Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities on the ground who are protecting and restoring the biodiversity within these vital ecosystems.

The final challenge

For the next stage of the finals, all six finalist teams will have 24 hours to survey biodiversity in a remote area of tropical rainforest, followed by 48 hours to produce the most impactful real-time insights. The winning team will demonstrate the scalability of their technology and maximize performance on biodiversity surveying and producing insights to meet the prize criteria and effectively disrupt the current biodiversity assessment landscape.

The ETH BiodivX project exemplifies the power of interdisciplinary collaboration and innovative thinking. The team is making significant strides in advancing rainforest conservation through cutting-edge technology, community engagement, and scientific research. Restor supports BiodivX in this monumental event, hoping for an outcome that will leave a lasting impact on local communities and the global scientific community.

Go team!