Breakthroughs in artificial intelligence are radically reshaping the way humans analyze and ingest information. To keep pace with these changes, the Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida – home to more than 40 million specimens and artifacts, and one of the nation's largest natural history collections – recently created the first curatorial positions for AI.
Rather than managing a collection for organisms like plants or birds, as most curators do, the museum's new AI curators are tasked with developing machine learning tools to study specimens in ways that were previously impractical or impossible.
AI offers new ways to study and monitor biodiversity
In fields of biology focused on human health, scientists have used a type of AI called deep learning to scour endless reams of DNA in order to spot mutations, predict the three-dimensional structure of proteins, discover new therapeutic drugs, and make clinical diagnoses. Deep learning models have also found their way into the biodiversity sciences, where they have accelerated and exponentially increased the value of natural history specimens and cultural heritage objects.
