2017 год - год экологии
занимательные факты по английскому языку на тему

2017 год — год экологии.

Помощь волонтеров в Британии животным на дорогах.

We associate modern science with very expensive equipment, very complicated experiments or theoretical modeling, with specially educated and trained personnel – scientists, engineers and lab assistants. But there are many scientific research works, in which anyone can participate.
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In the UK a study of wildlife road kill is conducted. This is about wild animals (sometimes, domestic animals as well) killed by cars and trucks while crossing roads. Scientists want to know which species get killed, how many of them, in what particular places. This may help to develop some measures for reduction of such accidents. Mostly the animals are the victims, but in case of larger animals vehicles may be damaged, or people may be injured. So, it's not only about safety of the wild animals, though their safety is also important. The simplest measure is to put traffic signs indicating places of frequent collisions with animals or signs limiting speed. Other measures may require building fences in those places where big animals cross roads rather often.

Anyone who lives in the UK and moves on the roads by motor vehicles, or by bicycles or, just walk along them can participate in this research program. The only equipment they need is a smartphone enabled with the GPS receiver and the mobile Internet access, and an account on Facebook or Twitter. People who want to participate in this research can register on the web site of the program and report animals killed on the roads, when they see any, to the Facebook or the Twitter pages of this research project. They need to report the location, the species of the animal and the state of the dead animal – recently killed or already rotten. Many people participate for free, just for the pleasure of being involved into important scientific research.

For scientists this approach makes their research economically possible. It would be prohibitively expensive to hire many thousands professionals, pay them adequate salaries, equip them with vehicles and smartphones, to make them drive along the roads just to find dead animals and report them.

But this approach is also a big headache. The observational bias, when people see not exactly what actually happens, is known to all scientists. In this case of involvement of non-professional observers, the bias is huge. Over a hundred people may report a single killed deer or a fox, but only a few, or even no one, may report killed hedgehogs, squirrels, hamsters, wild pigeons, not to mention frogs. And in case of a single dead deer, scientists may have all those hundreds reports with different locations, different species and different states of the carcass and will not be able to figure out how many deer have been actually killed. At the same time, they may still have no idea of how many squirrels or hedgehogs are killed on the roads.

Scientists apply statistical methods for filtering the raw data from the benevolent participants. This increases the reliability of the data manifold.

This text is based on the information presented in the BBC popular science radio programmes.