The LanternPredator: A Machine-learning-based Robot for Controlling the Spread of Invasive Species

Lanternflies are an invasive pest species that can cause significant economic damage to agriculture by affecting plants and crops and disrupting the balance of natural ecosystems. These insects have a fast reproduction cycle, can withstand high-temperature variations, and have no natural predators in the US, making it very difficult to control their spread. Motivated by this environmental issue, we designed the LanternPredator, an autonomous pest control robot to help control the population growth of lanternflies. The proposed solution integrates machine learning algorithms for detecting the right insect species, an acoustic stimulus to attract the insects to a zap trap, and sonar for autonomous navigation.