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Bellow is our recent interview with Hanan Lepek, CEO at Senecio Robotics:
Q: Could you provide our readers with a brief introduction to Senecio Robotics?
A: Senecio Robotics is an Israeli Start Up with experts coming from aerospace and defense, utilizing advanced technologies to make a difference in combating mosquito borne diseases.
Recently Senecio won the 3rd prize in its Life Science category during the International Start Ups competition in Shenzhen, China to be followed by being profiled in “Solution Nation” book about promising Israeli start-ups responding to worlds most Intractable Problems.
As the female mosquito mates once in her life time, releasing enough sterile male mosquitoes (non biting), results in a dramatic reduction in the local population within just a few weeks. The technique has been proven in multiple projects around the world, including the USA, Brazil, Australia, China and more.
However, since only males are allowed to be released, and as the mosquito gender visual feature differences are in the micron level, one of the key challenges was to develop a technology that enables the automatic sex sorting, packaging and finally the release of the mosquitoes.
This is where Senecio focused its efforts resulting in a unique solution, utilizing deep learning together with robotics and automation for the Sorting and Packaging, to novel aerial release solutions for aircrafts and drones.
Q: You’ve recently been granted a patent for this large scale mosquito suppression solution; could you tell us something more?
A: Our granted patents and pending patents (which received positive reviews) cover both release and automatic sorting.
For the first stage, the automatic sorting and packaging, we designed a solution which manipulates the mosquitoes in such a way that they do not move (being stationary) and then we teach the computer to decide on its own if the mosquito is a male or female utilizing neural networks, just like people learn.
Once the robot classified the females and males, we use robotic arms to remove any female contamination and then load the males by air flow into release tubes.
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What we see in the picture taken in the Senecio lab, are two STATIONARY male and female aedes albopictus mosquitoes (Asian tiger), being manipulated by our machine. We are now able to repeat the process again and again on large numbers, and provide stationary images to our neural network which classify the mosquitos sex and its coordinates are then sent to the next automatic station for the sex sorting and the male only loading into the release tubes.
The novel approach can work for a large variety of mosquito species, including ones that transmit Dengue, Chikungunya, Yellow fever, West Nile viru and even Malaria.
Specifically, for Malaria, Senecio’s approach holds a huge advantage, since the current common methods rely on mechanical sorting of the mosquito pupa based on difference in pupa size between female and males, differences which almost do not exist for the anopheles mosquito, the main vector for the Malaria.
Q: Can you give us more insights about the technology developed and services you provide?
A: We have two main technologies. Our main solution is the BioMosquito™ Factory:
• Automate the Sex Sorting and packaging process
• Modular solution, adapted to required scale
• Backtracking each release tube with imaging of the loaded mosquitoes
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Our second technology is the BioMosquito™ Release, using the same tubes coming out of the factory :
• BioMosquito Aircraft Release: Release millions sterile mosquitoes per flight, utilizing our Dynamic Aviation partners aircraft, the King Air.
Recommended: King Air with Senecio dual aerial release POD mounted under the belly
• BioMosquito Drone Release: Release up to 100,000 sterile mosquitoes per flight, using off-the-shelf commercial drones
• BioMosquito Van (Ground) Release: Release of up to 1,000,000 mosquitoes per trip. The release van propagates tubes towards the release position in which the mosquitoes are being blown out using a fan, resulting in a sequential release of tubes using air.
Q: Why is handling mosquitos a challenge?
A: Mosquitoes are very fragile. There is a whole set of technical contradictions that we needed to solve in order to provide a viable solution. Any solution which aims for large commercial operation, requires both abilities to handle millions of mosquitoes per day, while overcoming the problem that it is very difficult to classify mosquito sex “on the fly”. Not to mention packaging. At Senecio with a creative approach, we managed to solve both of the challenges at once. In the picture we see the challenges associated when trying to have more than one mosquito together, as they quickly tend to tangle to each other like Velcro.
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Following the manufacturing, trying to release large numbers of mosquitoes out of drones or aircrafts, we needed to design a unique aeronautic POD which provided a safe environment for the released mosquitoes, protecting them from the deadly wind shear while being released at up to 150miles per hour. Our POD technology was tested together with our aviation partner, Dynamic Aviation over multiple test flights in Virgina USA, as part of the prestige BIRD (Israel-United States Binational Industrial Research and Development Foundation) program.
Some similar challenges apply to drones as well. Mainly the question was how to keep the mosquitoes immobile, while still being able to release small dosages each time, according to the releasing vehicle coordinates. Following our experience with aerial release, we have designed a unique solution which combines a release cell and a storage cell which ensure the mosquitoes are being kept immobile, while enabling the release in small dosages when needed.
Q: What can we expect from you in the future?
A: There are many opportunities we are seeking such as in the US, Brazil China and even Africa, specifically in which our unique sorting can be a supporting tool in the eradication efforts.
We look forward to partnering with local mosquito districts and mosquito factories to test and validate our technology.
In the meantime, we invite everyone to join us on our upcoming Sterile Insect Technique symposium led by Senecio, at the upcoming AMCA international mosquito conference in Orlando, Florida February 2019.
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