Hi everybody!
I’m sharing regular Mothbox updates while working with the Digital Naturalism Laboratories (Dinalab) team. For those curious, you can read the previous Mothbox updates here. In today’s post, I’ll be talking about our new and improved system for processing Mothbox data, new Mothbeams that we’ve been building at Dinalab, as well as some other updates on our new mass-manufacturable version of the Mothbox.
New UI & documentation for Data Post-Processing
Now that we’ve got several Mothboxes being deployed across the globe, we fixed up our data post-processing pipeline so that it’s easier and faster for users to get their insect data! Now our Python scripts are broken into smaller, better-organised parts, offer huge performance improvements (especially with a CUDA graphics card), and, most importantly, we created a new UI using Gradio that folks can use instead of running each Python script on its own! We even have updated documentation on our website that shows you how to run the new UI!
New Mothbeams
The Mothbeam is the attractor light component of the Mothbox, and can be used both as part of the Mothbox or as a standalone device. We have come across a few folks who are interested in acquiring only Mothbeams and using them for traditional data-collection techniques, such as lightsheeting. So we decided to update our Mothbeams (building on the original design by Moritz atLabLab) so they are more customisable, and throughout September, we worked on putting together as many standalone Mothbeams as we could! Then Andy (@hikinghack) brought them to an automated insect monitoring conference in Denmark at the end of the month.
Progress towards a mass-manufacturable Mothbox
The previous version of the mothbox was optimised for getting a device together as quickly as possible with robust, off-the-shelf parts. This version uses the Plano 1360 polycarbonate box, which is rugged, clear (we even tested its UV clarity with our spectrophotometer), and weather-proof. The main downside, though, is that the process for making this box doesn’t scale well for mass manufacturing. Not only do you have to purchase the case, but you need drill a hole into and epoxy a camera lens before you have your final external housing for the Mothbox.
So, in the spirit of making this thing much easier to produce and much more widely available to people around the world, we have decided to make a 3D-printable box! 3D printed boxes have some cool upsides, like a flexible design that can accommodate smaller or larger mothbox models. We are even thinking of making two versions, one for people who want a standalone mothbox with 1-2 batteries in its box, and one for folks who want to only use an external power supply.
3D printable boxes can be made cheaply and efficiently, are easier to transport, can be customised easily (you can make them from different materials in different places), and can reduce logistics material density (rather than buying and travelling with 20 boxes, you could just take a 3d printer and some filament with you). All of these benefits make it easier to manufacture a Mothbox at scale.
This doesn’t mean that 3D printing doesn’t have some downsides, though! We’re still working through how to make the box as weatherproof as possible, since the layers that make up each print can be porous, and some materials are more likely to absorb moisture. So we’re still trying to make this new housing water-resistant, yet still clear enough to shine big photographic lights, while also ultra-clear enough near the camera to take crystal-clear photos, all while making sure it is still easy to print and manufacture (i.e., no tricky coatings).
We’re also on our fourth iteration of the Mothbox PCB (the main electronics board)! We’ve been working with Dinasaur Paul Hamilton in Australia to optimise this really complex circuit board rapidly, and the work has been paying off! There’s now also built-in temperature and light sensors, little switches to physically program your Mothbox’s schedule, and even more photographic LEDs up front!
To help make this mass-manufacturable Mothbox a reality, we’re teaming up with the Open Science Shop to create a network of manufacturers and vendors eager to build and sell Mothboxes locally! We will be hosting monthly meetings with various makers, vendors, and open hardware enthusiasts interested in establishing a distributed manufacturing network of Mothboxes. If you are interested in joining our Working Group, please register here.
Express your interest in purchasing Mothboxes and Mothbeams!
Are you interested in buying a Mothbox or a Mothbeam? Are you interested in perhaps purchasing a Mothbox kit or just the Mothbox PCB board? We aren’t quite taking orders yet**,** and we aren’t even taking pre-orders, but we would like to gauge interest so that we can start preparing! So if you or your lab might want to buy one Mothbox (or 100!) within the next few years, please fill out our quick little form and you will be some of the first we prioritise.
We just got back from Denmark and are heading to Portland Next!
The Mothbox team is busy sharing their progress at several events! Andy (@hikinghack) just returned from a trip to Aarhus, Denmark, to present the Mothbox at an automated insect monitoring conference, and he will also be heading to Portland in November with Kit (@wellreadpanda) for the 2025 Entomology Society Meeting.
In other exciting news, two of our team members will be starting their PhDs at the end of this year! Hubert (@Hubertszcz) will be working with Alexandre Antonelli, Daniel Zuleta, and Daisy Dent at the University of Gothenburg, and Bri will be working with Dr Shawan Chowdhury at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. Both will continue to incorporate their work with the Mothbox project into their PhDs!
Bonus: Kit wins Boring Fund Award for Mothbox Project!
The Wildlabs’ Boring Fund supports elements of science and conservation work that are often overlooked, such as organising and training data sets! Dinalab’s Co-director, Kit (@wellreadpanda), applied and was awarded a grant to help train even better international data for the mothbox project! The dataset will also be published publicly, so that anyone in the world can improve their moth-detection skills!
New: Comic about Open Hardware and Serviceberries
I also wanted to quickly share a new comic made by Andy (@hikinghack) about the importance of making and sharing, and how the open source hardware movement is tied to the idea of gift economies. Andy draws parallels between open-source hardware and foraging for serviceberries (and Robin Wall Kimmerer wrote a whole book about serviceberries, too!) You can read the whole comic (for free, of course) here:
https://archive.org/details/serviceberrycomic/mode/2up
That’s all I have for now, I will be back again soon with more Mothbox project updates!