{"id":24649,"date":"2026-10-14T17:43:30","date_gmt":"2026-10-14T12:13:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indianeagle.com\/traveldiary\/?p=24649"},"modified":"2026-10-14T17:43:30","modified_gmt":"2026-10-14T12:13:30","slug":"anika-puri-ai-elephant-poaching-detection-tool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.indianeagle.com\/traveldiary\/anika-puri-ai-elephant-poaching-detection-tool\/","title":{"rendered":"Anika Puri: Indian-American Teen Who Built a $300 AI Tool to Detect Potential Elephant Poachers"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Source: ChatGPT<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

At age 17, Indian-American student Anika Puri developed a $300 AI-powered tool to help wildlife rangers spot potential elephant poachers. Her invention, ElSa (Elephant-Savior), uses artificial intelligence and thermal drone footage to distinguish between human and animal movement patterns. During testing, the system achieved 90.9% accuracy in detecting humans. Her work also earned her a $25,000 Davidson Fellows Scholarship in 2022.<\/span><\/p>\n

Who Is Anika Puri?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Anika Puri is an Indian-American researcher and technology innovator from Chappaqua, New York, who developed an interest in science, robotics, and engineering at a young age. Her interest in wildlife protection began during visits to India. While visiting markets in Mumbai, she noticed ivory jewelry and decorative items being sold. This made her curious about elephant poaching and the challenges involved in protecting endangered animals.<\/span><\/p>\n

As she learned more about the problem, Puri discovered that wildlife rangers use drones equipped with thermal cameras to monitor wildlife reserves and other protected areas at night. However, checking hours of drone footage can take a lot of time and effort. She wanted to find a simpler and more affordable way to help rangers. This idea led her to develop ElSa, an AI system that could help identify human activity in wildlife areas.<\/span><\/p>\n

What Is ElSa, Anika Puri’s AI Wildlife Protection System?<\/b><\/h3>\n

ElSa, short for Elephant-Savior, is an AI-powered system that uses thermal drone footage to detect human movement in wildlife areas. Thermal cameras detect infrared radiation emitted by objects, allowing them to capture heat patterns and help identify people and animals in darkness. However, it can be difficult to tell them apart, especially when drones record footage from high above the ground.<\/span><\/p>\n

To solve this problem, Puri created ElSa to study how people and animals move. Instead of relying only on their appearance, the system looks at their speed, direction, and movement patterns. This helps wildlife rangers spot possible human activity in protected areas without watching every minute of drone footage. However, ElSa cannot confirm whether someone is a poacher. Rangers still need to review the footage and investigate anything suspicious.<\/span><\/p>\n

How Does Puri’s AI System Detect Potential Poachers?<\/b><\/h4>\n

Monitoring large forests and national parks is difficult, especially at night. Drones make the job easier by recording footage from above, but reviewing hours of videos can take a lot of time. Puri developed ElSa to help rangers with this task. The system uses AI to study movement in thermal videos and identify differences between humans and animals. It looks at movement characteristics, including:<\/span><\/p>\n