ScienceDaily (Oct. 18, 2012) — A team
of elephant researchers from Stanford University has transformed a remote
corner of southern Africa into a high-tech field camp run entirely on sunlight.
The seasonal solar-powered research camp gives scientists a rare opportunity to
quietly observe, videotape and photograph wild elephants at Mushara waterhole,
an isolated oasis in Etosha National Park in Namibia.
"One of the really special aspects
of solar energy is that it allows us to be in this incredibly remote area
that's closed to tourists and is off the grid," said lead researcher
Caitlin O'Connell-Rodwell, an instructor at the Stanford School of Medicine and
a collaborating scientist at Stanford's Center for Conservation Biology. She is
also co-founder of Utopia Scientific, a non-profit organization that promotes
awareness about science, conservation and public health.
"We get to watch elephant society
unfold before us in a very quiet environment -- no generators, no people, no
vehicles," she added.
O'Connell-Rodwell has been studying
elephant communication at Mushara for 20 years. She was the first scientist to
demonstrate that low-frequency calls produced by elephants generate powerful
vibrations in the ground -- seismic signals that elephants can feel, and even
interpret, via their sensitive trunks and feet.
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