ATLAS, a satellite-connected wildlife monitoring system developed by Simon Fraser University researchers and collaborators, prioritizes useful camera footage according to scientific objectives and available energy. Its October 2026 research paper describes deployment at 18 salmon-monitoring sites along North America’s Pacific coast from April through November 2025.
The system addresses a practical constraint: solar-powered monitoring stations must supply both their cameras and an energy-intensive satellite terminal. ATLAS assesses footage against experts’ instructions, then schedules transmissions using battery reserves, expected solar input, and connection conditions.
Researchers evaluated competing approaches by replaying recorded conditions on deployment hardware. ATLAS achieved 87.4% mean clip-selection accuracy, 26.4 percentage points above the comparison systems’ average. During low-solar periods, those systems averaged 16% downtime; ATLAS maintained near-continuous operation. These comparisons used replay rather than simultaneous trials of competing systems at each site.
The work follows earlier remote-access research involving Starlink-connected salmon monitoring in northern British Columbia. That study described cooperation with the Pacific Salmon Foundation and First Nations groups, identifying electricity supply and environmental conditions as obstacles to sustained connectivity.
The ATLAS results show how selecting transmissions according to scientific value can help preserve monitoring continuity. Its reported accuracy measures whether selected clips match expert priorities, rather than the accuracy of a salmon population estimate.
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