Mini Good News | September 08, 2009 | 20 comments

Google's search engine pinpoints extinction

source: http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2009/09/googles-search-engine-pinpoints-extinction

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pjacobs51
Thanks to the BBC for a link to this paper describing how Google's algorithm for ranking web pages could determine what species are most critical for sustaining ecosystems.

The authors write in PLoS Computational Biology that their version of PageRank could ascertain which extinction would likely lead to ecosystem collapse.

Species are embedded in complex networks of relationships. Some more so than others. In those cases, a single extinction can cascade into the loss of many other species.

Figuring this out in advance is supremely difficult. The number of links in even simple ecosystems exceeds the number of atoms in the universe. We can't sort out that kind of complexity without quantum computers.

But maybe Google can. Researchers Stefano Allesina and Mercedes Pascual reversed the definition of the PageRank algorithm that ranks a webpage as important if important pages point to it. In the conservation biology context, even humble species are important if they point to important species.

The researchers also designed a cyclical element into the foodweb system by including the detritus pool... you know, that to which all returns and that from which all arises.

Allesina and Pascual then tested their method against published foodwebs to rank species according to the damage caused if they were removed from the ecosystem. They also tested algorithms already in use in computational biology to find a solution to the same problem.

The results: PageRank gave them exactly the same solution as the more complicated algorithms.

In the real world, this research will likely make it easier to quickly target conservation efforts for maximum benefit.

Hope evolves in that muddy puddle where technology meets environmentalism.
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20 comments // Google's search engine pinpoints extinction

  • EmperorThan
    • 0
      EmperorThan  

    • When does the "al gore"-rithm (see what I did there? hur hur hurr) say humans will be extinct?

      Google is becoming like Walmart in that South Park episode.

    • 2 years ago
  • CalgarC
  • remanns
  • skiersam10
  • ManchesterParking
  • LarzNero
  • kennymotown
  • michail77
  • besic
    • 0
      besic  

    • This will be a great tool to science in general. There is a lot of potential in a cool innovation like this. Two thumbs up!

    • 2 years ago
  • freecrack
    • 0
      freecrack  

    • whats scary is that although it defies realistic logic of all the technologies that sucessfully deliver the service they are supposed to provide google is number 1 so they know something everyone else doesnt

    • 2 years ago
  • GenocideByLyrics
    • 0
      GenocideByLyrics  

    • "Figuring this out in advance is supremely difficult. The number of links in even simple ecosystems exceeds the number of atoms in the universe."

      This is both an incredibly untrue and incredibly stupid thing to say.

    • 2 years ago
  • Hunnter
    • 0
      Hunnter  
    • Image
    • GenocideByLyrics:

      There is a predicted number of 10^80 atoms in the universe.
      Links between these atoms go well over a million times this.

      Links between animals in an ecosystem aren't as simple as "this animal eats that".
      Ecosystems are more complex than any lifeform on this planet.
      The number of links we are talking is incredibly high.
      The number isn't just pulled out of someone's ass.
      And i'd go as far as saying that the links generated by this aren't even most of the links present, in fact i could guarantee it.

    • 2 years ago
  • frizzlecat
  • aka6
    • 0
      aka6  

    • There's a fair number of animals that have been domesticated by humans, which might survive without us around, but would definitely see massive population declines. That and pandas. Pandas would definitely go extinct without us making them have sex.

    • 2 years ago
  • quanta
    • 0
      quanta  

    • evolution folks , plain and simple. this system has done this many times before and will continue to do so for a long time to come. Who knows what we'll be down this road. Just know we will be. hope we don't look like a coackroach.

    • 2 years ago
  • joshcraig
    • 0
      joshcraig  

    • the funny thing is what if we take are selfs out of the equation no animals are reliant on us. Are we at the very bottom of that scale or are we at the top shitting all over the bottom

    • 2 years ago
  • michail77
    • 0
      michail77  
    • joshcraig:

      I don't think I need any algorithms to know the answer to that. However, there are probably some parasites that might have a hard time. Much of our domesticated livestock as well. Rats would suffer some.

      It probably mostly stems from the fact we are not prey. Or disappearance would still cause a drastic change among what is left.

    • 2 years ago
  • Mike_Johnston
    • 0
      Mike_Johnston  
    • joshcraig:

      Interesting thought though. How much impact would there really be without humans? All we do is consume. We are not prey for anything and, for the most part in developed countries, we don't even return to the food chain when we die due to being embalmed and buried...

    • 2 years ago
  • conservativelyliberal
  • lordsbassman
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