California scientists build robot to look for great white sharks near beaches

Researchers at Cal State Long Beach have begun testing a semi-autonomous shark surveillance bot, a 10-foot-long unmanned craft that uses acoustic receivers and cameras to patrol near beaches for up to a week at a time, with plans to add a drone and DNA detection equipment. The device aims to alert lifeguards to the presence of great white sharks, which regularly swim near people without attacks, though California has recorded 236 shark incidents since 1950, including 17 fatalities. Chris Lowe, professor of marine biology and director of the Shark Lab at CSU Long Beach, said the bot can be programmed to 'mow the lawn' and be driven by lifeguards or lab staff.

Getting your Trinity Audio //trinityaudio.ai player ready...From a distance, it looks like a kayak or a surfboard. But it’s not a person enjoying an afternoon at the beach — it’s a new high-tech device to look for great white sharks. Researchers at Cal State Long Beach have begun testing what they are calling a “semi-autonomous shark surveillance bot.” The unmanned craft, a prototype that is about 10 feet long and 3 feet wide, hit the water last month in Southern California. RELATED: Autopsy reveals force of single shark bite that killed Monterey swimmer Erica Fox The craft can patrol near beaches for up to a week at a time, using acoustic receivers to listen for white sharks in the wild that have been fitted by scientists with tracking tags. It also has cameras, and will soon include a drone for aerial surveillance that can send live 360-degree images back to lifeguards and biologists on the shore. “The idea is that you program it to mow the lawn — just go back and forth — in the ocean,” said Chris Lowe, a professor of marine biology and director of the Shark Lab at CSU Long Beach. “Lifeguards can drive it, or we can drive it from the lab.” Plans also are afoot by scientists at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in Moss Landing to fit the craft with equipment that can detect shark DNA in the water, picking up traces of skin, mucous and other waste that leaves clues when the famous apex predators are coming and going through a popular beach area. Shark attacks remain extremely rare. California has recorded 236 since 1950, including 17 fatalities, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. San Diego County has the most incidents with 27, followed by San Mateo County with 22, Santa Barbara with 21, then Marin, Monterey and Humboldt with 19 each, Santa Cruz County with 17, and San Luis Obispo and Sonoma counties with 16 each. Every year, millions of people swim, surf, kayak and dive in the ocean off California. In recent years, drone footage and signals from acoustic tags have shown that sharks regularly swim near people and almost never attack. “Sharks are swimming by surfers and swimmers all the time, and the people don’t know they are there,” Lowe said. “It is happening daily.” Several high-profile deaths in recent years have drawn more attention to the issue, however. In December, Pebble Beach resident Erica Fox, 55, was killed by a great white shark off Lovers Point in Pacifica, in Monterey County, while swimming in the ocean. Her autopsy report, released by authorities Wednesday, showed she died from a single bite https://www.mercurynews.com/2026/07/30/autopsy-monterey-pacific-grove-lovers-point-shark-attack-erica-fox-single-large-bite/ from a shark that Lowe estimates was 16 feet long. In June 2022, another member of Fox’s swimming club, the Kelp Krawlers, Steve Bruemmer, was bitten and seriously injured while swimming https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/06/24/shark-attack-victim-i-didnt-know-if-i-was-going-to-bleed-to-death/ in the same area. Two months later, a paddleboarder and his dog were thrown into the water there but escaped unhurt after a shark bit their board from below. Before Fox, the last fatal shark attack in the Monterey Bay area occurred May 9, 2020. Ben Kelly, 26, was surfing about 100 yards offshore at Manresa State Beach https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/05/12/legend-santa-cruz-surfer-killed-by-shark-celebrated-as-the-brightest-of-lights/ , roughly 4 miles south of Aptos in Santa Cruz County, when he was bitten by a 10- to 12-foot great white shark. Authorities said the bite severed an artery in his leg. He was helped back to the beach but died a short time later. Adult great white sharks mostly eat seals and sea lions. Juveniles eat fish, squid and rays. Researchers think that most bites are accidental; great white sharks mistake people for seals or sea lions. “We don’t smell like food to them, we don’t look like food, and we don’t sound like food. Therefore they nearly always ignore us,” Lowe said. “We are probably getting dozens of encounters a week without bites.” Lowe said he hopes to have the surveillance device finished in two years, in time for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, when triathletes will be swimming in Long Beach Harbor, an area that sharks have been known to visit. Along the way, he said, it can help provide scientists more information about where and when sharks are present, and can help the public get a better understanding that the ocean is a wild place and sharks are part of it. At first, Lowe said, he will use the device off Southern California, in places like Long Beach Harbor, Santa Monica Bay and Huntington Beach. But he said with enough funding, others could be made and used across the state in marine waters in Central and Northern California, as well. “This is not about ‘there’s a shark in the water, let’s pull everybody out,'” Lowe said. “It’s about giving people more information so they can make decisions for themselves.” “It’s an information tool,” he added. “We aren’t trying to scare people. We are trying to inform them so they can make better risk assessments. It’s like when you go to Yellowstone, and there are signs saying stay 150 feet from the bison.” Although Lowe said he believes this is the first time they all have been placed on one craft, many of the tools on the robot have been used by shark researchers for years. Barbara Block, a professor of marine sciences at Stanford University who has done groundbreaking research on great white sharks, tuna and other ocean species for decades, called Lowe’s project “a step forward.” She said it’s important to remember that juvenile white sharks, which are often found closer to the beach in shallower waters, don’t bite people. Block’s team also uses DNA research to study sharks in the wild. She said while there are benefits, researchers cannot yet identify individual sharks from it, and changing ocean currents can create problems. “It tells you when a shark is present,” she said. “But it comes with lots of caveats. The DNA is in the water, and the water is moving. It takes 72 hours before it degrades. You might be looking at DNA from 3 days ago or today. It’s a challenge for all of us. Did a shark pass today or two days ago? The water moves.” The best way to know in real time if a shark is present is from acoustic tags and from drones, she said. Although hundreds of sharks have been tagged in the wild, many more have not. Jim Birch, a scientist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute who helps lead efforts to design robotic equipment and ocean sensors there, said MBARI recently has used the DNA technology to study algae blooms in Lake Huron and to track ocean species between San Francisco and the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. That information can show over time what plants and animals generally live in certain areas and how they might be shifting due to climate change. The environmental DNA technology, known as “eDNA,” also detects harmful algae blooms, can identify if endangered salmon are present in rivers, and can discover whether invasive species like zebra mussels or quagga mussels are present in lakes, he said. “Visual and acoustic will give you real-time information about sharks,” he said. “The eDNA gives you the more broad biological perspective.” The project also has support from the New York University Center for Robotics, with $300,000 in funding from the Seaver Institute. The Seaver Institute is a private philanthropic foundation based in Los Angeles. It was founded in 1955 by Frank Roger Seaver, a San Jose native born in 1883, who became a prominent lawyer in Los Angeles, owned an oil drilling equipment company and donated millions to Pomona College, Pepperdine University and other nonprofits. Birch and Lowe said they are early in the shark surveillance robot project but that it has significant promise in the years ahead. “We don’t know enough about white sharks,” Birch said. “There is so much about the ocean we still don’t know. White sharks are fascinating apex predators, but they go away. The ocean is a big place. One of the big drivers is human curiosity. It is also about public safety, so that we can put a sign up at the beach saying, ‘White sharks are here during these months and you decide.'”