Regarded as one of the ocean's most formidable predators, killer whales are pack hunters, with some orcas hunting other marine mammals while others prefer to eat only fish. In a new study published in the Journal of Experimental Biology, Matthew Bowers from Duke University and colleagues speculated whether aquatic mammals that are potential killer whale prey could distinguish calls of the predatory killers from those of other marine mammals.

Regarded as one of the ocean's most formidable predators, killer whales are pack hunters, with some orcas hunting other marine mammals while others prefer to eat only fish. In a new study published in Journal of Experimental Biology, Matthew Bowers from Duke University and colleagues speculated whether aquatic mammals that are potential killer whale prey could distinguish calls of the predatory killers from those of other marine mammals.

What do sharks do when we’re not looking?

To answer this question, Murdoch University fish biologist Lauran Brewster attached accelerometers to the fins of 24 lemon sharks in the Bimini Islands, Bahamas to find out.

Similar to our wearable Fitbits, the accelerometer collects data about the sharks’ movements, which are then analysed using a statistical approach called machine learning. “Very basically, machine learning is a model that learns patterns in data and can be used to identify similar patterns in new data and make predictions from it,” said Brewster.