DSAIL BLOGS

IndabaX 2025

Mary Kariuki

IndabaX Kenya AI Summit

The theme of the summit was “Akili Unde Katika Siasa na Demokrasia”, which emphasized the need for responsible AI and ethical use of Artificial Intelligence(AI) in political and democratic processes ...

Mary Kariuki
Academic Adventure at DSAIL

Teofilo Ligawa

EXCLAIM 2025: AI for Climate Science at the Frontier

This conference focused on the intersection of AI and climate science. The symposium brought together researchers, data scientists, climate modelers, and technologists all working toward ...

Teofilo Ligawa
Academic Adventure at DSAIL

Dishan Otieno

My Academic Adventure at DSAIL

Life often offers uncertainties and unpredicted events that shape our character physically, socially, spiritually, and career wise. One such transformational moment has been my career journey at DSAIL filled with captivating events ...

Dishan Otieno
Fishpond Water Quality Monitoring System

Dishan Otieno, Gabriel Kiarie, and Jason Kabi

Fishpond Water Quality Monitoring System (DSAIL PondLive)

Fish farming, also known as aquaculture, plays an important role in supplying a steady and nutritious source of protein to populations all over the world. However, in the face of technological ...

Dishan Otieno
Scholarship Application Expedition

Muhinyia wa Ndegwa

My Scholarship Application Expedition

Navigating scholarship applications can indeed be challenging, riddled with setbacks and rejections. Many are tempted to give up, but with unwavering determination, patience, and persistence...

Muhinyia wa Ndegwa
Tree Planting Initiative

Jason Kabi

Faida Za Miti

Conservation experts, climate scientists and organizations tasked with conservation are in consensus that it is high-time we start taking conservation seriously. Climate change and destruction of catchment zones are real phenomena and the Global South including Kenya are ...

Jason Kabi
Data Collection at Ol Pejeta

Gabriel Kiarie

Data Collection at Ol Pejeta Conservancy for the Raspberry Pi TDR Project

Electric fences are used to create Protected Areas (PAs) to help preserve biodiversity, provide habitat to wildlife, and reduce Human Wildlife Conflicts (HWCs). Electric fences are prone to faults...

Gabriel Kiarie
Bats Misconceptions

Muhinyia Ndegwa

Get to know Bats: Dispelling Misconceptions about these creatures

Bats are fascinating and unique creatures that are often misunderstood. In this part of the world, they are sometimes termed creepy and diabolic! They are often associated with dark powers...

Muhinyia Ndegwa
Knee Flexion Measurement

Victor Kulankash

Knee Joint Flexion Angle Measurement using NVIDIA Jetson Nano

At DSAIL, we have developed an NVIDIA Jetson Nano based system that is capable of processing real-time webcam video input...

Victor Kulankash
Kieni Forest Data Collection

Collins Emasi

Into Kieni Forest; a Data Collection Exercise

Our aim was to collect stereoscopic images of randomly sampled trees which we would use to build a system that employs scientific methods to estimate the biomass of a tree...

Collins Emasi
Women in Conservation Technology 2022

Yuri Njathi

Technology for Wildlife Conservation

The DSAIL team presented the DSAIL-Porini dataset, the cutting-edge software and hardware used to collect images, and the preliminary software used to automate the data annotation process...

Yuri Njathi
DSAIL Research Day 2022

Lorna Mugambi

DSAIL Research Day 2022

The DSAIL Research Day is when research interns and undergraduate research assistants at the Center for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (DSAIL) gather to share with each other ...

Lorna Mugambi
Time Domain Reflectometry

Gabriel Kiarie

Time Domain Reflectometry (TDR)

TDR is a method of fault detection and localisation in electric cables. TDR involves sending a fast-rising pulse down a cable and sampling it at the input. The sampled signal is then analysed...

Gabriel Kiarie
Raspberry Pi TDR

Gabriel Kiarie

A Raspberry Pi Based Time Domain Reflectometer (TDR)

A Time Domain Reflectometer (TDR) is a device that is used to locate faults in electric cables. It is based on the principle of reflection of electric ...

Gabriel Kiarie
Reflection of Electric Signals

Gabriel Kiarie

Reflection of Electric Signals in Conductors

This blog combines some of these concepts to explain reflection of electric signals. An electric signal travelling down an electric cable gets reflected wholly or partially when it encounters ...

Gabriel Kiarie
DSAIL Bioacoustics System

Gabriel Kiarie

DSAIL Bioacoustics System

The DSAIL Bioacoustics System is a Raspberry Pi based acoustic sensor that was developed at DSAIL. The system was developed with the aim to collect acoustic data of birds and also perform automatic classification of birds ...

Gabriel Kiarie
DSAIL Power Management Board

Gabriel Kiarie

DSAIL Power Management Board: Powering the Raspberry Pi Autonomously Off-the-Grid

When designing a Raspberry Pi system to deploy in the field, the problem of powering the system needs to be handled carefully...

Gabriel Kiarie
Bioacoustics Monitoring

Gabriel Kiarie

Deploying 'Ears' in Ecosystems: Bioacoustics monitoring

Bioacoustics monitoring of ecosystems provides a potential remedy to the hurdles faced when using surveys to monitor ecosystems. Most animals, like human beings, use sound as one of their means of ...

Gabriel Kiarie
GCP InfluxDB Setup

Jason Kabi

GCP-InfluxDB

The following are brief steps on how to setup / launch an InfluxDB Virtual Machine on GCP (Google Cloud Platform), install python 3.7 on it and run a pythonscript that queries the data from an IoT network server like ...

Jason Kabi
Project Ewaso Hardware

Jason Kabi

Etch (Project Ewaso Hardware Development)

Etching is a subtractive method used for the production of etched circuit boards: acid is used to remove unwanted copper from a prefabricated laminate...

Jason Kabi
Project Ewaso Overview

Jason Kabi

Project Ewaso (project overview)

The Upper Ewaso Nyiro (Ngare Ngiro) is one of the major rivers in Kenya. For a millennium, it has been a lifeline for farmers and pastoralists in Kenya...

Jason Kabi