Narrator: This is Science Today. Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have discovered an unobtrusive way to monitor animal habitats. David Culler, professor of computer science, says that by installing a network of wireless microsensor motes into a habitat, researchers can obtain highly specific, raw data about the environment without being disruptive.

Culler: : So for example, if you're monitoring animals, you can do it in this very unobtrusive fashion. And it may well be that what we see is quite different than what people have seen before because they've been intruding on the very thing that they're trying to measure. As well as that we're able to measure it at granularity that they've never been able to perceive it.

Narrator: Culler says once the microsensors are installed, the challenge for biologists will be to process all of the data.

Culler: So it's like, when you invent a microscope, there's all of the sudden all of these organisms that you've never seen before and all these interactions. So it's getting information of the physical changes, activities, across space and time, and then being able to make sense out of that and take action in response to it.

Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.