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School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science
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  4. Case study: Sensing the forest

Sensing the forest: exploring climate change through sound, AI and art

Anna Xambo looking at camera

Dr Anna Xambo

Senior Lecturer in Sound and Music Computing

Challenge

The Sensing the Forest project was born from two urgent crises: the climate emergency and the cultural and artistic challenges facing Higher Education. Led by Dr Anna Xambó (Senior Lecturer in Sound and Music Computing at the School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science), the initiative was driven by two central questions: can music, sound art, and artistic methods raise awareness of climate change? How can these methods collaborate with and inform scientific research?

Early conversations with forest scientists from Forest Research Dr Matthew Wilkinson, Dr George Xenakis and later Dr Mike Bell, at sites including Alice Holt in Surrey and the Northern Research Station in Edinburgh, were fundamental to shaping the project’s interdisciplinary methodology and activities. Equally, discussions with artistic curators Louise Fedotov-Clements and Hazel Stone at Forestry England provided essential insights into how artworks could be meaningfully exhibited in forest environments.

The project’s vision was to shift from a human-centric model of sensing and computing to one that is bio- or forest-centric. The team aimed to discover hidden ecological phenomena and their links to climate change, while also promoting acoustic ecology - listening to natural soundscapes to connect with complex environmental systems.

Approach

At the heart of the project is the use of AI, Internet of Things (IoT), acoustic ecology, and creative media to interpret forest environments and engage the public. The team developed several bespoke technologies:

  • DIY solar-powered streamers – led by Luigi Marino, these off-grid audio devices capture and stream natural soundscapes, with recordings made publicly available on Freesound. [Figure 1]
  • Custom data logger – developed by Mike Bell and Catrina Jones, this measures carbon balance indicators including temperature, humidity, wind speed, radiation, and CO₂ concentration. The data has been used in real-time artworks such as Peter Batchelor’s Dendrophone. [Figure 2]
  • DIY tree talker (hardware and software) – created by an interdisciplinary team including Mahmoud B. Elmokadem, Krishna Nama Manjunatha, Tug O’Flaherty, Georgios Xenakis, Gerard Roma and Anna Xambó, this device combines sensors for soil moisture, temperature, humidity and tree stress, providing new insights into forest health. [Figure 3]

The project also introduced the concept of soundscape-based music and creative AI-using AI to analyse, classify, and retrieve natural sounds for artistic applications. This was showcased in a live coding performance at the International Conference on Live Coding 2025 in Barcelona, with further presentations planned at the Web Audio Conference 2025 (WAC 2025) in Paris and at the Life Code Live concert organised by Creative Coding Utrecht in the Netherlands. 

Methodologically, Sensing the Forest combines data science, HCI, DIY prototyping, IoT engineering, acoustic ecology, and artistic practice. This mix enables both rigorous environmental monitoring and creative interventions designed to inspire public engagement.

Forest experiments

[Figure 1]

Sound installation in forest

[Figure 2]

Sensing the forest

[Figure 3]

Community Involvement

Community and public engagement have been central throughout. Key initiatives include:

  • Your Sonic Forest: an onsite and online summer school at Alice Holt Forest involving international artists. Site-specific works included A Tree Listens to Itself (Miles Scharff), Tree Museum (Ed Chivers), and In Touch (Beccy Abraham). A short documentary by QMUL PhD student Shuoyang Zheng captured the exhibition. [Figure 4]
  • The Dendrophone: a one-year sound installation by Peter Batchelor, running 2024–25 at Alice Holt. Using environmental data to generate evolving soundscapes, it invited visitors to reflect on forests through sound. [Figure 5]
  • Seminar series and media outputs: online talks with artists and scientists, a blog with interviews, videos of events, and an upcoming podcast.
  • Participatory design: involving students and community members in developing DIY tools such as the tree talker, fostering citizen science engagement.

From these activities, the team identified six thematic lenses for designing forest-based climate experiences: extinction, memory, visibility of hidden processes, interconnection, human-environment interaction, and the tree as a cybernetic system.

Sound installation in forest

[Figure 4]

Sound installation in forest

[Figure 5]

Impact

Feedback from participants has been strongly positive. Visitors described the experiences as “unique and innovative,” prompting them to “rethink interaction with the environment” and providing “a calming and enlightening experience.” Guided walks and tours proved especially effective for contextualising artworks and gathering reflections.

For students, the project has created opportunities to link research with education. Examples include:

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