Have you wondered what your pets are feeling? When your dog wags (来回摇摆) its tail, does that mean it is happy? A new app called Happy Pets can tell you what’s going on.
The app uses artificial intelligence (AI) to analyze (分析) the facial expressions of cats and dogs. Then it can tell you what breed (品种) your pet is and how it is feeling. It can show the five most common feelings — happy, angry, neutral, sad and scared.
Researchers at the University of Melbourne in Australia developed the app. The key technology used in the app is facial recognition, a common use of AI. We can unlock our mobile phones or enter train stations with facial recognition readers. But this is the first time that the tech has been used with animals.
The app’s AI was first taught to recognize a picture of an animal. Then, it was taught to recognize the facial features (特征) of cats and dogs. Next came the most important step — teaching it to detect emotions based on certain facial features. For instance, if a dog tightens up its eyes and mouth while changing the position of its ears, this means the dog is scared. To master this skill, the AI program “saw” and “read” thousands of example images.
How accurate are the results? The researchers think they are trustworthy since the app has been tested many times. Interestingly, they have found that cats are harder to read than dogs. In the future, the app might also be able to analyze a pet’s body to make its readings more accurate.
【小题1】What is the app Happy Pets used for?| A．Playing games with pets. | B．Telling us how pets feel. |
| C．Training pets to remember facts. | D．Dividing pets into different groups. |
| A．touch | B．discover | C．get | D．feel |
| A．It is part of a student project. | B．It works better on cats. |
| C．It uses facial recognition technology. | D．It often provides untrustworthy results. |
| A．How people use the app. | B．How the app’s AI was trained. |
| C．What certain facial features mean. | D．What emotions the app can recognize. |
| A．show how to recognize animals’ feelings |
| B．show how to care for animals |
| C．describe a study on animals |
| D．describe a new app |
