Ben McEwen
Postdoctoral Researcher Machine Learning & Biodiversity Active Learning Co-lead of the Listening Lab
Kia ora! I am a postdoctoral researcher specialising in audio machine learning and bioacoustics based at Tilburg University, Netherlands. My research interests include active learning and uncertainty quantification for scaleable and data-efficient biodiversity monitoring.
My current project is TABMON where I am contributing to the development of a transnational biodiversity monitoring system with autonomous acoustic sensors from Norway to Spain.
I am the co-lead of the Listening Lab a multidisciplinary research group developing computational bioacoustic tools for conservation in New Zealand. I completed my PhD in computer Science from the Unversity of Canterbury where I developed methods for detection of invasive species. I am especially interested in how computational tools can aid in the detection of rare, at-risk and invasive species.
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News
| Mar 01, 2026 | Active Learning for Bioacoustics — I am please to announce that the Active Learning for Bioacoustic BioDCASE data challenge will be released on April 1st. |
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| Oct 29, 2025 | Co-organising the BioDCASE Workshop — See you at the upcoming BioDCASE and DCASE Workshop! |
| Sep 07, 2025 | IBAC Conference — I presented our research related to Active Sampling for Data Efficient Large-Scale Bioacoustic Monitoring at the International Bioacoustics Congress in Denmark. Check out the poster here. |
| Oct 01, 2024 | Starting Postdoctoral Research in the Netherlands — I’ve joined Tilburg University as a postdoctoral researcher in Dr. Dan Stowell’s group, working on the transnational TABMON biodiversity monitoring project. Learn more here. |
| Aug 01, 2024 | PhD Completed — I’ve completed my PhD Computational Bioacoustics for the Detection of Rare Acoustic Events. You can read the full thesis here. |
Latest Posts
| Mar 06, 2026 | Active Learning for Bioacoustics BioDCASE Challenge An active learning data challenge for bioacoustics launching April 1st |
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| Feb 03, 2026 | BaseAL Release An Active Learning Evaluation Framework |
| Sep 05, 2025 | Data Efficient Large-Scale Bioacoustic Monitoring Developing a transnational biodiversity monitoring network and data pipeline. |
| Mar 15, 2025 | Stratified Active Learning Improving model generalisation across diverse ecosystems and changing soundscapes. |
| Mar 15, 2025 | Active Few-shot Learning Data-efficient detection of unrepresented species |
Selected Publications
Check out my other papers on Google Scholar