Welcome to the website for ECE 480 Senior Design Team 6. ECE Senior Design Team 6 was tasked with building a robotic hyena to aid in the field research efforts of Dr. Kay Holekamp. Her research team was seeking a hyena decoy that has the ability to make specific movements to portray common body language expressed by hyenas. The objective of this project is to use the robot to invoke reactions from hyenas as a result of body movements and audible cues. The main body language signals which hyenas exchange occur predominately in ear, tail, and head movement. Hyenas also make noises verbally which complement their physical demeanor. The team started with the static spotted hyena decoy shown below and has animated the model to allow it to mimic these behaviors. The head, tail, and ears have been designed and programmed as a real spotted hyena would. With robotic integration into the hyena model, the research team will be able to use this robot to examine the reaction of spotted hyenas to various behaviors and obtain meaningful data for advances in mammalian behavior studies in hyena societies. The hyena is meant for use in field experiments and is designed to meet the requirements of our client. The robot portrays hyena behaviors to attract and interact with hyenas in the wild. Dr. Kay Holekamp