BERT

2026-07-01 10:28:11

KAIST Unveils BehavERT: AI Decodes Animal Movement Like Language, Detects Autism Behavior in Mice

Researchers at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) have developed BehavERT, an AI model based on the BERT architecture that interprets animal movement patterns by converting skeletal coordinates of body parts (nose, ears, spine, limbs, tail) into tokens. Without prior biological training, the model autonomously detected social behavior deficits in Shank3B knockout autism model mice by analyzing mouth-to-mouth contact. Outperforming existing models across five international benchmarks, BehavERT not only classifies behaviors but also understands their meaning, with potential applications in drug development, psychiatric research, and behavioral genetics.

320
KAIST Unveils BehavERT: AI Decodes Animal Movement Like Language, Detects Autism Behavior in Mice