Distance sampling with milder assumptions

Estimating animal density or abundance is a fundamental challenge in statistical ecology. Distance sampling is a widely employed method for addressing this issue. Recent work has shown that the assumptions underlying distance sampling may be relaxed by leveraging the relative time at which an animal is detected during a survey. There are several avenues for further methodological development, depending on the interest of the applicant. For instance, parametric assumptions could be relaxed; the methods could also be generalized to allow a surveyor’s path to be nonlinear or allow animal movement. Each of these possibilities is motivated by real-world data in need of comprehensive analysis.