SIUE Citizen Science Shows Everyday People Can Map the Moon
Edwardsville, Ill. (PRWEB) April 16, 2014 -- A team of scientists working with the CosmoQuest virtual research facility (CosmoQuest.org) has demonstrated that it is possible for everyday people to map the Moon with the same quality as a group of experienced professionals.
These crowd-sourced results are being published in the journal Icarus and highlight the ability of citizen scientists to advance planetary research. CosmoQuest is a second-generation citizen science site run out of the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville STEM Center by Assistant Research Professor Dr. Pamela L. Gay.
While “crowdsourcing science” may sound as if they are handing out lab sets and white coats, CosmoQuest has actually done something much more impactful. They handed over the moon.
CosmoQuest’s MoonMappers research portal invites the public to learn about the lunar surface and aid professional researchers in mapping craters and other features on the Moon.
MoonMappers is led by researchers Stuart Robbins of the University of Colorado and Irene Antonenko of the Planetary Institute of Toronto. CosmoQuest community members are the first citizen scientists to demonstrate volunteers can accurately identify planetary surface features.
With over 500 million craters on the moon alone, and new data coming in from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter daily, there is much science to be furthered.
“As early as the 1800s, top researchers, such as Harvard's Edward Pickering, realized the field of astronomy could advance faster by engaging amateur astronomers in collecting data for professional researchers,” Gay said. “Utilizing the global community of amateur researchers that CosmoQuest has drawn together, research can happen more quickly, more accurately, and more often than ever before.
As shrinking funding reduces the number of professional positions, the need for help is greater than ever before. “CosmoQuest allows passionate volunteers and professional scientists to effectively explore our solar system together and accomplish science that might otherwise never be done,” Gay said.
In a statistical comparison between the results of eight professional crater counters, and MoonMappers’ cadre of amateur counters from around the world, it was shown that the combined results are consistent across both groups even across varied types of craters. This study also showed that the variation in counts between different professionals could be as much as 35 percent, while there was a 1-to-1 relationship between the combined professional counts and the citizen scientist counts.
“The results from the study were very reassuring to us,” said Robbins, the study’s lead author. “Without this first step of verifying the accuracy of volunteer crater counters, there would be no point in continuing the project.
“Our study results mean we can now use the power of crowd-sourcing to gather more data than we ever thought possible before.”
This means willing volunteers can meaningfully contribute to science any time they feel like sitting down and marking a few features. Waiting for the bus? Sitting in the doctor’s office? Or, “Even do it at night while watching television,” is Robbins’ advice to help further humankind’s knowledge of these objects’ history.
While mapping the Moon is a goal unto itself, there is actually a lot of science tied in with mapping all these divots on the lunar surface.
“Throughout our solar system’s existence, a steady stream of objects - asteroids and comets mostly - have rained down on the Earth and our Moon,” Gay stated. “While it may seem these objects are out to kill life on Earth (and they certainly killed the dinosaurs!), they also offer us a chance to understand our history.
“When we see an area of the Moon that is smoother, we know something has erased the craters, but when we see a very cratered region, we know we are seeing an old surface that holds a record of past collisions.”
CosmoQuest is directed by Gay, and is designed to provide the public with an online experience that a professional might have at a research center.
“Put simply, the sky is large, and astronomers need all the help the public can offer!” Gay said.
In addition to hosting MoonMappers and two other citizen science projects, CosmoQuest also offers online classes, provides multiple weekly seminars using Google’s Hangout-on-Air technology, has materials for teachers, and is home to the Virtual Star Party series. This second-generation citizen science site goes from asking people to click through images to asking them to learn what it takes to become an active collaborator.
Contacts:
Dr. Pamela L. Gay, CosmoQuest Principal Investigator
Assistant Research Professor, SIUE
starstryder(at)gmail(dot)com
(618) 307-6546
Cory Lehan, CosmoQuest Lead Programmer
Programmer, SIUE
corylehan(at)gmail(dot)com
(618) 444-2156
Stuart Robbins, MoonMappers Science Lead
Research Scientist, University of Colorado
stuart.robbins(at)colorado(dot)edu
Doug McIlhagga, Southern IL University Edwardsville, http://www.siue.edu, +1 (618) 650-5600, [email protected]
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