Citizen Scientists Making Incredible Discoveries   
       
   April 22, 2011: "Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known,"   
   wrote Carl Sagan.   
       
   And now you can be the one to find it, thanks to Zooniverse, a unique citizen   
   science website. Zooniverse volunteers, who call themselves "Zooites," are   
   working on a project called Galaxy Zoo, classifying distant galaxies imaged by   
   NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.1   
       
   "Not only are people better than computers at detecting the subtleties that   
   differentiate galaxies, they can do things computers can't do, like spot   
   things that just look interesting," explains Zooniverse director Chris   
   Lintott, an astronomer at the University of Oxford.   
       
   Zooite Hanny van Arkel, a Dutch schoolteacher, discovered this strange green   
   object floating in her cosmic soup:   
   [...]   
   In this image, the Voorwerp floats near a spiral galaxy. Credit: NASA/ESA   
   Hubble Space Telescope   
       
   When van Arkel noticed this unusual greenish object and posted an image of it   
   on the Galaxy Zoo forum, not even the experts knew what it was.2 They named it   
   "Voorwerp," Dutch for "object."   
       
   Another group of Zooites found green "peas" in theirs, and dubbed themselves   
   the "Peas-Corp."   
       
   The peas turned out to be small, round green galaxies about a tenth the size   
   of the Milky Way. These are now believed to be the most efficient star   
   factories in the universe, forming huge numbers of stars in a hurry. "It was   
   easy to find 'peas' by computer once we knew they were there, but without the   
   human factor we'd never have noticed them," says Lintott.   
   [...]   
   These "green peas" are actually galaxies. Credit: Carolin Cardamone and Sloan   
   Digital Sky Survey   
       
   Lintott started Zooniverse in 2007 to solve a very large and unique problem:   
   "I had too many galaxies on my hands," he explains.   
       
   Lintott was faced with classifying, by shape, one million galaxies imaged by   
   the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. First he did what any self-respecting scientist   
   would do.   
       
   "I asked a graduate student to classify them."   
       
   The student was good at it, but after he catalogued 50,000 images, it was   
   obvious he needed help - a lot of help -- sorting the other 950,000. The   
   solution came to Lintott and the very relieved student while they were sitting   
   in a pub.   
       
   "Why not ask for volunteers?"   
       
   Zooniverse and its first project, Galaxy Zoo, were born.   
   [...]   
   Above: Get involved in real science at the Zooniverse home page.   
       
   "We were blown away by the response. We had so many hits that our web server   
   crashed on the first morning!"   
       
   They quickly solved the server problem and the project took off. With the   
   Hubble Space Telescope, Galaxy Zoo is taking volunteers deeper into the cosmos   
   than ever before. And the Zooniverse team has proven that the Zooites'   
   classifications are as good as those by professional astronomers.   
       
   "Their contributions are extremely important," says Lintott. "They're helping   
   us learn how galaxies form and evolve. And they take their work seriously."   
       
   But that doesn't prevent them from bringing a sense of adventure and just   
   sheer fun to the research.   
       
   "Not long ago some Zooites asked us to take them on a pilgrimage to   
   Zooniverse's birthplace. There was quite a celebration at the pub that night!"3   
       
   After Galaxy Zoo kicked off, scientists began approaching Lintott at   
   conferences asking for help. "They realized that we'd found a great way to   
   sort a lot of data fast."   
       
   Zooniverse now offers several citizen science projects, including three more   
   using NASA data. Moon Zoo volunteers use data from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance   
   Orbiter to count craters, helping write the history of the moon. Milky Way   
   project participants scour infrared images gathered in two NASA Spitzer Space   
   Telescope surveys of the Milky Way's inner regions. They help astronomers   
   catalogue intriguing features, map our galaxy, and plan future research.   
   Zooniverse's Planet Hunters are helping NASA's Kepler telescope find stars   
   likely to host planets.   
       
   "I'd love to confirm one of their finds and be able to send an email to   
   someone saying, 'You've found a planet!' "   
       
   Now, please excuse this writer. She has planet hunting to do.   
       
   Author: Dauna Coulter | Editor: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA   
       
   More Information   
   To learn more about Zooniverse, visit http://www.zooniverse.org/ .   
       
   Footnotes:   
       
   (1) In earlier phases of the project, volunteers classified images from other   
   telescopes such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.   
       
   (2) Researchers took follow-up telescope observations of the "Vo   
   rwerp."According to an American Astronomical Society press release: "One of   
   the strangest space objects ever seen is being scrutinized by the penetrating   
   vision of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. A mysterious, glowing green   
   blob of gas is floating in space near a spiral galaxy. Hubble uncovered   
   delicate filaments of gas and a pocket of young star clusters in the giant   
   object, which is the size of the Milky Way. The Hubble revelations are the   
   latest finds in an ongoing probe of Hanny's Voorwerp .In the sharpest view yet   
   of Hanny's Voorwerp, Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 and Advanced Camera for   
   Surveys have uncovered star birth in a region of the green object that faces   
   the spiral galaxy IC 2497 - a bright, energetic object that is powered by a   
   black hole."   
       
   (3) Zooniverse blog comments are another indication of the volunteers'   
   sometimes playful approach: "When I'm on @galaxyzoo I like to pretend I'm a   
   vengeful deity, discarding galaxies ... Is this wrong?"   
       
       
   Regards,   
       
   Roger   
      
   --- D'Bridge 3.59   
    * Origin: NCS BBS (1:3828/7)