Citizen Scientists Double Known Brown Dwarf Count Through NASA Project
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NASA's Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 citizen science project has announced the discovery of over 3,000 new brown dwarfs over the past decade, essentially doubling the known population of these objects. The effort, involving roughly 200,000 volunteers, has produced a new catalog that reveals extreme and unusual types of brown dwarfs. The project continues to analyze billions of sources from NASA's WISE and NEOWISE-R missions.
Facts First
- Over 3,000 new brown dwarfs discovered by volunteers over ten years
- Known brown dwarf population essentially doubled by these discoveries
- Project involved roughly 200,000 volunteers using the Zooniverse platform
- 61 of the 75 authors on the discovery paper are volunteers
- Catalog reveals extreme T subdwarfs, ultra-cool objects, and a brown dwarf with aurorae
What Happened
The Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project announced that volunteers have discovered over 3,000 new brown dwarfs over the past ten years. These discoveries, published in a paper in the Astronomical Journal led by astronomer Adam Schneider from the U.S. Naval Observatory, have essentially doubled the number of known brown dwarfs. The project involved roughly 200,000 volunteers who examined data from NASA’s retired Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) and the Near-Earth-Object WISE Reactivation mission (NEOWISE-R) using the Zooniverse platform. Of the 75 authors on the paper, 61 are volunteers.
Why this Matters to You
This project demonstrates that you can contribute directly to major scientific discoveries without being a professional scientist. The discoveries help inventory the distribution of mass in the galaxy and map our cosmic neighborhood, which could lead to a better understanding of the universe's structure. The catalog of new brown dwarfs may provide astronomers with new objects to study that could reveal more about planetary and stellar formation.
What's Next
The Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project is currently sifting through more than 2 billion sources, which suggests more discoveries are likely. The success of this model may encourage similar large-scale citizen science projects in other fields.