Citizen participation in Astronomy and Related Space Sciences. (Work in progress presentation)

1. Collaborations
Between Scientists &
Non-scientists
Case of Astronomy and Related Space Sciences
Pedro Russo
Leiden University/UNAWE/IAU
russo@strw.leidenuniv.nl
@pruss
pedro.scienceoffice.org

2. Citizen participation in
Astronomy and Related
Space Sciences
For every professional astronomer, there are at
least 20 amateurs and many many more
astronomy enthusiasts.

3. Model of virtual
organisations for
citizen-science projects
Organisational
Level
Data mgmt
User Experience
Volunteer
Management
Communication
Individual
Organisational Level Outputs
Inputs
Skills Knowledge
Research Question Motivation Contribution
Task Definition Role/Contribution Satisfaction
Community

4. Individual Level
Demographics, Skills, Motivation, Satisfaction, Contributions
Organisational Level
Community, Volunteer Management, Task Design, Technology Design,
Communication, Knowledge Transfer

5. Astronomy Enthusiast

6. Astronomy Enthusiast
Skills: Low-medium knowledge
Motivation: Mild interest in science/astronomy/space
Contributions:
• Participation in talks, planetarium shows, exhibitions
• Popular astronomy content consumers (websites, pop sci
books)

7. Citizen-Astronomer

8. Citizen-Astronomer
Skills: Good IT skills, usually low level astronomy knowledge
Motivation:
• Contribution to science (i.e. no sandbox games, it must really
be a contribution to science)
• Learn more about astronomy
• You see things that very few people have seen before.
Contributions:
• Participation in Galaxy Zoo & other Zooniverse projects
• Serious-gaming: Cerberus

9. Amateur Astronomer

10. Amateur Astronomer
Skills:
• Medium level of astronomy knowledge
• Some observational skills
• Able to work with a simple optical telescopes
• Knows most of the popular constellations
• Can identify the main planets
Motivation:
• Will to learn more: mainly observation techniques and
observational astronomy.
• Participate in a community
Contributions:
• Advanced content consumer (specialized magazines)
• Participation in occasional stargazing events
• Basic observations to projects meteor watch and variable
stars

11. Amateur-Communicator

12. Amateur-Communicator
Skills:
Medium-advanced knowledge level of astronomy
Motivation:
• Share knowledge with fellow citizens.
Contributions:
• Public talks about basic astronomy
• Public stargazing events
• Write short articles for local or groups publications
• Production of small exhibitions
• Translation of content
• During IYA2009, 2.5 million people observed through
telescope for the first time.

13. Astrophotographer

14. Astrophotographer
Skills:
• Advanced technical knowledge
• Deep understanding of photography
• Advanced image processing skills
• Owners of cutting-edge astrophotography equipment
Motivation:
• Recognition by peers
• Beauty and aesthetics
Contributions:
• Beautiful astronomical images
• Contribution to astrophotography websites (Astronomy
Picture of the Day) and publications (The World at Night)
• Open hardware: Philips ToUcam Pro
• Image processing techniques: Lucky imaging

15. Advanced Amateur

16. Advanced Amateur
Skills:
• Advanced technical knowledge
• Deep understanding of science processes
• Good mathematics/programming skills
Motivation:
• Recognisiton by peers and professionals
• Contribute to astronomy research (ie. Publication of papers)
Contributions:
• Advanced contributions to several areas of astronomy:
supernova, planetary sciences, time-consuming and long time
coverage.

17. Overview of citizen
participation in Astronomy
Enthusiast Citizen-Astronomer Amateur Advanced Amateur
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
1. Popular astronomy content consumers (websites, pop sci books), participation in talks, stargazing
events, planetarium shows, exhibitions
2. Consumer of astronomy content ( specialised magazines)
3. Serious-gaming and citizen-science projects
4. Member of Astronomy Societies, sporadic observations
5. Organisation of talks, public stargazing events
6. Contribution to astrophotography websites (Astronomy Picture of the Day) and publications
7. Advanced contributions to several areas of astronomy

18. A concept for an on-line
platform for Pro-Am
Collaborations in Astronomy
An on-line platform to foster the collaboration
between professional and amateur astronomers.

19. Vision
Bring together amateurs and professional to make
sense of the Universe through collaborations and data
share.
A shared space and free resource to help the
communities to achieve common goals.

20. Goals
 To increase the collaborations between
professional and amateurs astronomers as well as
other astronomy enthusiasts.
 To foster pro-am collaborations.
 To raise awareness of the results coming from pro-
am collaborations.
 To provide standards to pro-am collaborations.

21. Structure
• About
– Team
– Why are we doing this?
• News
– Including latest papers published in the framework of pro-am
collaboration
– Events: Meetings, conference, schools,
• PRO-AM Projects
– Current PRO-AM projects
– Past PRO-AM projects
– Submit a new project

22. Structure
• Scientific Data
– Request data
– Submit/Share data
– Explore existing data
• Resources
– The scientific process
– Standards in astronomy
– How-to guides: Equipment, Software
– Types of data: Images, Spectroscopy, Radio
– Repository of presentations

23. Inspiration

24. Inspiration

25. References
Open Google document about Pro-Am
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uJIVVRveQB6SUvIpu_fnT4Ei-
yQ4IGaMTM6NPOgbM78/edit?hl=en_GB
Galaxy Zoo: Exploring the Motivations of Citizen Science Volunteers
http://link.aip.org/link/doi/10.3847/AER200903
Developing a conceptual model of virtual organisations for citizen science
http://www.inderscience.com/search/index.php?action=record&rec_id=35191