Citizen science: ongoing projects & tools v. 01

By Egle Marija Ramanauskaite

(molecular biologist, science journalist,

educator interested in citizen science)

Created September 2014

as part of:

Disclaimer: all projects and trademarks are used to provide an overview of what is available in the citizen science world. This is a non-profit and a completely independent initiative. The work is licensed under CC-BY-NC-4.0.

Table of contents

Distributed computing projects pg. 3 (no. 1-5)

Distributed thinking projects pg. 4-6 (no. 6-18)

Other crowdsourcing projects pg. 7 (no. 19-22)

App-based projects pg. 8-9 (no. 23-27)

Citizen science games pg. 10-11 (no. 28-35)

Projects for students pg. 12 (no. 36)

Project lists pg. 12 (no. i-xv)

Tools & field guides pg. 13-14

Image credits pg. 15

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Distributed computing projects:All based on downloading software, which uses computer’s idle time to run algorithms & solve problems; no “live” involvement.

Most distributed computing projects lie within BOINC platform and the full list can be found here -http://boinc.berkeley.edu/projects.php. Bellow are some examples.

1. SETI@home http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/

2. Rosetta@home http://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/

3. Milkyway@home http://milkyway.cs.rpi.edu/milkyway/

4. FightMalaria@Home http://boinc.ucd.ie/fmah/

5. Climateprediction.net http://www.climateprediction.net/

Searching for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI).

Folding proteins into stable 3D shapes to understand protein tertiary structure and fight diseases.

Creating an accurate 3D model of the Milky Way galaxy.

Running simulations of malaria proteins to aid disease understanding and search for a cure.

Running different climate models to understand how climate change is affecting the world.

Many others are available on BOINC (and, possibly, other) platform.3

Distributed thinking projects:Relies on the keen human eye (which is usually superior to computer algorithms) and “crowd-thinking” to look through huge amounts of data and / or

solve complex scientific questions, improve computer algorithms (instead of just collecting data).

6. The Sun Lab http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/labs/lab/sun/ Astronomy

7. The Cloud Lab http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/labs/lab/cloud/ Climate

8. The Energy Lab http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/labs/lab/energy/ Environment

Zoouniverse citizen science platform provides many distributed thinking projects in astronomy, climate, environment, biology and the humanities. Below are some of the best examples, but the rest can be explored at https://www.zooniverse.org/projects.

Asks to classify clouds and use real data to explore and re-create major storms.

Provides data, images and tools to explore Solar storms.

Asks to design renewable energy systems suitable for large cities and areas.

Projects 1-3 are all within NovaLabs platform http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/labs/.

Aims to look through millions of galaxy images to understand galaxy formation and other processed in the Universe – participants classify galaxies according to their shapes.

9. Galaxy Zoo http://www.galaxyzoo.org/ Astronomy

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10. The Milky Way Project http://www.milkywayproject.org/ Astronomy

11. Radio Galaxy Zoo http://radio.galaxyzoo.org/ Astronomy

12. Operation War Diary http://www.operationwardiary.org/ History

13. Whale.fm http://whale.fm/ Biology

14. Bat Detective http://www.batdetective.org/ Biology

Analyzing infrared data from Spitzer Space Telescope images to aid understanding of how stars form, mark objects and undiscovered galaxies for an ultimate Milky Way map.

Analyzing images from a radio telescope looking for supermassive black holes within galaxies. Scientists aim to understand the formation of supermassive black holes and the effect this process has on their host galaxies.

Transcribe WWI British war diaries – analyzing 1.5 mln pages of war diaries is anticipated to refine the history of the Western Front.

Listen to audios made with underwater microphones (hydrophones) to identify killer whale and pilot whale songs, and classify different dialects. The data should help scientists decipher whale “languages” and gather knowledge about these mammals.

Listen to and classify bat calls to monitor bat populations and get important insights into overall environmental issues. 5

15. Worm Watch Lab http://www.wormwatchlab.org/ Genetics

16. Cell Slider http://www.cellslider.net/ Cell biology / cancer

And there are many more within the Zoouniverse!

17. Stardust@home http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ Astronomy

18. ForestWatchers http://forestwatchers.net/pybossa

Watch microscope recordings of live C. elegans nematodes and spot them laying eggs. Various genetic mutants are expected to change egg-laying patterns helping scientists to discover gene functions. Homologs of C. elegans genes are also found in humans, aiding human genetic research.

Analyze aerogel images brought back to Earth during Stardust mission, looking for interstellar dust particles. Millions of aerogel images allow to zoom in and out through multiple layers looking for what is likely to be dust particles.

Look through multiple microscope images of and describe what you see – normal or cancerous cells, their color, shape or anything unusual (cells may be treated or untreated). This helps scientists to go through massive amounts of data, which is used to classify tumors and develop more sophisticated target therapies.

Run by Zoouniverse and Cancer Research UK.

Cleaning and marking satellite images to find deforestation areas around the globe.

PYBOSSA open source platform also hosts multiple citizen science projects - http://pybossa.com/. Bellow is one example.

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Other crowdsourcing projects:Relies on public contribution to collect greater amounts data often over large geographic regions, which could never be achieved by one or a group of

scientists alone.

19. SavingEnergy@Home http://savingenergy.socientize.eu/en/ Environment

20. Evolution Megalab http://www.evolutionmegalab.org/en_GB Evolution

21. The Great Sunflower Project https://www.greatsunflower.org/ Conservation

22. eBird http://ebird.org/ Conservation

Global effort to track and count plant pollinators (many of which have recently become endangered) worldwide and inform biodiversity and conservation research.

Aimed to collect as much temperature data as possible to create global temperature maps and discover best energy-wise solutions. Citizen participants measure indoor and outdoor temperature in their environment, and explore different energy saving approaches.

Participants observe and record the colors and patterns of garden snails in their environment, in order to study their adaptation to different environments, and how these adaptations change in response to climate change and other factors.

Platform dedicated to collecting bird-watching data to aid biodiversity and conservationstudies.

Many more are available on local scale, e.g. US, but currently I am only including global ones. 7

App-based projects:

23. The Globe at Night http://www.globeatnight.org/ Environment / Astronomy

Android and iOS apps to monitor light pollution and create global light pollution maps.

Android and iOS apps to monitor noise levels in your daily environment.

24. NoiseTube http://noisetube.net/ Environment

25. Secchi marine phytoplankton Environment

http://www1.plymouth.ac.uk/marine/secchidisk/Android and iOS apps to monitor marine phytoplankton, which is an important player (main autotroph) in marine ecosystems, and assess the effect of climate change and other environmental factors on these delicate organisms. Involves making a DIY secchi disk.

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26. Marine Litter Watch Environmenthttp://www.eea.europa.eu/themes/coast_sea/marine-litterwatch

27. That‘s Invasive Conservation

http://www.rinse-europe.eu/news/view/evaluate-the-rinse-app-that-s-invasive

Android app designed to record litter on European coasts and organize cleaning campaigns. Upcoming cleaning events are displayed on the map for anyone to participate in. Collected data is used by scientists to understand where is marine litter coming from and how to control it.

Again, many more are available on local scale, but currently I am only including the best global ones (and some available European) examples.

Android and iOS apps to record and identify invasive (non-native) species in Europe. The results should inform conservation efforts and biodiversity studies.

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Citizen science games:

Center for game science runs many scientific and citizen science games; below are two of the best examples, and the rest can be found here - http://centerforgamescience.org/games/.

28. Foldit http://fold.it/portal/ Molecular biology

29. Nanocrafter http://nanocrafter.org/ Molecular / synthetic biology

The following two games are from NovaLabs - http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/labs/.

30. EteRNA http://eterna.cmu.edu/web/ Molecular biology

31. Cybersecurity Lab http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/labs/lab/cyber/ IT

Defending a company against simulated cyber attacks, developing cyber defenses and completing cyber security challenges.

Taking advantage of human 3D thinking skills (which are superior to that of any AI) participants are asked to fold known polypeptides into stable proteins. Players compete and collaborate, share recipes, gather into groups. Best players can be checked out at the scoreboard. Reconstructed protein tertiary structures aid cancer, HIV, Ebola research and many others.

Players use pieces of DNA to design various nanoscale devices. Discoveries are used to inspire actual synthetic biology and nanoscale manufacturing.

Players fold actual RNR molecules and discover new designs – best are synthesized in the lab and may be used for future therapeutics and

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32. Phylo http://phylo.cs.mcgill.ca/ Molecular biology

33. Old Weather http://www.oldweather.org/ Climate

34. EyeWire https://eyewire.org/ Neuroscience

35. Citizen Sort http://www.citizensort.org/ Biology

Solve colorful phylogenetics puzzles to refine multiple sequence alignments – something that is challenging to do by computer algorithms alone. The players help to recreate actual evolutionary relationships, help to reveal gene function and gain insight into genetic diseases. Algorithms are also refined as a result.

Transcribe ship logs from 1850 to WWII to gather precise data about weather conditions. Players “join” expeditions and gain points for different transcription efforts (e.g. just numbering the pages earns some points too).

The game is run by Zoouniverse - https://www.zooniverse.org/projects.

Mapping 3D structure of neurons – players follow neuronal branches and mark connection recreating the 3D map of the brain and helping scientists understand how neural networks are created and how they work. Human effort also “train” computer algorithms to recreate neural networks. Players connect points and face gradually more complicated challenges.

Host several citizen science games: Hunt & Gather, Happy Match & Forgotten Island for science-lovers, as well as professional sciences. Games are based on sorting & classifying to learn about nature.

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Projects for students:

36. The SHArK Project http://www.thesharkproject.org/ Physics / Environment

Nothing to do with sharks, but splitting water with sunlight instead. Students are invited to experiment with inexpensive kits to find stable semiconductors that might photoelectrolyze water.

Project lists: (where you will find these and many more citizen science projects)

http://socientize.eu/?q=eu/content/outras-experi%C3%AAncias

http://www.scientificamerican.com/citizen-science

http://www.openscientist.org/p/citizen-science-for-your-phone.html

http://scistarter.com/finder

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Tools & field guides:

i. EpiCollect http://www.epicollect.net/ Data collection

ii. Magpi http://www.datadyne.org/magpi-mobile/ Data collection

iii. Cybertracker http://cybertracker.org/ Data collection

iv. Movebank https://www.movebank.org/ Data analysis

v. Project Noah http://www.projectnoah.org/ Data upload, sightings

vi. iNaturalist.org http://www.inaturalist.org/ Data upload, sightings

Web, Android and iOS, custom data collection forms, data analysis & export on a smartphone or a web browser. Advanced version (EpiCollect+) on web and Android for complex projects.

Form-based data collection through mobile phone.

Android, gps field data collection on a smartphone.

Web platform for tracking animal movements (e.g. Cat Tracker project is designed to track where and when is your cat). Platform allows to upload and analyze movement data, or view it on a map.

A social platform for nature lovers, where everyone can upload sightings of plants, animals and other organisms, ask for help to identify them, participate in missions and earn badges.

Another platform for nature lovers to upload and share their sightings.

vii. Public Lab http://publiclab.org/ Data upload, ideasIdeas and DIY tools for a variety of projects. Data from individual projects can be uploaded and shared within the community.

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viii. PYBOSSA http://pybossa.com/ Software tool for project creation

All of the following tools and field guides are apps (OS is indicated in each case).

ix. Star Walk Android, iOS

x. Audubon Android, iOS, Kindle, NOOK Colour

xi. Twigle Birds Field Guide Windows Phone

xii. MyNature Android, iOS

xiii. iPest1 iOS

xiv.RockHound iOS

xv. Molecules iOS

Many field guides for birds, mammals, reptiles, insects, plants etc. for different geographical regions.

Interactive astronomy field guide.

Helps to identify European and American bird songs.

Field guides for animal footprints, trees.

Field guide for identifying pests.

Field guide identifying rocks.

3D models of various molecules (DNA, RNA, proteins etc.)

Open source platform for creating own citizen science projects.

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Image credits (in order):

• Science is great, open it (open science) by Martin Clavey https://flic.kr/p/ajVSXQ CC BY-SA 2.0

• BOINC logo from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:BOINC_Logo_custom.png#mediaviewer/File:BOINC_Logo_custom.png CC BY-SA 3.0

• All Zooniverse logos by Grant Miller for the Zooniverse http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Zooniverse CC-BY-NC-4.0

• Stardust@Home logo http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Logo_Stardust@Home.png (free licence)

• Evolution Megalab logo http://www.evolutionmegalab.org/

• Globe at Night logo http://www.globeatnight.org/

• Noisetube logo http://noisetube.net/

• Secchi disk logo http://www1.plymouth.ac.uk/marine/secchidisk/Pages/Press-pack.aspx

• Marine Litter Watch logo https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.litterwatch

• RINSE logo http://www.rinse-europe.eu/ins

• Nanocrafter logo http://centerforgamescience.org/page/4/

• Citizensort logo http://www.citizensort.org/web.php/aboutus

• Field Guide by Ian Collins https://flic.kr/p/abGUao CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

• PhotonQ-Children of Siecle Bleu by PhOtOnQuAnTiQuE https://flic.kr/p/cCLj2w CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

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