A NASA-backed citizen science project is taking a ‘census’ of the universe 65 light-years away from the sun

To perform a ‘Counting’ cosmic objects nearbyObviously sending the survey isn’t working. Scientists must use many telescopes of different specializations to map and list all objects near the Sun.

So through the project Backyard Worlds: Planet 9you “Citizen scientists ‘help professional scientists create a new world’Census,” which resulted in more than 3,500 cosmic objectsThat’s what the American space agency says NASA.

new Stady Published in the magazine Astrophysical Journal The results of this census appear 65 light-years from the sun, and researchers have discovered this There are four times as many stars as brown dwarfsWhat Low mass objects are more common than high mass objects.

Brown dwarfs

Unpleasant Brown dwarfs Not really stars or planetsIt is part of the mesocosm. By comparison, it is more massive than Jupiter, but it does not fuse hydrogen in its core as lower-mass stars do.

The research supports this idea The formation process of brown dwarfs differs slightly from that of more massive stars. Both types of objects are thought to be formed when a cloud of gas and dust collapses, but there may be different ‘seeds’ that determine whether it is one type of object or the other.

Brown dwarfs are more massive and hotter than planets, but they don’t have the mass needed to become hot stars. Its atmosphere may be similar to that of the giant planet Jupiter.

The next step in this line of research is Examining space telescope data James Webb NASA, which studies molecular clouds containing the ‘seeds’ of stars, brown dwarfs and planets. Future research may reveal more about how these seeds differ from each other.

Three ‘citizen scientists’ from the project Backyard worlds He received observation time on the James Webb Space Telescope, as co-investigators on selected proposals for this instrument.

Citizen scientists

Scientists were able to organize the objects studied according to three different types of masses, because the frequency of the objects suddenly changed. This indicates that There are different physical effects responsible for creating different types of things.

said C. “There is something about the star formation process hidden in this data,” said Davey Kirkpatrick, lead author of the study and a researcher at IPAC (Infrared Processing and Analysis Center) at Harvard University. California Institute of Technology in Pasadena (California). “We still have an idea about how this works.”

Citizen scientists sped up the process of identifying objects in this census by 10 to 15 years, compared to what it would have taken researchers to do the work without them, said J. David Kirkpatrick.

Through the project Backyard World’s, Citizen scientists indicate whether objects in photo sets are ‘close’ (within the general area of ​​our Sun in the Milky Way), and observing the movement of objects relative to the background.

Use one A tool called WiseViewwas developed by a group of citizen scientists to easily collect images from the mission (Long range infrared scan detector) from NASA Volunteers Animation created to find moving objects. “They made the project more efficient for everyone,” Kirkpatrick said.

Previously, citizen scientists through the program helped investigate what was known about these objects in the scientific literature excellent Ambassadorsalso made by Kirkpatrick.

Participate in citizen science projects associated with NASA

The citizen scientists who participated in and are credited with writing this latest study, when not searching for cosmic data, work (as in the case of Leopold Grammais) as security and operations managers at airports in Paris-Charles de Gaulle that it Le Bourget.

Gramiz heard about the project Backyard worlds In 2019 he thought it would be fun to look for brown dwarfs, which he had never heard of before. Grammayes became so interested in these things that he learned to program so he could search astronomical databases more quickly. As part of this specific research, he helped discover some brown dwarfs and helped review the scientific literature.

There are more than 40 citizen science projects associated with NASA. Participation is open to anyone worldwide and is not limited to US citizens or residents.

like it April is Citizen Science MonthDon’t miss the next Meteored report coming very soon about NASA’s citizen science projects in collaboration between scientists and stakeholders right now.

News reference:

Kirkpatrick, JD et al. Initial mass function based on a population of ∼3600 stars and brown dwarfs consisting of 20 segments. Astrophysical Journal, Fifth. 271, no. 2, 2024.