exoplanets We can help in the search for Exoplanets!

[Unobscured Vision]

Ever wanted to contribute to Planetary Science?

 

Ever wanted to help in the search for Exoplanets?

 

Ever thought "wouldn't it be awesome if I could see my name in the 'Discoverer' bracket of an actual Exoplanet discovery"?

 

There's a place to do that, and they could really use the help.  And so far, it hasn't been taken seriously; but it's got ALL of the tools needed to make it happen. And it gets peer-reviewed if you find something (and you likely will).

 

https://www.planethunters.org/#/ is the place where this can happen. It's a sub-project of https://www.zooniverse.org/. One sign-up on Zooniverse is good at PlanetHunters. There's a tutorial that shows you how to analyze each light curve of the star you're looking at; and since it's mostly Kepler and K2 data, you'll never, ever run out.

 

Sometimes you'll be looking at a Cepheid Variable. Doesn't mean there aren't Transiting Planets, though. Eclipsing Binaries? Heh! Not a problem! Those systems have planets too, and they need to be identified.

 

Out of 50 classifications, I've been averaging about 3 planets per star. I'm getting very, very good at spotting them.  With some practice, you can too. I'm even seeing evidence of moons in some of them, based on the miniscule (but regular) shifts in their light differences.

 

Let's be nerds, folks. REAL nerds! And let's help the Kepler/K2 people sort through their data, shall we?