this post was submitted on 06 Jan 2026
114 points (99.1% liked)

Ask Lemmy

36553 readers
1637 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Rules: (interactive)

1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them

2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?

3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.

4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].

5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.

6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !askusa@discuss.online

Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija

Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Bluetreefrog@lemmy.world
TheSaneWriter@lemm.ee
TheSaneWriter@lemmy.thesanewriter.com
Asudox@lemmy.world
lemmy_bot@lemmy.world
beefbaby182@lemmy.world
ModeratorCan@lemmy.world
neidu3@sh.itjust.works
asudox@lemmy.asudox.dev
candyman337@lemmy.world
candyman337@sh.itjust.works
114
Do you like Astronomy? I'm looking for people who would want to hunt asteroids with me! :) (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) by oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
34 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Hey everyone!

I’m forming a team for a citizen science project called IASC — International Astronomical Search Collaboration and I’m looking for teammates! Interested?

It's nothing too crazy and the process can be underwhelming. I'll say that just so you don't expect anything extraordinary.

Basically, what we'd have to do is analyse images that will be sent to us from these two observatories in Hawaii called Pan-STARRS 1 and 2. And we'd have to look for moving possibily unidentified objects and send an report to IASC (the organization behind it).

It's super quick and simple, and it really shouldn't take more than 20 minutes per pack out of your day and you'll have an entire month to sort through the packs. So, time really isn't an issue and you can do things on your own time.

This is a great way to be part of hands-on science. You're helping scientists track objects and identify new ones. This is very relevant, especially on a planetary defense level. You can't protect yourself from a threat you don't see coming.

They offer certificates to all participants, and the certificates are pretty neat.

Requirements/preferences:

  • Willing to commit some time to analyzing telescope images
  • Preferably located in the Americas, Europe, or Africa (similar time zones are a plus)

Relevant links: https://science.nasa.gov/citizen-science/international-astronomical-search-collaboration/ http://iasc.cosmosearch.org/

If you want in or have questions, lmk below :)

(Sorry if this isn't allowed mods. I couldn't find anything that said I couldn't do this in the rules T-T)

top 34 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] quediuspayu@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 5 days ago (2 children)

If one of the requirements is to run windows that leaves me out.

[–] seathru@quokk.au 4 points 5 days ago

I was able to install it through Bottles as a "productivity app" and it worked right out of the box (Fedora 43). Haven't 100% function checked it yet, but so far so good.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)

The program we use is called "Astrometrica". It is Windows only in theory, but you could run it using Wine. Though, I haven't had much success in doing that.

If you'd like to try, I could help you out!

[–] quediuspayu@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Maybe using proton like if it was a game.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago

That could work. There's a guy in our group that uses Fedora and manged to get it running. So I'm guessing it's possible and easy to do.

[–] seathru@quokk.au 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

I'd like to join/help. Dm me the discord.

And for anyone wondering, I was able to get the app working in linux pretty easily (installed via Bottles as a "productivity app").

Edit: they updated the app. Still trying to get that running.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago

Of course! DMimg you right up!

[–] halfdane@piefed.social 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Hell yeah, I could install astrometrica through bottles as well, so you can count me in 🥳

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 4 days ago

Great news! Reaching out to you in your DMs right away.

[–] Tramort@programming.dev 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I would like to help. Please put me on the list.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

That's awesome! How can I reach out to you?

We've made a Discord server for our team, but if you don't have it that is completely okay.

[–] Tramort@programming.dev 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Dm me the discord link and I'll jump on

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Awesome!

If anyone else wants to join, let me know and I'll send the link.

[–] fishos@lemmy.world 1 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Can I get a link too? I already participate on BOINC

[–] ChanchoManco@lemmy.zip 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Hi, I'm interested but before I'll commit I have a doubt: you say it'll take 20 minutes per pack but how many packs will get for the month?

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

Each campaign lasts around a month, and the amount of packs per team can vary; I've seen 15 packs at the lowest and 25 at the highest. How many packs each team member will get will depend on how many members there are and how many we get. So, If there are 5 members, and 25 packs, it'd be logical for each member to get 5 packs to analyse that month.

[–] ChanchoManco@lemmy.zip 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Ok that's not much, count me in

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 4 days ago

I'll dm you

[–] Kevo@lemmy.world 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Hi, I'm also interested!

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago

Awesome. Sending you our Discord in your DM!

[–] Danitos@reddthat.com 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Hi. Interested, could you send the the invite link, please.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago

Awesome. Shooting you a DM

[–] Vanth@reddthat.com 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Yes, please. I was just thinking about looking for a new citizen science thing to do over the winter and this falls in my lap. Please DM the discord link to me as well.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago

That's great timing then. Check you DMs

[–] SatansMaggotyCumFart@piefed.world 1 points 5 days ago (2 children)

I have my blaze orange what kind of rifle guarantees a kill shot on an asteroid?

[–] degenerate_neutron_matter@fedia.io 4 points 5 days ago

A Falcon 9 does a pretty good job.

[–] brachypelmide@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Any idea on when the campaign begins? I would love to help, but January is completely blocked up for me by various stuff. February would be optimal for me.

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

It's hard to know, but I guess February/March. They happen pretty much every month, but there's a quota for each and the January one is full.

[–] brachypelmide@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Awesome! I'll give it a look in February then

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Great!

If you want to be a part of my team, however, we'll need to submit our team form this month.

[–] brachypelmide@lemmy.zip 0 points 5 days ago

Thank you!, but I'll have to decline because my life is anything but stable right now. Very likely something might come up during January and make me drop out after I had already registered. If that doesn't happen, I'll be able to assemble my own team for February no problem.

[–] neidu3@sh.itjust.works 0 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

Love it. However, I feel that it should be possible to automate the procedure: Grab images, sort them, and compare them to find any moving objects. Then somehow look them up to check whether it's already registered.

Sounds like a reasonably simple script wrapped around curl, some gfx library calls, and possibly selenium or WWW::Mechanize

[–] oysterenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 6 points 5 days ago

Automated software has a threshold for signal-to-noise ratio to avoid false positives. Human eyes (us hunters) are much better at spotting faint moving objects that dip below the threshold of the automated pipelines! :)