Filed under: Computers

Hey, amateur astronomers, listen to this: A couple of at-home space nuts recently discovered a pulsar with a screensaver that uses idle PC time to process data collected from telescopes. By using Einstein@Home to ‘donate’ a PC’s processors to the pursuit of science, the program harnesses thousands of willing computers, rather than one supercomputer, to analyze data. This helps on-the-clock astronomers to cheaply continue their research while they sift through data collected from the Arecibo radio telescope and the LIGO gravitational wave detector.

Wells Fargo computer professionals Chris and Helen Colvin personally built the “run-of-the-mill” computer, which first discovered the pulsar on June 11th, before it was confirmed by another user, Daniel Gebhardt, in Germany on June 14th. The Colvins told Fox News, “It’s just something that runs in the background and we don’t think about it very much.” The trio likely won’t receive anything (besides bragging rights) for their discovery, but we think, at least, they should get to name the star. After all, their PCs could’ve just been wasting time playing retro video games instead. Check out an interview with the Colvins and Gebhardt after the break. [From: Science, Einstein@Home and The National Science Foundation, via: Fox News]

Continue reading Citizen Scientists Use Einstein@Home Screensaver to Discover a New Pulsar

Citizen Scientists Use Einstein@Home Screensaver to Discover a New Pulsar originally appeared on Switched on Sun, 15 Aug 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Cameras, Digital Camera

Who needs the Hubble? Not Gerard Marull Paretas, Sergi Saballs Vila, Marta­ Gasull Morcillo and Jaume Puigmiquel Casamort, that’s for sure.

The four Spanish teenagers, working with their teacher Jordi Fanals Oriol as the Meteotek team at the IES La Bisbal school in Catalonia, started with a fairly lofty goal: They wanted to launch a balloon with a digital camera and some custom-built electronic sensors to 30,000 feet. Much to their surprise, they ended up considerably exceeding their expectations. Their $60 heavy duty latex balloon and $80 Nikon digital camera soared to 100,000 feet, right to the edge of space. Describing the team’s homegrown approach, Gerard Marull Paretas told the Telegraph, “We took readings as the balloon rose and mapped its progress using Google Earth and the onboard radio receiver.”

Like something out of a Roald Dahl book or upcoming Pixar film, these four students were able to accomplish something unexpected, and quite impressive, with meager resources. This is recession astronomy — for less than the cost of some people’s electric bills, the group was able to capture some stunning images from the very limits of the Earth’s atmosphere. Check out the gallery below for some images from the team’s Flickr feed. [From: Telegraph]

Related Links:

• College Students Contact Space Station With Self-Built Radio System
• British Put the First Teddy Bears Into Space
• Scotch Tape Creates X-Rays, Scientists Discover

Students Take Space Photos With Simple Latex Balloon and Digi-Cam originally appeared on Switched on Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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