High School Galaxy Explorers Team Search for Exoplanet Transit
Daniel with the Galaxy Explorer high school students. Click HERE to read the full blog article.
“When I was in high school, I got to use these digital smart telescopes to help SETI Institute astronomers with a global citizen science campaign to further characterize a recently discovered sub-Saturn-sized planet around a star over 619 light years away from planet Earth.”
These words are a quote from the future from a high school student involved in a February 2023 observational marathon of a NASA Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) planet candidate. Ignoring my ability to time travel, most would agree that that’s a pretty rad statement from a high school student. Even though I’m slinging words like “rad,” I’m not that old. When I was in high school, the only humans taking data from exoplanets were professional scientists using research observatories and advanced technical telescopes.
Today, we’re trying to make science and astronomy more accessible and democratic, and give students the opportunity for more engaging learning with real-life applications and skills. Advances in technology and inspiring education initiatives have allowed experiences like this to happen. The Unistellar Exoplanet Campaign utilizes small backpack-sized digital smart telescopes, called Unistellar Enhanced Vision Telescopes (eVscopes), to engage citizen astronomers to collect research-quality data on exoplanet transits. An exoplanet transit is when a planet outside our solar system transits its host star from our perspective, which creates a drop in its star’s brightness over time. Young students, mostly in high school, received three eVscopes last year from a generous Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation grant. They joined this exoplanet network as part of their experience with the Chabot Space & Science Center’s Galaxy Explorer program (Oakland, CA).