NASA and Citizen Scientist Breakthrough

This article details the scientific work done by citizen scientists, volunteers who help carry out scientific research and documentation alongside professionals.

"Citizen scientists have successfully located thousands of previously unknown pairs of “eclipsing binary” stars, NASA announced in June."

"Overall, the citizen scientists identified 10,001 eclipsing binary pairs. Of those, 7,936 were previously unknown."

"The researchers used machine learning to identify about 1.2 million potential eclipsing star pairs. Citizen scientists then validated a subset of about 60,000."

"These star pairs offer important data to astrophysicists, who consider the many measurable properties of eclipsing binaries — and the information they bear about the history of star formation and destruction — as a foundation of the field."

I had never heard of the concept of citizen scientists. It is such an exciting concept that I think many people would love to be involved in if given the chance. Being given the opportunity to make a small contribution to bigger scientific research would allow for additional learning.

References

Blakemore, E. (2025, July 6). Citizen scientists pinpoint 10,000 eclipsing star pairs. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025/07/06/citizen-scientist-binary-stars-astronomy/