{"id":47475,"date":"2023-07-06T10:36:15","date_gmt":"2023-07-06T10:36:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyatnightmagazine.com\/?p=120123"},"modified":"2023-07-06T11:32:31","modified_gmt":"2023-07-06T11:32:31","slug":"how-citizens-scientists-observed-the-dart-impact-and-contributed-to-planetary-defence","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/how-citizens-scientists-observed-the-dart-impact-and-contributed-to-planetary-defence\/","title":{"rendered":"How citizens scientists observed the DART impact and contributed to planetary defence"},"content":{"rendered":"

Unistellar citizen scientists observed the NASA mission’s impact into asteroid moon Dimorphos, the results published in a scientific paper. <\/p>

By Iain Todd\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Thursday, 06 July 2023 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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When NASA\u2019s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART)<\/a> mission launched on 24 November 2021, its mission was simple, but spectacular:<\/p>\n

To travel to the the Didymos system \u2013 an asteroid orbited by moon Dimorphos \u2013 and smash into the latter.<\/p>\n

The mission\u2019s goal was to see whether a human-made spacecraft would be able to significantly deflect an asteroid that happened to be on a collision course with planet Earth.<\/p>\n

DART arrived at the system on 26 September 2022 and made its successful impact into Dimorphos\u2019s surface.<\/p>\n

Professional telescopes around the world \u2013 and, indeed the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes<\/a> \u2013 captured the impact, providing important data to mission scientists as to whether or not the DART mission had been a success<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\""The\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
The impact of NASA\u2019s DART mission into asteroid moonlet Dimorphus, as seen by the James Webb Space Telescope (left) and the Hubble Space Telescope (right). Credit: Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

But a team of citizen scientists were also observing DART\u2019s impact, using a network of telescopes made by Unistellar.<\/p>\n

The company makes \u2018smart\u2019 telescopes that can automatically locate and track celestial objects and display them on a computer screen, rather than through an eyepiece.<\/p>\n

Using Unistellar\u2019s eVscopes<\/a>, observers in Kenya and R\u00e9union Island were able to observe the DART impact.<\/p>\n

The team of citizen scientists, which included 8 astronomers from the SETI Institute and which was led by SETI Institute postdoctoral fellow Ariel Graykowski, published the results in the journal Nature in March 2023.<\/p>\n