IN THE SPOTLIGHTS highlight from epj
Citizen Science : from the cosmos to the classroom
An extensive network of cosmic ray detectors allows high school students in Italy to contribute to cutting-edge particle physics research
Citizen science projects offer the general public , or segments of that public such as school students , an opportunity to take part in scientific research . The Extreme Energy Events ( EEE ) Project in Italy is a cooperation between particle physicists studying cosmic rays and school students , and their teachers , throughout the country .
This has the twin aims of bringing cosmic ray research into schools and setting up a country-wide ‘ open laboratory ’ of particle detectors . One of the lead researchers from the EEE Project consortium , Silvia Pisano of the Italian Centro Fermi and Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati of INFN , Rome , Italy , has summarised the results from about 20 years of this project in a new paper in EPJ Plus .
Cosmic rays are high-energy particles that travel through space at nearly the speed of light ; when they come into contact with the earth ’ s atmosphere they produce a variety of secondary particles that can be detected when they reach ground level . One primary cosmic ray can produce a shower of such particles that completely covers a city the size of , for instance , Bologna .“ There are still many open questions about these secondary particles , such as the full details of their energy spectra ,” explains Pisano .
The EEE network consists of about 60 detectors or “ EEE telescopes ” located across Italy , mostly in high schools . Students and their teachers are involved in all aspects of the project : installation and maintenance of the equipment , data collection and analysis , and disseminating the results . “ The peculiarity of an experiment designed in this way is that it can look for correlations between events that are hundreds of kilometres apart ,” adds Pisano . She and her collaborators are now planning to extend the network to include more schools , including some outside Italy .
Another ongoing development is the design of a mixture of gases for the detectors to replace the powerful greenhouse gas tetrafluoroethane ; school students are involved in this and other improvements . “ This experiment provides a unique environment for educating future generations in the practice of science ,” Pisano concludes . n
Reference
[ 1 ] S . Pisano on behalf of the EEE Collaboration . The extreme energy events project . Eur . Phys . J . Plus 137 , 1190 ( 2022 ). https :// doi . org / 10.1140 / epjp / s13360-022-03331-0
▲ Map of Italy showing the locations of schools participating in the EEE Project . Red dots show schools with telescopes and cyan dots show participating schools without telescopes .
Open Call for Papers – European Physical Journal Plus
Citizen science for physics : From Education and Outreach to Crowdsourcing fundamental research
Invited are the following type of contributions :
• Reports and case studies that qualitatively and quantitatively highlight the part that crowdsourcing has played in advancing the scientific aspects of a state-of-the-art research project
• Original articles that demonstrate in technical detail how existing or future scientific projects would benefit from crowdsourcing in terms of scientific endeavor and results , and how to achieve this by suitably designing the research project ( e . g ., by gamification of parts of a work package )
Guest Editor : Dr . Despina Hatzifotiadou , European Organization for Nuclear Research , CERN , Geneva , Switzerland , despina . hatzifotiadou @ cern . ch https :// epjplus . epj . org / open-calls-for-papers / 87-epj-plus / 2284-epjplus-focus-point-issuecitizen-science-for-physics n
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