Editor’s Choice: Funding the search for dark matter with citizen science — Small Steps to Space

Besides describing some pretty cool science, this article touches on distributed computing as a mode of citizen science but also points to the difficulties of keeping a good citizen science project funded. –LFF

Milkyway@Home is in trouble. The citizen science-powered search for our galaxy’s dark matter lost all of its federal funding last year. It only survived thanks to support from its volunteer community – and personal sacrifice by its science team. But US funding for basic science hasn’t improved. Once more Milkyway@Home is calling for help.

Following up on my 2014 article “Milkyway@Home volunteers rescue the crowdsourced search for dark matter”, I interviewed principal investigator Dr. Heidi Newberg, graduate student Jake Weiss, and community moderator Pete Boulay about Milkyway@Home’s struggles and how public participation has kept this amazing project alive.

Source: Funding the search for dark matter with citizen science — Small Steps to Space.