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GLOBE program volunteers across North America uploaded data to this map to match the July 21, 2017 event. A high concentration of observers makes the path of totality in the western part of the United States stand out. Credit: Globe Program
On April 8, 2024, as the moon passes between the sun and the Earth, thousands of amateur citizens will measure the air temperature and take pictures of clouds. The data they collect will assist researchers investigating how the sun influences climates in different environments.
Among those citizen scientists are the fifth- and sixth-graders at Alpena Elementary in northwest Arkansas. In the weeks leading up to the eclipse, these students visit the school’s weather station 10 times a day to collect temperature readings and monitor cloud cover. They will then upload the data to a phone app that is part of a NASA-led program called GLOBE, which is short for Global Learning and Observation to Benefit the Environment.
The goal, according to Alpena Elementary science and math teacher Roger Rose, is to “make science and math more real” for his students. “It makes them feel like they’re doing something important and worthwhile.”
The GLOBE eclipse tool is a small part of the much broader GLOBE project, where students and citizen scientists collect data on plants, soil, water, the atmosphere, and even mosquitoes. Contributors to the eclipse project will only need a thermometer and a smartphone with the GLOBE Observer app downloaded. They can access the eclipse tool in the app.
This is not the first time the GLOBE eclipse tool has been used in North America. During the 2017 North American eclipse, NASA researchers examined the relationship between clouds and air temperature and found that temperature swings during the eclipse were greatest in areas with less cloud cover, while temperature fluctuations in cloudier regions were quieter.
It’s a finding that would have been difficult, perhaps impossible, without the help of several amateur observers along the eclipse path, said Marilé Colón Robles, a meteorologist at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, and a GLOBE project scientist who n oversee the cloud. study part of the project.
The number of weather stations along this year’s eclipse path is limited, and while satellites give us a global view, they can’t provide the same level of detail as people on the ground, said Ashlee Autore, NASA Langley data scientist and will conduct a follow-up to the 2017 study. “The power of citizen science is that people make the comments, and they can move.”
It’s still unclear how temperature variations during a total eclipse compare across different climate regions, Colón Robles said. “This upcoming eclipse passes through desert regions, mountainous regions, as well as more humid regions near the oceans.” Having observations across these areas, he says, “will help us dig deeper into questions about regional connections between cloud cover and ground-level temperature.”
The studies should give scientists a better understanding of the flow of energy from the sun which is essential for understanding climate.
In many fields, citizen scientists are expected to gather in droves. “Basically, we’re inviting all of El Paso to campus,” said geophysicist and GLOBE partner John Olgin of El Paso Community College in Texas. The area will experience the eclipse almost completely, with around 80% of the sun covered at the peak. It’s enough to make for an interesting event involving citizen scientists from the United States and Juarez, Mexico, just across the Rio Grande.
Just a few minutes of midday darkness will have long-term benefits in increasing awareness of NASA’s citizen science programs, Olgin said, “It’s going to inspire people to say, ‘Hey look, you can actually do things with NASA. ‘”
More than 30 million people live along the path of the 2024 eclipse, and hundreds of millions more will see a partial eclipse. It will be another 20 years before as many people in North America experience another solar eclipse again.
With this in mind, Colón Robles has a piece of advice: As the moon actively blocks the sun, put away your phone and thermometer and marvel at one of the most amazing astronomical events of your lifetime.
Visit NASA’s Citizen Science page to learn how you can help NASA scientists study Earth during eclipses and throughout the year. The GLOBE Program page provides links to communities of GLOBE participants in 127 countries, access to data for retrieval and analysis, a roadmap for new participants, and other resources.
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Citizen scientists invited to collect data for NASA during eclipse (2024, April 2)
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