Team: 50
School: St. Thomas Aquinas
Area of Science: Astronomy
Proposal: Galaxies, Far, Far Away
By: Catherine Sedillo
Problem: Modern astronomical telescopes are looking deeper into the universe. The images that they produce reveal the existence of countless stars and galaxies. The seemingly infinite quantity of these astronomical objects in these images has become too much for humans to identify and characterize. Computers can provide the ability to automatically identify these astronomical objects.
Important: It is important because computers can preprocess the image and indicate to the astronomer the existence of specific objects or phenomena of interest. This helps identify new astronomical discoveries.
Plan of Action: Using computer programming (Python) and machine learning, train a neural network on recognizing astronomical objects of interest that exist within a telescope image.
Team Members:
Sponsoring Teacher: Eric Vigil