---
title: "New Website Lets You Help NASA Find Alien Worlds"
description: "NASA launched a new citizen science project called Planet Patrol that asks for the public to help identify new exoplanets."
date: "2020-10-01"
modified: "2020-10-01"
authors:
  - name: "Dan Robitzski"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/danrobitzski"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/new-website-help-nasa-find-alien-worlds"
categories:
  - "NASA"
  - "Science & Energy"
  - "Space"
tags:
  - "citizen science"
  - "exoplanet"
  - "NASA"
  - "the digest"
---

# New Website Lets You Help NASA Find Alien Worlds

![NASA launched a new citizen science project called Planet Patrol that asks for the public to help identify new exoplanets.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nasa-launched-citizen-science-project-hunt-alien-worlds.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: NASA\</em\>*

## Call for Help

NASA just launched a new citizen science project — it [wants the public's help](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/army-citizen-scientists-found-100-brown-dwarfs>) to find and identify brand new exoplanets.

The [newly-formed Planet Patrol](<https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/marckuchner/planet-patrol/>) asks volunteers to look over images taken by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), *[Space.com ](<https://www.space.com/planet-patrol-nasa-tess-exoplanet-volunteers>)*[reports](<https://www.space.com/planet-patrol-nasa-tess-exoplanet-volunteers>), in which NASA suspects but isn't sure whether there's a new exoplanet hidden away. That way, NASA scientists can focus their efforts instead of sorting through the mountain of data themselves

## Human Touch

This is the sort of work that technically could be automated with an algorithm trained to spot new worlds, *Space.com* reports. But it turns out that in this case, there's no substitute [for human judgment](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/astronomers-quarantined-citizens-hunt-galaxies>).

"Automated methods of processing TESS data sometimes fail to catch imposters that look like exoplanets," Veselin Kostov, the NASA researcher leading the Planet Patrol project, [said in a press release](<https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2020/search-for-new-worlds-at-home-with-nasa-s-planet-patrol-project>). "The human eye is extremely good at spotting such imposters, and we need citizen scientists to help us distinguish between the lookalikes and genuine planets."

## Crowded Space

Planet Patrol isn't the only citizen science project poring over TESS data for signs of exoplanets, *Space.com* reports. Another initiative, [Planet Hunters TESS](<https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/nora-dot-eisner/planet-hunters-tess>), is working toward the same goal but analyzing the data in a different way.

"We're all swimming through the same sea of data, just using different strokes," NASA citizen science officer Marc Kuchner said in the release.

**READ MORE:** [Volunteers wanted: NASA's Planet Patrol wants your help to find alien worlds](<https://www.space.com/planet-patrol-nasa-tess-exoplanet-volunteers>) \[*Space.com*\]

**More on citizen science:** *[Astronomers Call on Quarantined Citizens to Hunt for Galaxies](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/astronomers-quarantined-citizens-hunt-galaxies>)*

## Author
Dan Robitzki is a senior reporter for Futurism, where he likes to cover AI, tech ethics, and medicine. He spends his extra time fencing and streaming games from Los Angeles, California.

### Author social links  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/danrobitzski>)