Looking at a galaxy's shape can reveal a lot about it, such as its age and how it was formed. Galaxy Zoo harnesses the power of citizen science by asking volunteers to help classify hundreds of thousands of images of galaxies so that scientists can better study them. To join in, citizen scientists can click "Get Started" on the homepage or "Classify" in the banner menu. Users will be prompted with an image of a galaxy and a series of multiple-choice questions about its shape and characteristics. No previous galactic experience is required, but users can click "Tutorial" or "Need some help with this task?" for more instructions (and not to worry, each galaxy will be classified by multiple volunteers to ensure accuracy). In the Galaxy Zoo banner at the top of the page, readers can click "About" to learn more about the research team and the science behind the project. On that page, readers can click the "Results" tab and find the "Publications" link in the fifth paragraph to check out some of the scientific papers that have emerged from this research. The project was created through Zooniverse (featured in the 01-16-2015 Scout Report), a platform for virtual volunteers to assist professional researchers. In the page footer, readers can click "Projects" to find more volunteer-powered research projects from Zooniverse, such as counting penguins and transcribing handwritten historical documents.
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