If you enjoy navigating distant galaxies, leading intergalactic alliances and fighting space pirates, you might want to take on another challenge: discovering real planets.
The space-based online game EVE Online, which bills itself as 鈥渢he world鈥檚 largest living work of science fiction鈥�, is delving into science fact by asking players to help search for planets outside our solar system. Details of the citizen science challenge, which is part of an initiative called Project Discovery, emerged at the game鈥檚 annual Fanfest event in Reykjavik, Iceland, last week.
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A mini-game launching later this year within the EVE universe will present players with data from the now defunct COROT space observatory, which launched in 2006. They will be looking at luminosity curves, representing the change in a star鈥檚 brightness as a planet passes in front of it. Besides revealing the presence of exoplanets, the luminosity variations can reveal information about their orbit and atmosphere.
Although the COROT mission ended in 2013, there are still mysteries to unlock, says project member Michel Mayor, an astrophysicist at the Geneva Observatory in Switzerland. Mayor and his colleague Didier Queloz discovered the first exoplanet, 51 Pegasi b, in 1995. 鈥淭he people behind it still believe there might be nine planets undetected in the data, for varying reasons, so despite this mission finishing several years ago, we still have more to dig,鈥� he says.
Additional data from the Kepler space observatory and the in Chile will be added to the game at a later date.
Players will receive small amounts of in-game currency for each observation they make and may also earn special credits. This could create a risk of data being over-interpreted, but Mayor says there are strict processes to reduce false positives. 鈥淚f a lot of people have the same results, then scientists will start looking into the data in greater detail,鈥� he says. 鈥淲e have so many different levels of certification, so there might be a small dip in the luminosity curve but it may not be a planet. You have to consider and reconsider every claimed discovery.鈥�
The exoplanet project is a collaboration between Mayor, EVE Online creator CCP Games, the Swiss-based start-up , and the universities of Reykjavik and Geneva. It is the second citizen science challenge to be hosted by EVE Online. When Project Discovery launched last year, it set players the task of analysing high-resolution slides of human cells to look for patterns linked with proteins. Their findings contribute to the Human Protein Atlas, a database used by thousands of medical research groups.
The gaming approach proved a big success, said Attila Szantner, CEO of MMOS, at Fanfest. 鈥淎 huge problem in citizen science is that people are interested in the research, but the reality isn鈥檛 engaging enough. However, with this, CCP鈥檚 designers can make an engaging game which works on both levels.鈥�
Mayor is keen for more people to have the experience of discovering a planet like he did. 鈥淧ersonally, I would be really happy if one of these gamers found a new planet,鈥� he says. 鈥淏ut just asking people to participate and see the complexity of the situation 鈥� that kind of outreach is great.鈥�
Mayor thinks EVE Online players could be perfectly suited to the task. 鈥淗opefully, if they have the mind to fight battles in distant galaxies, then they will love astronomy,鈥� he says. But he points out that, by the standards of the EVE Online virtual universe, the exoplanets they will be looking for are practically in our backyard.
