Journal article
Bursts from Space: MeerKAT – the first citizen science project dedicated to commensal radio transients
- Abstract:
- The newest generation of radio telescopes is able to survey large areas with high sensitivity and cadence, producing data volumes that require new methods to better understand the transient sky. Here, we describe the results from the first citizen science project dedicated to commensal radio transients, using data from the MeerKAT telescope with weekly cadence. Bursts from Space: MeerKAT was launched late in 2021 and received ∼89 000 classifications from over 1000 volunteers in 3 months. Our volunteers discovered 142 new variable sources which, along with the known transients in our fields, allowed us to estimate that at least 2.1 per cent of radio sources are varying at 1.28 GHz at the sampled cadence and sensitivity, in line with previous work. We provide the full catalogue of these sources, the largest of candidate radio variables to date. Transient sources found with archival counterparts include a pulsar (B1845-01) and an OH maser star (OH 30.1–0.7), in addition to the recovery of known stellar flares and X-ray binary jets in our observations. Data from the MeerLICHT optical telescope, along with estimates of long time-scale variability induced by scintillation, imply that the majority of the new variables are active galactic nuclei. This tells us that citizen scientists can discover phenomena varying on time-scales from weeks to several years. The success both in terms of volunteer engagement and scientific merit warrants the continued development of the project, while we use the classifications from volunteers to develop machine learning techniques for finding transients.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 2.7MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1093/mnras/stad1298
Authors
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- Journal:
- Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society More from this journal
- Volume:
- 523
- Issue:
- 2
- Pages:
- 2219–2235
- Publication date:
- 2023-05-11
- Acceptance date:
- 2023-04-20
- DOI:
- EISSN:
-
1365-2966
- ISSN:
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0035-8711
- Language:
-
English
- Keywords:
- Subjects:
- Pubs id:
-
1339151
- Local pid:
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pubs:1339151
- Deposit date:
-
2023-04-27
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Andersson et al
- Copyright date:
- 2023
- Rights statement:
- © The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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