NASA Award Received for Project: “GA-MER”

Citizen science-based classification of galaxy mergers using the two-dimensional stellar kinematics of nearby galaxies observed with MaNGA

A recent award from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was given for the project “GA-MER: Citizen science-based classification of galaxy mergers using the two-dimensional stellar kinematics of nearby galaxies observed with MaNGA,” to the University of Memphis and Dr. Francisco Muller-Sanchez, assistant professor of Physics and Materials Sciences. Muller-Sanchez will serve as PI.

GAMER is a citizen science program which aims at identifying GAlaxy MERgers using for the first time the two-dimensional (2D) stellar kinematics of galaxies. Galaxy mergers are commonly identified via the visual inspection of astronomical images. State-of-the-art instrumentation in current ground-based telescopes provides velocity maps of the stars and gas in more than 10,000 galaxies. Using this information, it is possible to achieve more robust classifications of galaxy mergers. 

GAMER will use the infrastructure made available by the Zooniverse platform, which allows the rapid creation of citizen science projects. The platform will be available for users all around the world and it will have a similar structure as the Galaxy Zoo, one of the most successful citizen science projects. With a quick and easy tutorial, users will be introduced to stellar velocity maps and will be able to classify galaxies. This will provide accurate identifications of mergers, and clear up ambiguities from visual morphology classifications, especially because GAMER is sensitive to mergers in the final coalescence phase, post-coalescence mergers and minor mergers.

GAMER will create an online database of accurate identifications of galaxy mergers of thousands of galaxies, providing crucial estimates to the merger rate in the Universe.

For more information on this project, contact Muller-Sanchez at f.muller.sanchez@memphis.edu.