Arushi Nath. Grade 7. Toronto.
This year the 60th annual Canada Wide Science Fair (CWSF) was hosted virtually in Fredericton, New Brunswick, from May 13 -19, 2022. Over 350 finalists from all parts of Canada participated in the prestigious national-level science fair.
After several rounds of interviews spread over multiple days, my project, “Strengthening Planetary Defense: Detecting Unknown Asteroids using Open Data, Math, and Python” won 5 awards:
- Best of the Canada Wide Science Fair Award (Innovation)
- Gold Medal
- Excellence in Astronomy Award from the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada
- Top of the Category Award in Curiosity and Ingenuity, and
- Youth Can Innovate Award
It was an amazing feeling to have my project win the top awards of the Canada-Wide Science Fair in my very first attempt.
My project was about detecting unknown asteroids in sky images using open data and algorithms. I took images from 4 telescopes located at different latitudes to cover both hemispheres. I wrote Python algorithms to query European Space Agency's Gaia and NASA's Horizons ephemeris service to identify the known stars and asteroids in each field. Mean, standard deviation, and histograms were used to create masks to remove known objects. The remaining objects were classified as possible asteroid candidates. I detected 3 ‘preliminary’ asteroids. My algorithm’s plate-solving ability determined its Right Ascension and Declination using the telescope’s focal length and celestial location. I reported this information by creating a Minor Planet Center report for my images. I have made my code and methodology open-source to crowdsource planetary defense.
This project won a Gold Medal at the Toronto Science Fair and represented Team Toronto at the Canada-Wide Science Fair 2022 where it ended up winning the top award.
A fuller account of the project - the algorithms, the sky-image processing, and the asteroid candidates it produced - is in Strengthening Planetary Defense: Detecting Unknown Asteroids using Open Data, Math, and Python.
It was an amazing opportunity to have participated in the Canada-Wide Science Fair 2022. It was the first time I attended the event, and I am glad that the over 800 hours I invested in the project led to my winning the top award. Participating in the CWSF allowed me to get in touch with other finalists and learn about their projects and their future goals.
Link to Canada Wide Science Fair Project Board:
https://projectboard.world/ysc/project/planetary-defense-detecting-unknown-asteroids-using-open-data-math-and-python
Project release by Youth Science Canada: Plankton Wars and Planetary Defense take best project awards at this year’s CWSF
https://youthscience.ca/plankton-wars-and-planetary-defense-take-best-project-awards-at-this-years-cwsf/
Facebook Interview with the Winners: https://www.facebook.com/114544193043/videos/1106967886840300
Science Fair Advice from Gold Medal Winners:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlvcG7Ut6Rs
CityNews TV Interview:
https://toronto.citynews.ca/video/2022/06/15/two-siblings-working-to-make-a-difference-using-science/