Calling all Zooniverse volunteers!  As we transition from the dog days of summer to the pumpkin spice latte days of fall (well, in the Northern hemisphere at least) it’s time to mobilize and do science!

Our Zooniverse community of over 1.3 million volunteers has the ability to focus efforts and get stuff done. Join us for the Sunspotter Citizen Science Challenge! From August 29th to September 5th, it’s a mad sprint to complete 250,000 classifications on Sunspotter.

Sunspotter needs your help so that we can better understand and predict how the Sun’s magnetic activity affects us on Earth. The Sunspotter science team has three primary goals:

1. Hone a more accurate measure of sunspot group complexity
2. Improve how well we are able to forecast solar activity
3. Create a machine-learning algorithm based on your classifications to automate the ranking of sunspot group complexity

In order to achieve these goals, volunteers like you compare two sunspot group images taken by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory and choose the one you think is more complex.  Sunspotter is what we refer to as a “popcorn project”.  This means you can jump right in to the project and that each classification is quick, about 1-3 seconds.

Let’s all roll up our sleeves and advance our knowledge of heliophysics!