GOAs

San Francisco, Cordoba | Learning Through the Looking Glass

JWST: A portal to the universe.

High-Level Project Summary

The project consists of developing a platform and games related to the James Webb Space Telescope and other space objects, e. g. other telescopes, planets, nebulae. The proposed solution is a collection of games that provide information and allows to reach a wide target audience with fun activities.It is important because it allows the popularization of space activities and the knowledge they communicate. The JWST is an important advance for the knowledge of the Universe and for the scientific community, not only in astronomy but also in related sciences.https://www.instagram.com/goassfco/

Link to Final Project

http://conciencia.frsfco.utn.edu.ar/?page_id=15 and https://github.com/goassanfrancisco/learning_looking_glass

Link to Project "Demo"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8Ra42uj_fU

Detailed Project Description

This project presents a set of games through web development, with the aim of promoting space science and astronomical activities to a diverse audience. In this way, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), due to its complexity, size and power, allows us to take high-quality images of objects in our solar system, as well as the near, middle and distant universe. For this reason, the project includes four modules that provide information and allow recreational activities that relate the objects of the Universe with the capabilities of the JWST, in addition to comparing this telescope with its predecessors in space.

The modular design is developed to provide scalability to the presented project, which allows expanding to new interactive modules without interfering with the activities already developed.

Each module is detailed below:

EL CIELO A TRAVÉS DEL JWST (SKY THROUGH JWST):

In this instance, an image of the night sky is observed, where it is possible to select one of the objects from which images were obtained. This way you can know their location in the sky and allow access to relevant information about them. In addition, the Hubble Space Telescope, the Spitzer Space Telescope and the International Space Station were added to compare capabilities and functions.

In this way, it is intended to spread astronomical scientific knowledge and increase the interest of society in these activities. This provides information that results in the other interactive modules.

PUZZLES:

In this module, the assembly of 5 puzzles is proposed, which show images of the JWST, each one is made up of 25 pieces that must be ordered in the shortest possible time. Then it allows you to record the time obtaining a ranking with the 10 best times. Although in this instance it was thought for a young audience, it is not exclusive for other ages.

TRIVIA:

The trivia corresponds to a game of questions and answers, where 10 random questions with 4 options are proposed, which challenge the person's knowledge in space science, emphasizing the JWST telescope. The information contained in the questions is related to what is presented in the module “EL CIELO A TRAVÉS DEL JWST (SKY THROUGT JWST)”.

In this case, a ranking is proposed that awards a score based on the correct answers and the time used to complete them. The higher the number of correct answers and the shorter the time spent to achieve them, the higher the score obtained. In the same way that it is done in the PUZZLES module, this score can be registered and displayed in the ranking of the 10 best.

ALINEANDO ESPEJOS (ALIGNING MIRROS):

This game consists of moving the 18 hexagonal components of the main mirror of the JWST, to align them and achieve a better quality of the captured image of Jupiter. This explains the importance of this process in the proper functioning of the JWST.

For the development of the modules explained, HTML, css, JavaScript and PHP coding were used as the main languages. With them, a presentation and functionality suitable for access through PC and mobile devices are achieved. This contributes to increasing the impact based on the objectives set out in the challenge.

According to the time available, the plan was completed to meet the objectives of the challenge. As a result, it is highlighted that improvements can be made to the system as detailed below:

- Multilanguage platform: the objective is to achieve greater geographical coverage by implementing the system also in English, with the possibility of extending it to other languages.

- Sharing results on social networks: in order to achieve a greater diffusion of the platform and favor the user experience and the interconnection between them, the possibility of sharing the results of each game on different social networks such as Instagram, Facebook.

- Ranking and timing of the game by aligning mirrors (ALIGNING MIRROS), in order to improve the competitiveness of the game.

- Difficulty levels: The purpose is to provide different experiences to the user by incorporating difficulty levels (easy, medium, hard) in each of the games, giving the possibility to select the level. For example, puzzles of 3x3 pieces, 5x5 pieces, 10x10 pieces.

- Upgrades: Add objects and corresponding information based on new JWST visualizations and discoveries.

Space Agency Data

In order to choose our challenge and to be able to develop it, we used the official website ( https://www.spaceappschallenge.org/ ) from where we were able to learn about it, which inspired us to choose the James Webb Space Telescope challenge because of the scientific importance of its technology and what it can contribute to space and the impact it can have on the community in general.

Once the challenge was defined, we used the resources provided by NASA, the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and the European Space Agency (ESA)(https://webb.nasa.gov/content/multimedia/images.html , https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/ , https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Webb, https://esawebb.org/ , https://www.asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/satellites/jwst/science-images-from-james-webb-space-telescope.asp ) to obtain multimedia content and also to learn about the tools, news, etc. about the James Webb Space Telescope and thus be able to achieve the development of the main challenge posed.

Hackathon Journey

The experience was exciting and fun. Regarding what inspired our team to choose the challenge was the potential that the James Webb Space Telescope has at a scientific level and especially in astronomy, in addition to the fact that the group is part of an Astronomical Observatory located in the UTN of San Francisco, Cordoba, which is responsible for scientific dissemination. So, we thought it was a good idea to carry out this challenge, where through a games collection in a web development, the community can learn about space and well in this specific case about the new James Webb spacial telescope and that can be in a fun and challenging way.

The setbacks and challenges were always solved by discussing in group, always through a leader who was guiding us, the work was always done as a team looking to divide the tasks to solve the setbacks we had, either to find information, developments, schedules, presentations, etc..

We would like to thank Nicolás Otero, Hernán Mattio and Universidad Tecnológica Nacional (UTN) San Francisco because they were collaborators in our setbacks and especially the organization of this challenger because without them all this would not have been possible.

Within the framework of this event, in addition to the activities developed within this project, the group provided telescopes from the UTN Astronomical Observatory, with which the public was able to carry out nocturnal observations of the Moon, Jupiter and Saturn.