A Late Night at the Museum

This post originally appeared on the Zooniverse blog.

^{(Photo courtesy of the Etch A Cell team)}

At the end of October, The Zooniverse team was invited to the Natural History Museum in London to be part of the Museum’s monthly Lates event program.

^{(Photo courtesy of the Etch A Cell team)}

The event was organised by the ConSciCom team who have partnered with the Zooniverse to create two very successful projects – Science Gossip and Orchid Observers. The theme for the evening was to explore the role images, such as illustrations and photographs, have played within natural history and scientific research.

From studying animal behaviour using photos taken by camera traps, to advancing our understanding of cell biology with photos from microscopes, many Zooniverse projects improve our understanding of the world around us through the help of citizen scientist volunteers.

Teams from multiple Zooniverse projects, including BashTheBug, Etch A Cell, Notes from  Nature, Orchid Observers, Science Gossip and Seabird Watch, attended the event and spent the evening speaking to people about their projects, and showing how anyone can contribute to real research through citizen science.

^{(Photos courtesy of the Etch A Cell team and Jim O’Donnell)}

Illustrator Dr Makayla Lewis led a live gallery drawing event, asking visitors to pick up a pencil and spend 15 minutes sketching their favourite exhibits.

^{(Photos courtesy of Jim O’Donnell)}

Thanks to everyone who got involved, including Fiona (Penguin Watch), Freddie (University of Oxford), Jim (Zooniverse Developer), Makayla (Illustrator), Martin (Etch A Cell), Nathan (University of Oxford) and Phil (BashTheBug), and especially all our volunteers who attended the event!