Question

So you want to be a citizen scientist? The National Science Foundation (NSF) has got you covered. NSF supports citizen science across all areas of science, whether your passion is to scan the night sky, or explore your own backyard.

Join a flock of birders

eBird is an online platform that allows bird-watchers to go online and record their sightings to a database. With more than 100,000 active users, eBird's system is a treasure of information on bird population, distribution and habitat, which users can explore in real time.

Count every drop

The Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network (CoCoRaHS) is the largest provider of daily precipitation observations in the United States. Volunteers set up rain gauges and record data every time a rain, snow or hail storm passes over. Data is organized and shared on the CoCoRaHS website, and used by scientists, farmers and more.

Search for stars with your computer

Einstein@Home uses your computer's idle time to search for space signals. The project has already had major successes: Volunteers discovered about 50 stars, using data from Puerto Rico's Arecibo Observatory and Australia's Parkes Observatory. Einstein@Home also searches for gravitational-wave signals using data from NSF's Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory.

Be part of a supercomputer

To link all those home computers, Einstien@Home uses software called the Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing, better known as BOINC. The software choreographs(安排，筹划) the technical aspect of volunteer computing and helps you use radio telescope signals to search for alien life.

Join the plankton party

Without plankton, life in the ocean would not exist. These tiny organisms form the base of the food chain, and play an important role in the global carbon cycle. Plankton Portal enlists citizen scientists to identify images of plankton, snapped by the In Situ Icthyoplankton Imaging System (ISIIS), an underwater robot engineered at the University of Miami. ISIIS has taken millions of images in oceans around the world and upload them into a database; classifying the images helps researchers understand plankton diversity, habitat and behavior.

1.On the website of eBird, a bird-watcher can ________.

A. make contact with other active users

B. explore the world of birds in real time

C. observe all the existing bird species

D. provide and share birds’ information

2.The program “________” is not based on the Internet database.

A. Join the plankton party

B. Be part of a supercomputer

C. Count every drop

D. Search for stars with your computer

3.Which of the following is the best title of the passage?

A. Become a Citizen Scientist

B. Make a Contribution to NSF

C. Be part of Space Exploration

D. Follow the Steps to be a Citizen Scientist

Answer 1