PUNCH PULSE: A Citizen-Science Pipeline for Heliospheric Imagery

PUNCH PULSE (Public Understanding through Live Science Exploration) is an educator training program proposed under NASA's Science Activation program. We are building a nationwide network of trained facilitators at planetariums, museums, and science centers who guide public audiences through structured observation and interpretation of PUNCH imagery — and then channel those observers into sustained citizen-science classification through Zooniverse.

In facilitated sessions, audiences examine wide-field white-light imagery of the solar wind and transient structures. Educators guide participants through a scaffolded inquiry sequence: identifying visible features, comparing structures across space and time, connecting brightness variations to density through Thomson scattering, and reasoning about heliospheric conditions. The program extends the PUNCH outreach program's foundation in awareness and cultural connection by equipping educators to move audiences from inspiration into hands-on scientific practice.

Training is delivered at regional planetarium conferences nationwide, organized in annual cohorts with graduates mentoring subsequent cohorts. A regularly updated visualization loop built from recent PUNCH observations provides near-real-time context, and OpenSpace enables live data exploration during sessions.

What we need from you: PULSE will generate a large, trained observer base performing structured classifications on Zooniverse. The value of that effort depends on the questions we ask them. We are actively looking for science-team problems where many eyes on PUNCH imagery could contribute — feature identification, event cataloging, morphology classification, or anything else where human pattern recognition at scale adds value. If you have a question that a crowd could help answer, we want to hear about it. This is your citizen-science workforce; help us point it at the right targets.