Citizen science is the main objective of the projects presented in #NetBCNLab

The first #NetBCNLab meeting in 2015, organized by Barcelona Lab, held at the Sagrada Familia library was to talk about citizen science. In the meeting there were the owners of seven projects about citizen science: Riu.net, Atrapa el Tigre, Abelles Urbanes, Observadors del Mar, Bee-Path, CitizenSqKm and Punt d'Informació Aerobiològic.

Pau Fortuny opened the round of presentations with Riu.net, a project that analyzes the river water. They have an application that any citizen can download and provides a fun and easy way to know the status of water by the classification of some macroinvertebrates.

The second project presented was about analyzing the sea water. Joaquim Garrabou talked about Observadors del Mar, an initiative of the Institute of Science of the Sea-CSIC prepared to know the status of the costs. The objective is to create a database with the help of citizenship that provides quality information to know the marine life and know what happens at sea.

Isabelle Bonhoure by Open Systems Group at the University of Barcelona talked about Abelles Urbanes project that analyzes the state of the air in Barcelona by observing bees’ movement. John Palmer carried on with the presentation talking about Atrapa el Tigre, an application that allows mapping the areas inhabited by the “tiger mosquito”, others to provide information and advice on avoiding this mosquito.

Josep Perelló, coordinator in the Office of Citizen Science talked about Bee-Path, a project that was first tested on La Festa de la Ciència in 2012 that analyzes the people motion in specific areas.

Jordina Belmonte talked about an especially interesting project for people who are allergic to pollen. Punt d'Informació Aerobiology provides a map by the type and amount of pollen in each region of Catalonia. This information is available on their website and it’s made by the help of citizens collaborating in the project.

The last project was CitizenSqKm, presented by the journalist Mònica Garriga, who said that it’s a technological, educational, journalistic and civic participation project. It’s a map where people can make a census of the things in the neighborhoods in Barcelona, starting in Poblenou.

The meeting ended with an open discussion between scientists and citizens to discusse how to get people interested in citizen science or ways to open to the public the information obtained with the help of citizenship.