Abel Menzez, PhD
2024 seed grant awardee
Project description
Arecibo Wow! Exploring Interstellar Communication
OpenSpace will be integrated into our Arecibo Wow! project outreach activities, beginning with our main event on November 16, 2024, to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Arecibo Message. This will be an in-person event. The availability of the facilities at the former Arecibo Observatory (now Arecibo C3) for this event in November is still being determined; if they are not available, we will use our UPR Arecibo campus instead. The audio-visual products generated from this project will be shared at the event and available online throughout the year. The second event will commemorate the 48th anniversary of the Wow! Signal in August 2025. In these events, OpenSpace will be used to guide audiences through a virtual tour of the Milky Way galaxy, highlighting regions of interest in the search for extraterrestrial life, including known exoplanet systems, star clusters, and other areas relevant to SETI efforts. Below is a list of the proposed new products. They will be available in both English and Spanish, and accessible online for the international community.
Target audience age
| 0-4 | 5-10 | 11-14 | 14-18 | 19-22 | 23-26 | 27-99 |
NASA division
Astro
Grant status
Learning context
Digital Learning
Neighborhood /
Community
Informal /
Out of School
Home / Family
Citizen Science
Formal Education
SME bio
The search for extraterrestrial civilizations and the pursuit of interstellar communications are among the most profound scientific endeavors of our time, reflecting humanity's inherent curiosity about the cosmos and our place within it.
Abel Mendez, PhD
Arecibo Wow! Exploring Interstellar Communication
Director
Planetary Habitability Laboratory University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo
Professor Abel Méndez is a planetary astrobiologist and Director of the Planetary Habitability Laboratory (PHL) at the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo. His research focuses on the habitability of Earth, the Solar System, and extrasolar planets. Prof. Méndez is a NASA MIRS Fellow who has done research at Fermilab, NASA Goddard, NASA Ames, and the Arecibo Observatory. He developed the Earth Similarity Index and the Visible Paleo-Earth Project and maintains the Habitable Worlds Catalog. His work includes theoretical modeling of habitability, the characterization and detection of habitable worlds, and the search for extraterrestrial life.
SciAct team
OpenSpace description
Funded in part by NASA, OpenSpace brings the latest techniques from data visualization research to the general public. OpenSpace supports interactive presentation of dynamic data from observations, simulations, and space mission planning and operations. OpenSpace works on multiple operating systems, with an extensible architecture powering high resolution tiled displays and planetarium domes, and makes use of the latest graphic card technologies for rapid data throughput. In addition, OpenSpace enables simultaneous connections across the globe, creating opportunity for shared experiences among audiences worldwide.
OpenSpace is a pipeline for disseminating NASA data and visualized content. This collaboration supports the needs of our SciAct project by bringing OpenSpace software into the Arecibo Observatory.