About Us
This dream has been made possible by exceptional individuals whose talents and dedication have shaped our path. Some have moved on to new adventures, while others have stayed and grown with us. We are grateful for all the invaluable contributions to this project. You can explore the link: https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/marckuchner/planet-patrol/about/team to learn more about the extraordinary people who were with us during the first phase of the project.
Veselin Kostov (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center) is a research scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and SETI Institute. His research focus is on detection, vetting and characterization of transiting exoplanets and eclipsing multiple stellar systems from Kepler, K2, and TESS, with the goal of understanding how these form, evolve, and compare to the Solar System.
Luca Cacciapuoti is a PhD student at the European Southern Observatory, based in Garching, Germany. He investigates the properties and role of interstellar dust in star and planet formation using observations of the ALMA radiotelescope. He defended in BSc and MSc theses at the University of Naples Federico II (Italy), regarding the discovery and validation of exoplanets discovered with the transit technique.
Christian Magliano is a Ph.D. student at the Physics Department of the University of Naples Federico II. His main interests concern astrophysics, astrobiology and cosmology. He is currently involved in the search of exoplanets with special attention towards Earth-like planets orbiting Sun-like stars.
Marco Zaccaria Di Fraia (he/him) holds a PhD in Visual Based Autonomous Systems for Space Exploration from Cranfield University sponsored by Thales Alenia Space. He also holds an MSc in Aerospace, Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, and a BEng in Aerospace Engineering, both from the University of Naples “Federico II”. He is currently pursuing a MSc in Sustainable Development at SOAS University of London.
Following the doctoral academic experience, Marco moved to the startup world, first as an AI research engineer in a deep tech startup in the Oxford[Harwell] ecosystem (where he was the first hire) and then as a dataOps engineer in a retail startup, based in Silicon Valley.
Marco is driven by a desire to use technology to ensure everyone has the best possible quality of life and access to equal opportunities, regardless of where they are born and decide to live.
Aline Uemura Fornear is a Chemical Engineer by training, currently working in R&D in the consumer goods industry. When not working on Planet Patrol, Aline also volunteers with the Disk Detective project in the Zooniverse platform and as a school ambassador promoting science careers.
Hugo A. Durantini Luca (Universidad Nacional de Córdoba) iastronomy student in UNC-Famaf (Facultad de Matemática, Astronomía y Física) from Córdoba, Argentina. Doing citizen science in Zooniverse since 2014 with Disk Detective, with experience in several projects inside and outside citizen science including formerly being part of the TOROS project, aimed to perform an astronomical survey of the southern hemisphere sky as a counterpart for the gravitational wave observatory LIGO. You can follow him on twitter @HADL2015
Shaun Wallace is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of Rhode Island. He is a Human-Computer Interaction Systems researcher focusing on crowdsourcing, peer production, and citizen science. His public-facing research systems have engaged hundreds of thousands of visitors to deliver real-world impacts and augment their information seeking, vetting, and consumption behaviors.