The Be a Martian website allows members of the public to help scientists perform research tasks such as improving maps of the red planet.

“We’re at a point in history where everyone can be an explorer,” Doug McCuistion, director of Nasa’s Mars Exploration Program, said.”With so much data coming back from Mars missions that are accessible by all, exploring Mars has become a shared human endeavour. “People worldwide can expand the specialised efforts of a few hundred Mars mission team members and make authentic contributions of their own,” he added.

Users can, for example, count craters on Mars, a task Nasa said had posed a challenge in the past because of the vast numbers involved. “The collaboration of thousands of participants could help scientists produce far better maps,” Nasa and Microsoft said in a joint statement.

The website hosts hundreds of thousands of pictures of Mars including many which have never been released to the public before. It features a “virtual town hall” where users can have questions answered by Mars experts and offers prizes to software developers who create tools that provide access to Mars images for online, classroom and Mars mission team use. The website is located at beamartian.jpl.nasa.gov.

Via telegraph