“Sensing the Air”
Citizen science is a growing field in the scientific world, and involves volunteers from the general public in scientific research with collaboration with professional researchers.
Sensing the Air is an air quality monitoring citizen science initiative. We aim to create a local network of air quality sensors at citizens’ homes, offices, schools and public spaces that provide local air quality information at the places where people spend most of their time.
We do so by actively engaging citizens in the research process, including defining research questions, analyzing data and seeing what they can do in order to improve air quality in their neighborhood. Sensing the Air’s unique platform, http://sensair.net, was built using user-centered design methods, as it displays air quality information on multiple levels, enabling users to interact with the data at their level of choice. More about the process of building the project platform is presented in the video below.
This project is part of the European Union FP7 CITI-SENSE project, for improving the quality of life in cities and is done with collaboration with the Technion environmatics lab (headed by Prof. Barak Fishbain).
Project Members
Yaela Golumbic, Ph.D. Student
Ayelet Baram-Tsabari, Associate Professor
This project is conducted in collaboration with Prof. Barak Fishbain and CITI-SENSE.
Relevant Publications
Golumbic, Y.N., Fishbain B. & Baram-Tsabari, A. (2017) Why and How should we facilitate scientific information to the public. Ecology and the Environment 8(3), 5-6. (In Hebrew)
Golumbic, Y.N., Baram-Tsabari, A., & Fishbain B. (2016) Participation of school students in scientific air-quality research. Proceedings of Indoor Air 2016.
Golumbic, Y.N., Orr, D., Baram-Tsabari, A., and Fishbein, B. (Accepted). Between vision and reality: A Case Study of Scientists’ Views on Citizen Science. Citizen Science Theory and Practice.
Fishbain, B., Lerner, U., Cole-Hunter, T., Castell-Balaguer, N., Popoola, O., Broday, D., Martinez Iñiguez, T., Nieuwenhuijsen, M., Jovasevic-Stojanovic, M., Topalovic, D., Jones, R., Galea, K., Etzion, Y., Kizel, F., Golumbic, Y., Baram-Tsabari, A., Robinson, J., Kocman, D., Horvat, M.; Svecova, V., Arpaci, A. & Bartonova, A. (2016). An Evaluation Tool Kit of Air Quality Micro-Sensing Units. Science of the Total Environment.
Golumbic, YN, Baram-Tsabari, A., and Fishbain B. (2015). Citizen science: Public participation in science. (Review) Ecology and the Environment 6(1), 14-23. (In Hebrew)
HTML PDF
Golumbic, Y.N. (2015). What Makes Citizen Science Projects Successful, and What Can We Learn from Them for Future Projects? Technion Citizen Science Project (TCSP) report. (2015), 1–56.
In the Popular Media
“The information revolution: the citizens who help scientists” [Hebrew], Globes, August 26, 2017
Webinar: Citizen Science in a Global Perspective
“Something in the Air” [Hebrew], Zavit – A News Agency for Science and the Environment, June 15, 2016
“From Pollution to Cats: Citizens in White Coats” [Hebrew], Ynet, June 24, 2015