Gdańsk University of Technology is the first research unit in Poland to join the international network Globe at Night - Sky Brightness Monitoring Network (GaN-MN). The entire network includes 64 long-term monitoring sensors located in 19 countries around the world.
Globe at Night is a citizen science-based international campaign that aims to raise people's awareness of light pollution.
The campaign participants can conduct measurements of the brightness of the environment at night using smartphones. Since 2006, volunteers have made 185,000 measurements in 180 countries.
The sensor was placed on the roof of one of the tall university buildings and continuously measures the brightness of the sky on the campus of the university, and connection to the network provides access to data from all sensors located in various countries.
The initiator of the idea at the Gdańsk University of Technology, who also instigated preliminary talks, was Dr. Karolina Zielińska-Dąbkowska from the Faculty of Architecture. Dr. Katarzyna Bobkowska from the Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering supervised further activities associated with the sensor installation and connection to the GaN-MN network.
Participation in the project is a big advantage for the ILLUME group dealing with light pollution. According to the Gdańsk University of Technology experts, it will also draw attention to the increasingly important problem of artificial light pollution and its potential negative impact on human health and the natural environment.
The university also conducts research on changes in the sky brightness as part of the grant 'An innovative method of monitoring artificial light pollution in the natural and urbanized environments using unmanned aerial vehicles (drones)', financed by the Argentum Triggering Research Grants programme and supervised by Dr. Katarzyna Bobkowska.
Find out more at:
http://globeatnight-network.org/index.html
PAP - Science in Poland
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