More discovery certificates
12 Sep 2012 9:47:45 UTC
Topic 196518
(moderation:
Dear Einstein@Home volunteers,
good news, everyone! We're currently preparing the next batch of discovery certificates for the volunteers whose computers discovered a new radio pulsar.
Each of the lucky volunteers gets two framed certificates. These are signed by the Einstein@Home director, Prof. Dr. Bruce Allen, and either the PALFA chair Prof. Dr. James Cordes or the principal investigator of the PMPS, Prof. Dr. Andrew Lyne. One certificate always is in English, the other one is in the volunteer's native tongue (should that be English, we'll send two identical English certificates).
We've recently printed the individual certificates and send them off to our project partners in the US and the UK for their signatures. We got the signed certificates back earlier this week and now started framing them. At the bottom of this post, there's a list of all volunteers that will receive their certificates in this shipping batch. Should your computer have discovered a pulsar (look for your name here or here), check your email inbox, and make sure you reply to our official email.
This is what we started off from. Signed certificates at the bottom right, part of the pile of frames at the back of the table.
Now, getting more frames and putting each of the certificates into a frame.
All certificates are framed. You'll note there are some certificates left un-framed on the bottom right of the table. These will be finished later this week as we ran out of frames and have to pick up the new ones we ordered a while ago.
The frames will be packed probably next week and will then be sent to the volunteers all around the globe. When you received your certificate, please reply here so that we know everything went well. You might have to be patient, though. From the previous batch we know that it can take up to a few weeks for the certificates to arrive in the US or in Australia.
This batch includes certificates for the following volunteers: "Metod, S56RKO" (the one in Slovene), "KeithSloan", "Mel S Stark", "Philemon1752", "pax", "BobB", "Harald", "Fletuitus Maximus", "Guzel Sanatlar Saatchi & Saatchi", "Andrew Fullford", "pavlo" (the certificate in Ukrainian will be in the next batch), "Nemo", "ATLAS AEI Hannover", "Dusan Pirc", "Riaan Strydom", "Brian Adrian", "Bean13", "Frederick J. Pfitzer", "boinc_qc", "Eric", and "bench-seater".
The batch after this one will include certificates for "pavlo" (Ukrainian certificate), "Josha", "SF Chance", "Aku Leijala", "Augusto Cortemiglia", "Paul Frei", "Jyrki Ojala", "Matthias", and "spacemort".
Cheers,
Benjamin
Einstein@Home Project
More discovery certificates
)
Maybe a discoverer can name a star or something?
RE: Maybe a discoverer can
)
Unfortunately, this is not possible. Pulsars are "named" by their celestial coordinates. So, PSR J2007+2722 (the first Einstein@Home discovery) is the pulsar (PSR) at 20 hours and 07 minutes of right ascension and +27 degrees and 22 arcminutes of declination. Right ascension and declination form a a celestial coordinate system similar to the one on Earth, based on geographic longitude and latitude.
For the pulsars discovered by Einstein@Home, however, the names of the volunteers will appear in the scientific discovery publications along with the pulsars.
Cheers,
Benjamin
Einstein@Home Project
I am using the name Dingo for
)
I am using the name Dingo for BOINC. Do you ask for my real name if I discover anything so the certificate is in my name ??
Proud Founder of
Have a look at my WebCam<
Hi Dingo! RE: I am
)
Hi Dingo!
Yes, that is exactly what we do. We will send you an email and will ask for your permission to use your real name on the discovery web pages and in the scientific publication. If you don't want that for whatever reason, we'll of course not publish your real name. We will use your real name on the certificate of discovery, unless you'd rather like to see your BOINC name there.
We will also ask for a mailing address, so that we can send you the certificate. As you've seen in the pictures, these are not just pdf files, but real objects made from metal, glass, and plastic.
Cheers,
Ben
Einstein@Home Project
My wife just said you should
)
My wife just said you should send me one so I will quit building computers
These certificates look
)
These certificates look great! I'd like to congratulate the thousands of other users, too. Your electricity bills and hardware are essential in weeding through the data so a lucky few can make those cool discoveries.
Has anyone bothered to calculate what the processor time contributed so far would have cost the MPI/UW-M? Must be a fortune...
Well done people!
)
Well done people!
RE: Has anyone bothered to
)
A couple of years ago I saw an estimate for electricity costs alone - millions $USD per year I think. Put simply : these discoveries would not have occurred at all but for the generosity of contributors! :-)
Cheers, Mike.
I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...
... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal
RE: Has anyone bothered to
)
I've estimated that the electricity costs alone are around 8 million US dollars/year (or Euros/year in Europe, where electricity costs more) to replace our volunteer's computers with dedicated machines. Thus over the seven years that the project has been running, this is worth about 50 million US dollars. The costs of the hardware are difficult to estimate, but are probably comparable.
Note that the incremental electrical costs contributed by our volunteers are smaller than this. The costs above are an upper bound: they assume that volunteers are ONLY using their computers to run Einstein@Home. Since most volunteers use their computers for other purposes as well, the actual costs they incur are smaller than what I have estimated, since they come only from the extra power used by the CPU when running Einstein@Home code rather than sitting idle.
Director, Einstein@Home
The sexy certificates make it
)
The sexy certificates make it all worthwhile :)
My power bill last 3 month quarter was 900 bucks but I figure only about 300 of that was computers. My missus desperatley wishes/nags for them to be somewhere other than the corner of the lounge room lol and wont let me get more.
Getting that special email from the boffins in the lab and then getting a certificate to prove it makes the nagging and the power bill all worthwhile.
It is a bit of a shame we cant name our pulsars but then again could you imagine some of them names that a bunch of (essentially) computer geeks might come up with :)