Stars in their eyes

When most people think about protecting the Earth, they envision efforts to save rainforests, coral reefs, and endangered species. For students involved in the International Asteroid Search Campaign (IASC), however, their gaze is skyward.

With the support of the China Hands-On Universe (HOU) program, middle school and high school students search for potentially hazardous asteroids and near-Earth objects (NEOs) by analyzing astronomical images.

On Saturday, in a live video-broadcast with participants in Nanjing and Dongguan, students in Beijing received awards from the Killer Asteroid Project at NASA, the IASC organizer, in recognition of their discoveries.