Online Data Sets Research Ideas

Below are project topic and research question ideas. These have been checked and should allow for original research opportunities - that is, you could make actual discoveries and novel findings for each of these projects! And  you should not need access to a professional laboratory, but rather can access data sets online in your school lab or even in your own house.

In general, 'Big Data' and Data Science are already here in many fields of STEM. This link goes to a good summary article and video from Northwestern University, one of the leaders in Data Science.

It is important to realize that

this type of research requires computer programming 

knowledge and skills. 

One of the most popular languages presently for data collection and analysis is Python, and is the language many graduate students in research areas recommend learning; there are countless tutorials, YouTube videos, and pieces of information online for Python. The most popular free, online course to learn Python (as well as some other languages) is through Codecademy, although there are many other sources and tutorials online. If you are new to programming, open an account and start a self-paced course in Python!

Just click on a topic of interest, and it will take you to a separate post about that specific topic. You will find background information, relevant links to articles, vocabulary, data accessibility methods, videos, and so on. Hopefully you will find enough information to actually be able to do the project!

Online Data Set Topics and Research Questions:

Datasets Galore - Multiple Topics

For datasets on just about any topic you can imagine, check out over 1200 found at https://www.kaggle.com/datasets.

Astrophysics/Astronomy

Examples of student research papers using online astronomical datasets:
- Morphological classification of Post-Starburst Galaxies
- Albedo and Heat Recirculation of Hot Jupiter Exoplanets - Effect of Phase Shifts
- The Effect of the Asteroid Belt on the LISA Mission
- Environment and Variability of XBONGs (type of X-ray galaxy)


NASA Open Data Portal
https://data.nasa.gov/ This is NASA's primary site where we can access numerous datasets from different astrophysical experiments! There are ports to find code, as well. An incredibly rich resource for those interested in doing any type of data-based astrophysical projects! Other specific experimental sites are listed below. Astronomical Experiments and Datasets:
European Space Agency Planetary Science Archive

http://www.rssd.esa.int/index.php?project=PSA  Central data repository for ESA missions: currently Giotto,Huygens, Mars Express, Rosetta, SMART-1, and Venus Express, as well as several ground-based cometary observations

Exoplanets.org

http://exoplanets.org/  One of the premiere sites, with up-to-date data on thousands of exosolar planets and candidates.

Global Telescope Network
http://gtn.sonoma.edu/data_reduction/index.php Data reduction site

Kepler databases - the search for extrasolar planets; Kepler Planet Candidate Data Explorer, which is called Planetquest; the main Kepler site 

NASA Exoplanet Archive

http://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/  Another site with thousands of datasets for exosolar planets.

NASA Space Science Data Coordinated Archive

http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/

Each of the following have numerous links to individual projects/missions:

Astrophysics data: http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/astro/

Heliophysics: http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/space/

Solar system exploration: http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/

Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS)

Sloan Digital Sky Survey datasets can be found here, along with tutorials of how to access data. 

Spitzer Science Center

http://ssc.spitzer.caltech.edu/  space telescope with infrared

Variable Star Data
https://www.aavso.org/zapper

Zooniverse (general)

Over 40 different citizen science projects, where you can help scientists in a variety of fields make sense of enormous data sets!

https://www.zooniverse.org/

Two other citizen scientist sites are:

https://cosmoquest.org/x/science/mars/

http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/index.php

Some instructions for accessing certain Astrophysics Datasets:

1. Create Chandra Images from Raw Data

Basic steps:

1. Download .FITS data files either from X-ray or Multi-wavelength  images that be found here http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/openFITS/xray_data.htmland http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/openFITS/multiwavelength_data.html respectively

2. Download free image editor program from https://www.gimp.org/

3. Create Chandra images from raw data as described in an example here http://chandra.si.edu/photo/openFITS/crab.html

2. X-ray spectroscopy of supernova remnants

Basic steps:

1. Download, install and open ds9 program

2. Download ds9 image data files of supernova remnants

2. Follow some basic analysis instructions described in detail here http://www.chandra.si.edu/edu/formal/snr/ds9.html

3. Classify a supernova event as type Ia or type II  the spectra and compare the result with the information in the Photo Album http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/category/snr.html

3.  Galaxy classification and evolution with GalaxyZoo

1. Use the data from https://data.galaxyzoo.org/

2. Galaxy evolution activity http://www.zooteach.org/lessons/3-galaxy-evolution-with-galaxy-zoo

3. Galaxy classification activity http://www.zooteach.org/lessons/62-classifying-galaxies-as-an-early-inquiry-activity-in-an-introductory-honors-physics-class

More on galaxy zoo https://www.galaxyzoo.org/ and https://www.galaxyzoo.org/?_ga=2.24027962.1808757446.1505861686-797462615.1505861686

4.Interpreting data with photometric transits

http://www.zooteach.org/lessons/11-interpreting-data-with-photometric-transits

5. Tracking Jupiter's moons using image processing software to analyze observatory images of Jupiter and its moons

 http://www.globalsystemsscience.org/studentbooks/acc/ch7/investigation1

6. Exoplanet transits using telescope images, image processing software, and data from the Internet to determine the size and orbital period of an exoplanet

http://www.globalsystemsscience.org/studentbooks/acc/ch8/investigation1

7.Transit tracks activity

https://www.nasa.gov/kepler/education/formal/transittracks

8.Hubble's hot stars 

https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/bridgetk/hubbles-hot-stars/about/research

9. More classroom activities on planet finding

https://www.nasa.gov/kepler/education/formal

10. More activities based on galaxyzoo

http://www.zooteach.org/

11. More activities on Chandra X-ray observatory

http://www.chandra.si.edu/edu/formal/index.html

Long List of Astronomy Programs with Real Data
http://nitarp.ipac.caltech.edu/page/other_epo_programs 

Genomics/Medical

HIV Databases: Includes Sequence, Vaccine, Immunology databases for HIV, and data for other viruses (Hepatitis C and Hemorrhagic fever). Includes some tools to look at data.
https://www.hiv.lanl.gov/content/index

Human Genome Resources and Databases

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genome/guide/human/

NIH Cancer Institute

http://www.cancer.gov/research/resources/data-catalog  data collections from NCI initiatives

Geoscience & Climate Science

Concord Consortium has a user-friendly site for NOAA Data Analysis

Check out a data portal for NOAA data and an analysis platform for it (CODAP). Instructions are here.

Examples of student research papers using online geoscience datasets:
- Antarctic Sea Ice Fractal Analysis (using fractal dimension as measure of change due to warming)
- Scaling law for Strength and Frequency of High-Energy Storms

 

The NOAA site on paleoclimate data:

https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/paleoclimatology-data

There is also one for seismic data:

http://ds.iris.edu/ds/nodes/dmc/data/types/events/

And of course, there is always NASA, which holds a lot of earth science data:

http://science.nasa.gov/earth-science/earth-science-data/
https://earthdata.nasa.gov/

There is a journal that specifically publishes earth system science data sets:

http://www.earth-system-science-data.net/

And Stanford compiled a list of earth science data sources:

http://library.stanford.edu/guides/earth-science-data-repositories

EdGCM Climate Modeling site
http://edgcm.columbia.edu/ This is a professional level, but user friendly, simulation for modeling climate change. It is meant to be something high school students can use to model climate into the future. Click here for one example from a student.

USGS Geomagnetism Program

http://geomag.usgs.gov/

NOAA Geomagnetism Site

http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/geomag/ 

NOAA: Climate interests

https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access

NCEI is the world’s largest provider of weather and climate data. Land-based, marine, model, radar, weather balloon, satellite, and paleoclimatic are just a few of the types of datasets available. Detailed descriptions of the available products and platforms are below.

• Quick Links
• These links provide quick access to many of NCEI's climate and weather datasets, products, and various web pages and resources.
• Land-Based Station
• Land-based, or surface, observations include temperature, dew point, relative humidity, precipitation, wind speed and direction, visibility, atmospheric pressure, and types of weather occurrences such as hail, fog, and thunder collected for locations on every continent.
• Satellite
• Geostationary and polar-orbiting satellites provide raw radiance data collected by ground stations to help monitor and predict weather and environmental events.
• Radar
• An acronym for Radio Detection and Ranging, a radar is an object-detection system that uses radio waves to determine the range, altitude, direction of movement, and speed of objects producing raw data as well as generating analysis products.
• Model
• Access to near-real-time, high-volume numerical weather prediction and global climate models and data. Looking into the past, present, and future to assist in the analysis of multidisciplinary datasets and promote interoperable data analysis.
• Weather Balloon
• Weather data from the atmosphere, beginning at three meters above the Earth’s surface. These data are obtained from radiosondes, which are instrument packages tethered to balloons that transmit data back to the receiving station.
• Marine and Ocean
• Meteorological data transmitted from ships at sea, moored and drifting buoys, coastal stations, rigs, and platforms. The data may include weather as well as ocean state information.
• Paleoclimatology
• Past climate and environmental data, derived from natural sources such as tree rings, ice cores, corals, and ocean and lake sediments, extend the archive of weather and climate back hundreds of millions of years.
• Severe Weather
• Archive of destructive storm or weather data and information, which includes local, intense, and damaging events such as thunderstorms, hailstorms, and tornadoes. It can also describe more widespread events such as tropical systems, blizzards, nor’easters, and derechos.

Climate Project Ideas

• Are there correlations or any discernible relationships between weather patterns in the US and/or Canada and changes in Arctic ice loss? One might look at rainfall, wind speeds, wind direction, jet stream flow, temperatures, snow fall, frequency of storms, drought conditions and lengths, and any other parameters for which there are data.
• Will be working this year to develop some help resources for running a real, professional climate model program...it is a simpler, older simulation, but it should be wonderful for curious high school students! More to come...

Particle Physics

Examples of student research papers using online particle datasets:
- Organizational Properties of Baryonic Decays


The CERN CMS experiment has put an incredibly large dataset online, free for anyone to use. Check this article out for more details.

CERN Open Data

http://opendata.cern.ch/research

Fermilab - for classes to use as lessons

https://ed.fnal.gov/data/

Social Networks

Examples of student research papers using online datasets of social and professional networks:

- The Limits of Gender Diversity in American Movies
- Scientific Mentorship within Howard Hughes Medical Institute
- Using Author Attribute Graphs to Investigate Sociology of Science