June 25, 2021

Virtual LLNL-UC Merced Data Science Challenge tackles asteroid detection though machine learning

Jeremy Thomas/LLNL

Over three weeks, students from the University of California, Merced collaborated online with mentors at LLNL to tackle a real-world challenge problem: using machine learning to identify potentially hazardous asteroids that could pose an existential threat to humanity. Throughout the event, the teams tackled problems around the theme of “Astronomy for Planetary Defense.” For the main challenge, students were tasked with applying deep learning models to optical astronomy data to detect and identify Near Earth Objects (such as asteroids). Read more at LLNL News.