---
title: "Radio Galaxy Zoo"
chunk: 3/3
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Galaxy_Zoo"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:15:44.023207+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

In November 2017, a team led by Omar Contigiani published a paper in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society studying the mutual alignment of radio sources. Using data drawn from the Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty Centimeters (FIRST) and TIFR GMRT Sky Survey (TGSS), they investigate the most powerful radio sources, namely the largest elliptical galaxies emitting plasma-filled jets. The abstract begins: "We study the mutual alignment of radio sources within two surveys, FIRST and TGSS. This is done by producing two position angle catalogues containing the preferential directions of respectively 30059 and 11674 extended sources distributed over more than 7000 and 17000 square degrees." The FIRST sample sources were identified by participants in RGZ, while the TGSS sample was the result of an automated process. Marginal evidence of local alignment is found in the FIRST sample, which has a 2% probability of being by chance. This supports other recent research by scientists using the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope. The abstract ends: "The TGSS sample is found to be too sparsely populated to manifest a similar signal." Results suggest that there is a relative alignment present at cosmological distances.
v) Radio Galaxy Zoo: Compact and extended radio source classification with deep learning (May 2018).
In May 2018, Lukic and team published a study in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society concerning machine learning techniques. The abstract begins: "Machine learning techniques have been increasingly useful in astronomical applications over the last few years, for example in the morphological classification of galaxies."

== Gems of the Galaxy Zoos (ZooGems) ==
During the next two years, up to 105 RGZ objects will be observed with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) as a result of Program 15445, whose P.I. is William Keel. The program's abstract begins: "The classic Galaxy Zoo project and its successors have been rich sources of interesting astrophysics beyond their initial goals. Green Pea starbursts, AGN ionization echoes, dust in backlit spirals, AGN in pseudobulges, have all seen HST followup programs." As a result of NASA 'gap fillers' initiative, it is hoped that significant scientific progress can be made by HST observations of a total of 304 objects, which have been chosen by voters using a Zooniverse custom-made interface. Keel stated: "Each one of them might not be enough for an individual study, but when you put them all together it adds up to an interesting study."
Gems of the Galaxy Zoos finished in September 2023 after imaging 193 of the 300 candidates. Many of the images can be viewed on Wikimedia Commons.

== See also ==

CSIRO
Evolutionary Map of the Universe
Galaxy formation and evolution
Galaxy morphological classification
Radio astronomy

== References ==

== External links ==
The Radio Galaxy Zoo website.
The National Radio Astronomy Observatory Exploration and Discovery webpage.
Radio Galaxy Zoo: a quick start guide to hunting supermassive black holes.