Citizen CATE 2024

Join an eclipse relay race for science! The Citizen Continental-America Telescope Eclipse (Citizen CATE) 2024 is a network of volunteer teams equipped and trained to capture videos of the Sun’s corona – or atmosphere – during the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse. 

The 2-3 minute clips made by each team will be combined into a 60-minute movie that reflects the magnetic structure of the Sun’s middle corona, revealing the electron density and showing how magnetic energy is converted into heat. The movie will also reveal the motion of density features in the middle corona, allowing scientists to measure the strength of the solar wind.

Will you be near the path of totality on April 8 (see the map below)? Find 1-2 other people to join you and apply to become a Citizen CATE 2024 team.

Go to Project Website

AGES

Teams of up to 3 people, age 18 and older

Division

Heliophysics

where

April 8, 2024 path of totality

launched

2023

What you’ll do

  • Attend at least 4 practice observation sessions.
  • Participate in training events and information sharing meetings leading up to, during, and after the eclipse.
  • Make and record observations during the April 8th total solar eclipse.

Requirements

  • Time: days to weeks. There are required training and practice sessions, plus observation on April 8.
  • Equipment: Selected teams will be provided free equipment, which they can keep. 
  • Knowledge: None. In-person training and remote support will be provided.

Get started!

Learn more:

Visit the project website to learn more about the science behind our project and the research questions that we hope to answer.

Follow Citizen CATE 2024 on X!

Get to know the people of Citizen CATE 2024!

Two people sit at a laptop looking at the Citizen CATE website
Black text reading "Chasing the Eclipse 2024" on a white background are stacked in a gentle arc around a black crescent in the lower left.
Across a true color image of the United States and the northern parts of Mexico, we see an arcing band of shade. In this band of shade are seven white telescopes on tripods, indicating the teams of Citizen CATE volunteers who will be trained and equipped to capture imagery of the eclipse as it passes over their heads.
The band of telescope icons that runs from Mexico into Texas and all the way to northern Maine and Maritime Canada shows the “path of totality” for the April 8 2024 eclipse. This is the area from which people on Earth can witness a complete eclipse of the sun. Citizen CATE seeks volunteers along this path.
Credit: Citizen CATE project
The Moon completely blocks the Sun. Light is escaping around the edge of the Moon, giving it a thin bright white outline. A fainter, uneven white, pale blue, and pale orange smear spreads away from the Moon into the black of space that surrounds it.
The Citizen CATE 2024 project produced this false color image of the solar corona during the 2023 total solar eclipse from Exmouth, Western Australia. The image combines two crossed polarization angles, indicated by color. Prominences, loops and streamers are easily visible in this high-resolution image.
Credit: SwRI/Citizen CATE 2024/Dan Seaton