Expert Exchange: Training on remote sensing techniques for the study of planetary science, La Paz, Bolivia

Europlanet 2024 RI’s Expert Exchange Programme aims to support the planetary community to share expertise and best practice, and to prepare new facilities and services. The programme provides funding for short visits (up to one week).

Javier Eduardo Suarez Valencia of Constructor University, Germany, visited Universidad Mayor de San Andrés in La Paz, Bolivia, from 21 July 21 to 4 August 2023.

The main objective of activity was to train the scientific community of the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, the biggest university of Bolivia, on remote sensing techniques to study planetary surfaces. This was the first activity of its kind done in Bolivia, an under-represented country in the field of space sciences, but one with great potential.

We received a positive response from the different sectors of the academic community, a total of twenty-eight people applied for the training, of which twenty-two were selected due to space limitations. Of the total attendees, five were personnel of the Planetario Max Schreier, six were professionals, and eleven were undergraduate students from different universities. The participants came from diverse areas, mainly geology, physics, chemistry and astronomy, whit some participants from agronomical sciences. Since most of the attendees were young professionals and students, we can consider as a success the main objective of the Planetario Max Schreier, to attract the new generation of Bolivian scientist to space sciences, the host institution is interested in continuing research in the area, as well as supporting the students that want to continue a professional path in this direction.

The activity was madein a workshop-like style, where the participants actively worked in the understanding, processing, and interpretation of planetary data. This methodology was optimal since the bottleneck of planetary sciences training is usually not related with data acquisition or availability, but more with the techniques and computational power to develop it. During the activity, the participants learnt about the basic notions of planetary geology, space missions, data download and management, and cartography. Furthermore, thanks to the five days of the course, the participants had enough time to apply modern techniques with real data on the Moon and Mars. The work made followed the same steps that a professional planetary geologist would do, culminating with the creation of a geomorphological map of a region on the Moon or Mars, analysed from scratch.

Overall, the activity was a great introduction for those interested in the subject and would ease the path for anyone that wants to continue in the field. This was also a great opportunity to test two tools developed at Constructor University, and one developed at the University of Padova under the scope of the Europlanet GMAP initiative.

• The first one is a docker tool for processing planetary data, which is a robust, easy-to-install package that comprises all the necessary software to work with planetary information. This proved to be useful, as the students were able to follow the workflow in their own laptops without worrying about OS differences and complex installation processes.
• The second one is the Jupyterhub GMAP platform, a web service that serves a similar objective as the docker tool, but without any installation and that needs only a stable internet connection. This tool is still under development, so this was a good test to measure its limitations and margins of improvement.

Lastly, we used the Mappy tool, a QGIS plugin developed in the University of Padova. This mapping-assisting tool have been tested several times, so this was an opportunity to spread its use among Bolivian scientists. Furthermore, we applied all the mapping guidelines and workflows developed by GMAP during the last years, again spreading its use to a larger user base.

Lastly, this was a great scenario to engage the Bolivian scientific community in Europlanet activities, the participants and the host institution were not aware of the multiple opportunities that Europlanet has. They were particularly interested in the mobility and training programs supported by the institution. To continue their involvement with Europlanet, they were all invited to upcoming Europlanet activities, such as the 1st Europlanet Latin American Planetary Science Workshop, to be held at the end of October in Buenos Aires, and the Winter School 2024, which will be fully virtual and open to everyone. We consider the exchange as a success, and we expect the Planetario Max Schreier and the Bolivian community to remain in contact with the Europlanet RI.

Expert Exchange Objectives covered by this visit: Training, Early Career Support.

Find out more about the Europlanet Expert Exchange Programme.