Slashdot Mirror

Public Lab is probably the best known - https://publiclab.org/. Here's how they describe themselves: Public Lab is a community where you can learn how to investigate environmental concerns. Using inexpensive DIY techniques, we seek to change how people see the world in environmental, social, and political terms.
I wrote an article about the DIY science community last year that tells you a bit more about how they and other "community science" outfits got started. (If the site asks you to subscribe just clear your cache).

I know that you didn't read the k/s page but it really does help:

"We’ve based much of our work on the large amount of scientific literature available on fluorescence spectroscopy for oil identification. A selection of articles have been collected and summarized on this page -- and we welcome contributions to the list. "
http://publiclab.org/wiki/oil-...

Nice job throwing up a googled link to spit FUD when you don't know what you're talking about, tacokill. Spectrasensors.com sell laser absorbance spectroscopy systems operating in the mid-IR range, and don't sell UV fluorescence gear. I see somone before you left a comment detailing our real research [LIDAR, above], which you didn't look at, or you'd notice that we're building on 40 years research into laser fluorescence for field identification of oil. What we're doing was cutting-edge in the early '80's. now it isn't. We aren't trying to do anything new, except use cheap equipment. http://publiclab.org/notes/mat...

There've been open source spectrometers for smartphones and webcams on Thingiverse and PublicLab.org for a few years: http://thingiverse.com/thing:49934, http://thingiverse.com/thing:125428

http://publiclab.org/wiki/spectrometer

And a papercraft spectrometer for $10: http://publiclab.org/wiki/foldable-spec

The new project looks great -- I just hope the new project intends compatibility with the growing open/crowdsourced spectral library at http://spectralworkbench.org/ -- because the more data in there, the easier matching becomes.

Welcome to the open spectrometry movement!

There've been open source spectrometers for smartphones and webcams on Thingiverse and PublicLab.org for a few years: http://thingiverse.com/thing:49934, http://thingiverse.com/thing:125428

http://publiclab.org/wiki/spectrometer

And a papercraft spectrometer for $10: http://publiclab.org/wiki/foldable-spec

The new project looks great -- I just hope the new project intends compatibility with the growing open/crowdsourced spectral library at http://spectralworkbench.org/ -- because the more data in there, the easier matching becomes.

Welcome to the open spectrometry movement!

The change is to *replace* the IR filter with a notch filter that just removes the visible red, while leaving the near IR and green/blue light. The combination is interesting for detecting plants.

    http://publiclab.org/notes/cfastie/04-20-2013/superblue