Science hack event in Nairobi

An application using real event data from CMS has won “Best Science” prize in a public “Science Hack Day” held in Nairobi between 13th and 15th April 2012. Science Hack days bring together a wide range of enthusiastic members of the public to create something completely new using existing scientific systems or data.

The winning application visualized real CMS di-muon events from the 2011 LHC run, which are made public for use in various educational programmes, such as the IPPOG Masterclasses, Quarknet and I2U2. The application showed an animation of muons produced in CMS superimposed on a map of the world, showing where they would go if they were to continue without stopping (which they don't in reality).

Other prizes were awarded to Leah Atieno, a 15-year-old high-school student, for a voice-controlled walking robot and Denis Munene for a crowd-mapping platform to help promote the fight against malaria.

The Nairobi event, involving 240 developers, is part of broader series of Science Hack Day events. CMS data previously featured in another very successful event in San Francisco.