Name: Project Noah
Big Idea: Project Noah harnesses the power of mobile to let users contribute to real scientific data and research.
Why It's Working: Project Noah calls itself a "butterfly net for the 21st century," giving members of the connected generation a way to reconnect with nature on the platform where they're most comfortable — their smartphones. Its catalog of nature images aims to one day capture every living species on the planet.
Nature Deficit Disorder, the idea that children's behavioral patterns are changing because they are spending less time outside, was introduced in Richard Louv's 2005 book Last Child in the Woods. In short, screens replace the wonders of the natural world that used to provide children with hours of entertainment, leaving kids to wither indoors.
The team at Project Noah (short for "Networked Organisms and Habitats") thinks that spending time exploring nature and time attached to screens don't need to be mutually exclusive. The startup hopes to mobilize a new generation of nature lovers with a modern digital experience.
"Project Noah is what would have happened if Charles Darwin had created Foursquare," co-founder Yasser Ansari tells Mashable. "Anyone can be a citizen scientist and participate in real world scientific inquiry. We're measuring the pulse of mother nature."
Project Noah primarily comes to life as a mobile app, available for iOS and Android. The app is a tool for anyone — from an amateur nature lover to a professional scientist — to document the wildlife and plants around them. You can take photos, called "Spottings," add observations and tag your location. If you don't know what you've found, you can ask the Project Noah community for help identifying what you've Spotted. Project Noah contains a map of all Spottings made, so you can explore what other people have seen in your area — or across the globe.
The database hosts about 200,000 Spottings and almost half a million photos, shot in 215 countries and all seven continents. The Android and iOS apps together have been downloaded about 250,000 times.
Within the app, you can create and accept missions, such as photographing different varieties of orchids or "animal architecture," like beehives or beaver dams.
Similar to badges found within other social check-in apps, you can earn "Patches" for completing different tasks.
Project Noah recently launched a digital classroom for teachers, including special missions for the school environment. One middle school biology teacher is using the tool to challenge his students to document every living organism on their campus. For students or other users who are not smartphone owners, you can access the tool via a web browser.
Some noteworthy discoveries have already been made through Project Noah, such as the first known photograph of the Impatiens plant, spotted by Dipanshu Mitra, in Sikkim, India. The flower had previously only been captured through illustrations.
As the startup, which has seed funding from National Geographic, continues to gain traction, Ansari sees potential to print books of Spottings and Missions, create a presence in biology classes across the world and build the largest known database of nature observations.
"Tech has leveled the playing field, but we need to go beyond inspiring people. We need to give you tools," Ansari says. "Parents say, ''I forgot how much I loved this,' and kids say, 'I didn't even know this existed.'"
Series presented by GE
Image via Project Noah user Gerardo Aizpuru