Got a cool idea for a research project, but need funding? Check out Petridish.org, which has just launched crowdfunded science and research projects. I think this is a really great idea that could open up funding for some amazing research ideas.

On Petridish.org, researchers post materials about themselves and their research, and the public can discover projects that are exciting to them. In exchange for contributing to the project, backers receive insider updates on the research, naming rights to new discoveries, and other exciting souvenirs from the work.

Here’s a list of projects: blog.petridish.org.

I especially like this one: Help us find the first exomoon (outside of the solar system). “Not only will the study of exomoons enhance our understanding of planets and solar systems, but because moons are potentially habitable, our project would advance the search for extraterrestrial life,” says the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics project description.

The goal: $10,000 for a small supercomputer working 24 hours a day to sift through the Kepler data.