io9
If you've ever seen the movie Contact, you'll know the alien-hunter stereotype: quirky, visionary loners who sit up all night listening to static, hoping for the signal that will change the world. That's probably not far off from real life, except that SETI (that's Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) scientists are getting creative. Here at the Astrobiology Science Conference, 2008, they're presenting new ways of looking for little green men, including watching for signs of alien lasers, infrared signals, and even gravity waves.
SETI scientists have been looking for alien lasers for years now — part of the Optical SETI programs several universities and observatories across the country.
Those projects are still going full-bore, but scientists are hoping to increase their chances of success by building a detector that will look for near-infrared lasers, too. Just on the lower edge of the optical range of electromagnetic wavelengths, Andrew Howard and colleagues from UC Berkeley figure there's no good reason aliens wouldn't build a near-IR laser. And if they did, they'd obviously use it to broadcast complex signals to Earth containing detailed plans on how to build a device for interstellar travel.
Maybe that's getting a bit ahead of ourselves, but just in case, we'd better look for intelligent signals broadcast through gravity waves, too. These still-theoretical ripples in space-time are being tested for by the LiGO (Laser interferometry Gravitational wave Observatory) detector, mostly as a way to test astronomical theories. At least one researcher, Peter Hahn believes we should start analyzing the data for signs of ET, too.
Comments
My but that picture brings back memories! Never a more lovely sight than the VLA on a sunny day, especially when the dishes begin to dance.
The lack of results from SETI nee OZMA has always depressed me, don't want the Fermi Paradox to be true. The idea of looking for other possible communication types makes a lot of sense-- us skiffy types have been postulating about gravity wave tech (Whatever the hell that is) for years. Who knows, They might be talking amongst themselves by ansible--or superstrings and a pair of really big paper cups.
An alien race sending lasers probably wouldn't be detectable on Earth. They would send direct laser lines. Also, they may still be in their solar system. Plus, the galaxy is a large place and we have only been looking for a short time in the grand scheme. I don't think that no results now is bad, maybe in a couple hundred years or so, though.
We've searched a tiny array of possible wavelengths for a very short period of time. The cosmos operates on scales of tens of millions of years at the least - I don't think it's terribly surprising that we haven't come across a recognizable form of intelligent life yet. I'll start wondering where it is when we've actually searched a good portion of the galaxy.
(Of course this also assumes that they WANT to be found. They could easily have some protocol a la the Prime Directive, and are deliberately blocking out ability to hear them.)
I would like to speak to you about the important role of the SETI Institute and of the Planetary Society, spreading the message of science to ordinary people.
I participated in a project, The Phoenix Project, that produced a dvd, which is flying to Mars right now, a collection of works, pictures and sounds about and from Mars.
Wouldn`t it be interesting if you talkeed about it? There`s so much to say.
[poucaeaterra.blogspot.com]
[www.planetary.org]
[www.planetary.org]
LIGO (funded by the National Science Foundation), as well as other worldwide gravitational wave projects, is actively engaged in a scientific endeavor to search for the gravitational waves predicted by Einstein's general theory of relativity. We look for gravitational
waves from a variety of astrophysical sources, such as coalescing binary neutron stars and black holes. The nature of the gravitational waves is such that a detectable gravitational wave coming from a galactic or extra-galactic source requires an immense amount of energy (over one trillion, trillion gigatons of TNT). It is highly unlikely that detectable gravitational wave amplitudes could be produced from anything other than massive and large scale astrophysical processes.
Marco Cavaglia
University of Mississippi
LIGO Scientific Collaboration
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