Key Takeaways:
- Extensive cosmic survey with Murchison Widefield Array finds no evidence of alien technology among over 10 million stars.
- Technosignatures hunt in Vela constellation region proves inconclusive after 17-hour monitoring by Australian observatory.
- Search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) faces challenge as assumptions about alien technology come into question.
- Breakthrough research narrows down potential Milky Way star systems hosting detectable alien civilizations to less than 0.04%.
An Australian observatory meticulously scrutinized an expansive expanse of the celestial sphere for indications of sentient existence. Alas, it emerged fruitless.
Should the notion of “stumble upon an extraterrestrial society” be present in your 2020 roster of extraordinary events, it appears you shall need to exercise patience. A novel, extensive inquiry into the cosmos delved into its shadowy thickets, surveying in excess of 10 million celestial bodies, yet regrettably yielded no traces of alien civilizations.
The research, disclosed in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia on the commencement of the week, delineates a quest for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) employing the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA), an assemblage of 4096 antennas entrenched in the crimson earth of Western Australia designed for intercepting radio signals from the cosmos. “These are diminutive arachnid-like antennas positioned on the terrestrial surface,” elucidates Chenoa Tremblay, co-author of the study and an astrophysicist affiliated with CSIRO, a scientific research entity under the purview of the Australian government.
Tremblay and her colleague, Stephen Tingay, from the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research, utilized the MWA to eavesdrop on “technosignatures,” or telltale traces of extraterrestrial technology, within a sector of the celestial sphere encompassing the Vela constellation. Tremblay expounds that this sector holds scientific intrigue owing to the abundance of stars that have undergone supernova explosions, fostering propitious environments for stellar genesis. The pursuit of alien lifeforms thus “rides piggyback” on other inquiries scrutinizing this locale to unravel the lifecycle of stars.
But how does one discern a radio signal from outer space emanating from an alien culture? “Imagine a vehicle alarm triggered by inadvertently leaving your headlights on, where a sequence of evenly spaced ‘ping’ sounds ensues,” Tremblay illustrates. The investigation quests for a recurrent ping that could potentially be indicative of emissions from a celestial body or “a meticulously engineered signal.”
Following a 17-hour auditory vigil over the Vela region, no enigmatic signals were discerned. Despite capturing data from over 10.3 million astral entities, including the detection of six documented exoplanets (with the likelihood of numerous others existing in the vicinity), the team acknowledges that the endeavor resembled a quest within an ocean, yet with the examination confined to “a volume of liquid akin to a commodious backyard swimming pool.”
Yet, there exists another significant caveat.
“Seeking technosignatures presupposes that the civilization possesses technology akin to our own,” Tremblay asserts.
Intelligent lifeforms may not have evolved the capacity to communicate via radio transmissions, she posits. Part of her research also investigates the origins of rudimentary molecules essential for life and methods to potentially detect them. If signals of these molecules can be identified, it might connote extraterrestrial life — albeit not of the variety depicted in Hollywood blockbusters.
A comprehensive scrutiny of the Galactic Center may be on the horizon, a celestial precinct previously under scrutiny by the team. As the quest for life progresses concurrently with other scientific ventures, Tremblay intimates that “our trajectory shall hinge upon the trajectory of ancillary scientific pursuits.”
This bodes well for the SETI endeavor. It may resemble a quest for a solitary leaf within a somber woodland, yet through the confluence of this undertaking with other scientific and astronomical investigations, the mysteries of the cosmos are gradually unveiled to us.
Researchers unveiled a “significant breakthrough” that could refine the pursuit of intelligent life within our galactic abode, the Milky Way. Astronomers, hailing from the University of Manchester and collaborating within the Breakthrough Listen consortium, reevaluated data and imposed additional constraints on radio transmissions originating from within the Milky Way. These fresh parameters facilitate a more precise delineation of regions worthy of auditory scrutiny: The revised data suggests that less than 0.04% of stellar systems harbor the potential to sustain an alien civilization employing technology discernible to us.
