I was wondering if there was anymore information on an unusual radio signal that was picked up by the Arecibo observatory in Febuary 2003. The radio signal's frequency was 1420 megahertz and was drifting between 8 and 37 hertz. Apparently this
mysterious signal was identified on separate occasions. Maybe I'm way behind on the news about this or something, but I'm very interested in any new developments on SHGb02+14a.

I recently found this old news after following another link that Byron Leigh Hatch supplied on a story from newscientist.com about looking for giant structures placed in orbit around nearby stars by alien civilisations.

> ...about looking for giant structures placed in orbit
> around nearby stars by alien civilisations.


Aren't they called Dyson Sphere...?

---

you have to look also here


Reports of SETI@home Extraterrestrial Signal Highly Exaggerated

...
At Arecibo the giant radio telescope still scans the sky, looking for an alien transmission. Around the world, millions are still crunching SETI@home data on their personal computers. The Search for extraterrestrial intelligence continues at full speed, but as of now there is no breakthrough.

Of course, this could change at any time… We promise to keep you posted.

and here is also somethink interesting

This confidence that an alien culture that could contact us would be more advanced than us is not unreasonable. If they have the technology to purposefully contact us, and this is something we cannot do, then their technology must be beyond ours. What is never explained, however, even though it is raised in the movie, is why we would expect this alien culture to be benevolent. It is just as likely, if not more so, that an alien civilization would be more of the variety depicted in the movie Independence Day. This hope reflects more on Carl Sagan's optimistic cosmic humanism that any scientific reality.

the original Message
Contact: A Eulogy to Carl Sagan

Greetings from Germany NRW
Ulli S@h Berkeley's Staff Friends Club m7 ©

> > ...about looking for giant structures placed in orbit
> > around nearby stars by alien civilisations.
>
>
> Aren't they called Dyson Sphere...?
>
>
>

Dyson Spheres are not what you have described, although I am not sure where your question arises from.

The sphere that bare the name of James Dyson are infact some thing constructed that totally encloses a star and it's inner planets. Dyson proposed that an Advanced civilisation would dismantle Gas Giants and use the material to construct massive , all encompassing spheres around their parent star. This would give them unlimited energy and a staggering amount of living space. He proposed that they could be detected as the sphere would block all radiation from the parent star but would be detectable in Infra-Red.

So far none have been found.

---

There was also an episode of STNG enitled Dyson's Sphere where they find Scotty's ship stranded on one and he had locked himself in a transporter loop to servive 75 years or so.

>about looking for giant structures placed in orbit around nearby stars by alien civilisations.

right now we can only detect very large planets at best but as our technology gets better I think it may be just 1 of many different ways that we will look for ET.

> > ...about looking for giant structures placed in orbit
> > around nearby stars by alien civilisations.
>
>
> Aren't they called Dyson Sphere...?
>

No, what I was referring to was an article from Byron about massive structures that would be used to send out communications.

> you have to look also here
>
>
> Reports of SETI@home Extraterrestrial Signal Highly Exaggerated
>
> ...
> At Arecibo the giant radio telescope still scans the sky, looking for an
> alien transmission. Around the world, millions are still crunching SETI@home
> data on their personal computers. The Search for extraterrestrial intelligence
> continues at full speed, but as of now there is no breakthrough.
>
> Of course, this could change at any time… We promise to keep you posted.
>
> and here is also somethink interesting
>
> This confidence that an alien culture that could contact us would be more
> advanced than us is not unreasonable. If they have the technology to
> purposefully contact us, and this is something we cannot do, then their
> technology must be beyond ours. What is never explained, however, even though
> it is raised in the movie, is why we would expect this alien culture to be
> benevolent. It is just as likely, if not more so, that an alien civilization
> would be more of the variety depicted in the movie Independence Day. This hope
> reflects more on Carl Sagan's optimistic cosmic humanism that any scientific
> reality.
>
> the original Message
> Contact: A Eulogy to Carl Sagan
>
> Greetings from Germany NRW
> Ulli [img]http://home.teleos-web.de/ubrinkschmidt/smile/xyxwave.gif [/img] height="20">
>

Thanks, I found more information about the candidate signal. The issue is also explained better here.

> There was also an episode of STNG enitled Dyson's Sphere where they find
> Scotty's ship stranded on one and he had locked himself in a transporter loop
> to servive 75 years or so.
>

That was a great episode. :)

> right now we can only detect very large planets at best but as our technology
> gets better I think it may be just 1 of many different ways that we will look
> for ET.
>

I agree. However, i'm not quite convinced that an alien civilization would find it economically feasible to intentionally build a planet-sized structure with the sole purpose of grabbing our attention (as the article suggests). My guess is that those resources would be best put into other forms of communication.

I don't dismiss the fact that as our technology improves, we may spot large scale alien constructs though, regardless of their intended purpose.

Dig

---

> There was also an episode of STNG enitled Dyson's Sphere where they find
> Scotty's ship stranded on one and he had locked himself in a transporter loop
> to servive 75 years or so.
>
> >about looking for giant structures placed in orbit around nearby stars by
> alien civilisations.
>
> right now we can only detect very large planets at best but as our technology
> gets better I think it may be just 1 of many different ways that we will look
> for ET.
>

I think you're right, that when the technology advances and larger space-based telescopes are made, then we probly would look for things like this. There's a nice discussion about structures like this at this thread.

It's been a long time since I've seen an STNG episode terrorhertz, so I don't remember that one.

I too have just read that New Scientist article, and came here to post pretty much exactly this thread!

I also read the article where the signal is not exactly dismissed, but certainly played down, and a couple of other documents concerning the signal. It struck me that a couple of very big assumptions had been made.

It is assumed that the a signal detected must be a deliberate attempt to make contact. Why should that be the case? We blast all manner of signals into space without them being a deliberate attempt to contact others. We certainly do not correct these signals for planetary rotation, or anything else, they leak off into space the way they go.

It also appears assumed that a signal would necessarily come from a planet. There are discussions concerning the rapid rotation rates etc. The signal may be simply a beacon on a rotating spacecraft for example.

I'm not suggesting this as a serious suggestion, but it did strike me that some big assumptions have been made in dismissing it.

---

Wave upon wave of demented avengers march cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream.

> I too have just read that New Scientist article, and came here to post pretty
> much exactly this thread!
>
> I also read the article where the signal is not exactly dismissed, but
> certainly played down, and a couple of other documents concerning the signal.
> It struck me that a couple of very big assumptions had been made.
>
> It is assumed that the a signal detected must be a deliberate attempt to make
> contact. Why should that be the case? We blast all manner of signals into
> space without them being a deliberate attempt to contact others. We certainly
> do not correct these signals for planetary rotation, or anything else, they
> leak off into space the way they go.
>
> It also appears assumed that a signal would necessarily come from a planet.
> There are discussions concerning the rapid rotation rates etc. The signal may
> be simply a beacon on a rotating spacecraft for example.
>
> I'm not suggesting this as a serious suggestion, but it did strike me that
> some big assumptions have been made in dismissing it.
>

Maybe some signals are like you said, not deliberately sent to us at all, and the SETI people are carefull not to comment on them. If they were to be wrong about even one signal, than scientists might use that to discredit them.

But what about some of those weaker signals that SETI gets? Do you think that SETI is quietly optimistic about some of them but are just cautious not to comment? [edit] Welcome to the thread adrianxw. [/edit]

I think that some signals have been found but many are not 100% sure what they are so they will dissmiss them rather than be made fools of.For all we know some signals we write off as natural could indeed be unnatural.I personally find it hard to believe that we are the only intelligent life in the universe it seems alot of people assume that they will act as we would by colonizing the galaxy or conquering other worlds we really have no Idea the motivation or thoughts of another civilization.Maybe there are not thousands of advanced life forms in our galaxy but I am confidednt there are at least a few other than Us.Only time will tell hopefully in our life time we will find out something.

---

I agree. However, i'm not quite convinced that an alien civilization would find it economically feasible to intentionally build a planet-sized structure with the sole purpose of grabbing our attention (as the article suggests)...

Hopefully *they* will only try to communicate with us.. If any alien civilization is advanced enough as to build planetoids or devices of such size, would they only use them as comm. devices? Hopefully... However, remember SW's Death Star..

But returning to the so-called mysterious signal, if I understood correctly, the signal varies in frecuency right? So, why is it so 'unbelievable' that it is unnatural? What if *they* don't know how technologically advanced we are, nor they now in which radio-frecuency we are conducting our search (nor even know if we are conducting a search). As far as I know, we do our search based at one particular frecuency (something to do with Hydrogen, right?), and even if this frecuency is the right one, how would other civilizations know that we know that's the correct one? Couldn't they assume we don't know that, and thus broadcast a "chirping beacon", or something of that sort? I don't know if I made myself clear, and please, enlighten me and others about the reason(s) why we conduct a search at that precise frecuency.

Megaman

---

I found this information to answer the hydrogen question.From this website. http://www.bigear.org/seti.htm


Even if we believe that there may be other civilizations, in which direction should we look and, if we use radio, on what wavelength (or frequency) should we listen? Let us answer the last part of this question now.

The most abundant element in the universe is hydrogen (H). It emits a natural radio signal, called the hydrogen line, at a wavelength of 21 centimeters (or frequency of 1420 megahertz). An advanced extra-terrestrial civilization would certainly be aware of this hydrogen radiation and if they chose to attract attention to themselves with a beacon signal they might choose to use this wavelength or one close to it. Also 21 centimeters is near a minimum of the background noise from the galaxy (and beyond) and is relatively free of absorption by the interstellar medium and by our atmosphere and the probable atmosphere of other planets (see Sky Noise Diagram). Therefore, a beacon should be detectable at a greater distance at 21 centimeters or thereabouts. This is the general line of reasoning used by Cocconi and Morrison in 1959 (see lead article of this issue).

There is also natural emission from the hydroxyl (OH) radical at 18 centimeters. Now if you combine hydrogen (H) with the hydroxyl radical (OH) you get water (H2O), so the wavelength region between 18 and 21 centimeters is often referred to as the "waterhole", in further allusion to the fact that galactic civilizations might (like radio amateurs) gather around this "waterhole" to chat like different species of animals gather around an African waterhole to drink.

Also I read somewhere that by international agreement no one broadcasts on this frequency so its free and clear from earth noise.

---

Thanks for the info, I had a really vague idea on why the search was done on that particular frecuency. Well, thank you and nice crunching!

---