How is a candidate signal presented?

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Message 1504406 - Posted: 15 Apr 2014, 15:48:33 UTC

Hello everyone,

I have a quick question about day-to-day operations of SETI and SETI@home. How is a candidate signal reported to the staff?

More specifically, once "the system" finds a candidate signal, is it reported via a printed report, an automatically-generated email, something else? And would such notification be a summary of many candidates, or would each candidate warrant its own initial report?

I realize that such a notification wouldn't mean a candidate signal was "the signal," just how the staff is initially notified that there's something of interest. How does HAL 9000 tell them? : )
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Josef W. Segur
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Message 1504453 - Posted: 15 Apr 2014, 20:28:43 UTC - in response to Message 1504406.  

See the answers in your previous How is a candidate signal first reported to staff scientists? thread.
                                                                   Joe
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Message 1504779 - Posted: 16 Apr 2014, 16:23:41 UTC

Let's try again.
SETI@Home is not looking for the single "Wow" signal, but is looking for a repeating signal from a single location in space. To do this, once we have done our first screening, the next stage of the project, which is a back office operation, runs through all the collected data and collates it all. This will present to the project scientists a list of potential interesting sources for the radio telescopes to go back to and dig harder, only once that digging has been finished will it be possible to say "We have a signal that is worthy of being decoded". Then the hard work begins - collect a big enough sample from the source (hours not seconds) and first demodulate it (what modulation technique has been employed?), then decrypt it (think about the problems of interpreting a foreign script without any idea of the syntax, the syntax employed and without the aid of a "Rosetta Stone").
Bob Smith
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Message 1504795 - Posted: 16 Apr 2014, 16:38:12 UTC

I understand the overall processes and concepts associated with SETI, but I'm not clear on how a scientist is actually notified that a signal of interest exists. I think there was some misunderstanding in an earlier post, so I'll restate the question as part of a hypothetical situation.

[ It's Monday morning. Ms. Scientist arrives at work. Over the weekend SETI@home systems have been crunching data, and three signals meet the criteria for review, with one signal rising above the others in interest. How does Ms. Scientist find out about the signal? Does she get a paper printout? Does she get an email? Is she notified in some other way? Does she receive three separate notifications or does she receive one that summarizes all three signals? ]

I've spent many hours online researching SETI and astronomy in general (although I don't claim to be an expert or even well-versed compared to those who claim radio astronomy as a vocation or avocation). I've searched the threads here, including those I've started, but haven't found anything about my what I'm seeking. I've done a fair amount of reading, specifically:

--Cosmic Company: The Search for Life in the Universe
--Confessions of an Alien Hunter: A Scientist's Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
--The Eerie Silence: Renewing Our Search for Alien Intelligence
--Lonely Planets: The Natural Philosophy of Alien Life
--First Contact: Scientific Breakthroughs in the Hunt for Life Beyond Earth
--A Thin Cosmic Rain: Particles from Outer Space

I haven't found that one small piece of information - how someone is actually notified that a signal should be reviewed. I know that Mr. Ehman reviewed a printout of the Wow! signal, and I know that ninety-some feet of printout was reviewed when pulsars were discovered in 1967. I understand the general parameters that constitute a such a signal, but I don't know what actually happens in the offices once the system flags something. I assume things have changed since the Wow! signal. Can anyone help?

Dave
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Message 1504797 - Posted: 16 Apr 2014, 16:40:03 UTC - in response to Message 1504779.  

Thank you Bob, much appreciated!

Dave
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Message 1504847 - Posted: 16 Apr 2014, 18:23:02 UTC

From the first cut we do to the second level done in the lab is an automated process, no human intervention.
From there on there is a degree of human intervention - automatic when huge amounts of data have to be dug through, and become more human as the pile gets smaller.
Bob Smith
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Message 1504848 - Posted: 16 Apr 2014, 18:26:02 UTC - in response to Message 1504847.  

Thanks Bob!
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Message boards : SETI@home Science : How is a candidate signal presented?


 
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