The cryptic signal repeats every 16 days. A Harvard researcher said the signal may have 'artificial origins'.
Earlier this month, Canadian researchers announced that they had detected a powerful radio signal emanating from a distant galaxy and repeating every 16 days.
Avi Loeb, head of the Department of Astronomy at Harvard University, said this week that he believed the signals were coming from an alien civilization.
To be clear, Loeb also acknowledged that the signals – 'fast radio bursts' or FRBs – could be generated by young neutron stars called magnetars, or another as yet undiscovered natural phenomenon.
“But at the moment we do not have an explanation that clearly indicates the nature of the radio signal,” he wrote. 'Thus, all possibilities should be considered, including those of artificial origin.'
One particular possibility, he said, is an extraterrestrial civilization using a beam of energy to propel a cargo through space, and that Canadian researchers are picking up radiation emanating from it.
However, Loeb noted that he had previously explored the concept in 2017 and found that the energy required to move a load using energy beams would be overwhelming. In fact, he said, such a beam would require as much energy as all the sunlight falling on the Earth.
“This will require an incredible engineering project, far more advanced than we have on Earth,” he wrote. “So the main technological challenge is the enormous power that a radio transmitter has to carry.”
Loeb nonetheless thinks it might be worth considering seriously. He also noted that different radio signals can be caused by different phenomena.
In 2018, for example, he suggested that the interstellar object Oumuama could be an alien probe.
“An advanced technological civilization,” he said then. “Suppose you took a cell phone and showed it to a caveman. A caveman would say it is a good stone. The caveman is used to stones. So now imagine that this object – Oumuama – is a telephone and we are the people from the caves. '
