“A beacon in the galaxy”: scientists have a message for extraterrestrials

In 1974, humanity attempted, for the very first time, to make contact with a hypothetical advanced extraterrestrial civilization housed on the side of the star cluster. M13. Via a message radio sent from Arecibo telescope (Porto Rico). That was almost 50 years ago now. Since the astronomers discovered more than 5,000 exoplanets. And thus confirmed the idea that an evolved form of life could have developed elsewhere in theUniverse.

This is why a international team of researchers propose today to try our luck again. To send a new message to the stars. A much more elaborate message than that ofArecibo. The objective of which would be to provide as much information as possible about our company and thespecies human. As condensed as possible. This is the ambition of the project ” Beacons in the Galaxy » (BITG) – understand “a beacon in the galaxy ».

Let us remember that the Arecibo message is not the only one that humanity has sent with the intention ofaliens. Each time, two crucial questions arose. The bottom one. And that of form. Regarding the latter, we forget our human languages. Scientists have often opted for the bitmap. One way to exploit the binary code – probably the most rudimentary form of math – to create rasterized images.

The trouble is that already when Frank Drake, an American astronomer pioneer in the search for intelligent extraterrestrial civilizations, designed a prototype of the Arecibo message in this way, the colleagues to whom he sent it failed to decipher it. Nobel prize-winning colleagues, however. And then, are we really certain that the targeted extraterrestrials will be able, physically, to see the images thus coded? If so, won’t the human culture that sticks to our representation of objects blur the message?

Questions of substance and form

Today, researchers plan to base their message on a “alphabet” bitmap created almost 20 years ago by physicists. In practice, they first intend to send a prime number, to signify that the message to follow is indeed artificial. Then, using the“alphabet” bitmap, the message would introduce our base 10 number system and a few notions of mathematics. Then, the message would use the spin-flip transition of theatom ofhydrogen – a kind of universal time unit – to explain the notion of time and mark the moment when the message was sent from Earth. To also introduce periodic table elements. And even revealing the structure and the chemistry of our DNA and amino acids.

The end of the message counts on the fact that the extraterrestrials will be able to understand our drawings. There is a sketch of a man and a woman – both raising their hands in greeting – a map of the Earth’s surface and its atmosphere as well as a diagram of our Solar system. There is also the frequency radio than the alien must use to respond to the message and the coordinates of our Solar System in the Milky Way relative to the location of globular clusters thought to be familiar to an extraterrestrial, regardless of its position in our galaxy.

It remains to find the instrument that could send this message. The Arecibo radio telescope is out of the race. It collapsed in December 2020. So scientists are eyeing an instrument located in China, the Fast radio telescope – for Five-Hundred-Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope. But for now, he is only able to listen to the stars. Not talking to them…

Once the amenities – “not insignificant” – facts, we will have to wait for the right moment. Between March and October, according to the researchers. When our Planet is at a 90° angle between the Sun and its target, a dense ring of stars near the center of the Milky Wayto some 13,000 light years from U.S. What minimize the risk that the message is lost in the background noise emitted by our Star. And despite this, you will have understood, we would then have to wait thousands of years before we could even hope for an answer.

A message to extraterrestrials, good or bad idea?

All this if we really decide to take action once again. Some talk about wasting time. Among billions of targets, how to choose the right one? How do you know if it’s the right time? And others even fear that the message may fall on the ears of hostile civilizations. “Meeting an advanced civilization could be like Native Americans meeting Columbus. It didn’t go so well.”threw stephen hawking a few years ago already.

To those who agreed with the opinion of the famous physicist, the team that designed this new message replied that we should perhaps try to overcome our fears. She also replies that a malevolent extraterrestrial civilization capable of coming to us would not need to wait for a signal from us. It would probably be able to detect evidence of life in the chemical signatures of our atmosphere. Or the electromagnetic radiation that has been leaking from our radios, televisions and radar systems for a good century.

And it is ultimately the debate that this international team of researchers wishes to reopen. “To invite all of Earth’s inhabitants to participate in this fundamental discussion. Encourage people to think about it. » If only because the need to communicate is part of our Genoa. Or because if we were to, one day soon, embark on the interstellar travelwe might be happy to take advantage of the help of neighboring civilizations.

30 years ago: first message to possible extraterrestrials

Thirty years ago, a few scientists decided to send a radio message for the first time to possible technological extraterrestrial civilizations capable of picking up these signals. To date no response. Moreover, the scientists did not really expect this message to be picked up by anyone. The real purpose of the message was to demonstrate the very great power of this telescope then recently commissioned and capable of sending information into deep space.

Article of Remy Decourt published on 01/12/2004

This message was sent by the American radio telescope Arecibo (305 m) located in Puerto Rico, in a natural depression, on November 16, 1974. It contained summary information on humanity. The representation of the fundamental chemical components of life, the formula of DNA, a simple diagram of the Solar System, a stylized image of a human being and a representation of the radio telescope.

This message, however, caused a small controversy. Some people criticized this initiative because they felt it could be dangerous to reveal yourself to potentially hostile extraterrestrials. These people don’t have too much to worry about. Indeed, the chances of this message being detected from another world are extremely low. It was sent only once, over a period of three minutes and in the direction of the globular cluster M 13 (300,000 stars) in the constellation of Hercules. Located more than 25,000 light-years from us, M13 is so distant that theepisode has covered, to this day, only one thousandth of the distance which separates us from it.

However, the center of the globular cluster will not be present when the signal reaches its destination. Indeed, M13 is moving, driven by the rotation of our Galaxy, and is slowly moving away from its current position. But anyone in the cluster could still detect it with a radio telescope similar in size to Arecibo’s. It would still appear 10 million times more intense than the radio signal naturally released by the Sun.

Note: the NASA engraved on a disc a message placed on the Pioneer 10 probe, launched in March 1972, and which is now more than 12 billion kilometers from Earth. In the meantime, scientists also used the Arecibo telescope to try to receive signals from a possible intelligence extraterrestrial.
Several projects with this aim have followed one another. Currently, Internet users around the world can participate in this research by helping scientists to process, via their computerthe large amount of data received and which the Arecibo computers can no longer examine on their own (project SETI).