Massive Radio Array to Hunt for Extraterrestrial Signals from Other Civilizations

The National Science Foundation’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) is joining the search for signals from other galactic civilizations. The VLA, one of the world’s most powerful radio telescope arrays, is collecting data that scientists will analyze for the type of emissions that only artificial transmitters make, signals that would betray the existence of a technically accomplished society. The VLA consists of 27 antennas spread over 23 miles of desert real estate and has been engaged in a project known as VLASS (Very Large Array Sky Survey), a radio reconnaissance of 80% of the sky since 2017. While these observations are being undertaken, a tap on the signal distribution network will shunt a copy of the data into a special receiver sporting very narrow (approximately one hertz wide) channels. Researchers expect that any signals from a deliberately constructed transmitter will contain such narrow-band components, and their discovery would indicate that the signal is not produced by nature but by an alien transmitter. The new processing system for SETI is dubbed “COSMIC” – the Commensal Open-Source Multimode Interferometer Cluster – and is spearheaded by the SETI Institute, in collaboration with the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and the Breakthrough Listen Initiative. COSMIC operates commensally, which means it works in the background using a copy of the data astronomers are taking for other scientific purposes. The range of frequencies to be monitored is unprecedented, and the tally of star systems examined will be approximately ten million. When combined with the exquisite sensitivity of the VLA, COSMIC will be approximately a thousand times more comprehensive than any previous SETI search.