Astronomers aim to CHAT WITH ALIENS
MESSAGE
Astronomers translate universal knowledge into waves and binary code.
MESSENGER
Future messages to aliens will be transmitted by laser.
DESTINATION
Signals are despatched towards planets that might harbour intelligent life.
Wow!, writes Jerry R. Ehman in red on the printed read-out in front of him. It is August 1977, and the astronomer is reading data from the Big Ear radio telescope, when unusual code among the endless rows of 1s, 2s, and 3s makes him stare. The ‘6EQUJ5’ sequence indicates radio waves 30 times more powerful than the usual background radiation of space. Ehman immediately draws a circle around the sequence, before writing the letters that subsequently become the signal’s name.
During the month following the ‘Wow!’ signal, astronomers aimed the Big Ear at the Sagittarius constellation, where the waves came from. But the 72-second radio signal was never repeated. Since then, astronomers have built better and more powerful telescopes, and have scanned a larger section of the sky, but to no avail. Ehman’s signal is still the only known potential attempt by aliens to contact us.
Now a new organisation, METI, is
