Harvard Scientists Theorize That Fast Radio Bursts Come From Alien Space Travel

[Garrison L. Hilliard]

Could these mysterious flashes of radio waves come from a planet-sized
device to power alien spacecraft?

By Jay Bennett
Mar 9, 2017

Fast radio bursts (FRB) are perhaps the most mysterious phenomena we
observe in the cosmos. Earlier this year, astronomers announced they
had pinpointed an FRB for the first time in a dwarf galaxy that sits
three billion light-years away. These intense blasts of radio waves
last only 1 to 5 milliseconds, and they have perplexed astronomers
since the first one was discovered in 2007.

The leading theories suggest that FRBs come from incredibly volatile
cosmic events, such as material being ejected from supermassive black
holes, the explosions of superluminous supernovae, or rotating
magnetars that lash surrounding material with their immense magnetic
fields. But researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for
Astrophysics (CfA) have proposed a much more enticing theory. What if
FRBs aren't natural phenomena at all, but rather come from a massive
artificial structure used to power alien spacecraft?

"Fast radio bursts are exceedingly bright given their short duration
and origin at great distances, and we haven't identified a possible
natural source with any confidence," said Harvard professor Avi Loeb
in a press release. "An artificial origin is worth contemplating and
checking."

The idea is that FRBs come from an immense alien power plant that is
used to propel ships using light sails. A powerful beam of light can
propel a reflective surface in the vacuum of space, which is the basis
for light sail technology. Current human light sail experiments use
light from the sun, but scientists are also working to develop a
worldwide system of lasers that could propel small nanoprobes to about
20 percent the speed of light. Such technology, called photonic
propulsion, could send a probe to Alpha Centauri, the closet star
system to us, in roughly 20 years.


It's possible that a more advanced alien species uses photonic
propulsion to power much larger spaceships. Loeb and fellow Harvard
researcher Manasvi Lingam found that if an object twice the size of
the Earth were harnessing solar power and converting the energy into a
laser beam to propel spacecraft, then the radio emissions from it
would be detectable even across billions of light-years. Such a
planet-sized power system would be capable of accelerating a spaceship
weighing a million tons, which is about 20 times bigger than the
biggest cruise ships.

"That's big enough to carry living passengers across interstellar or
even intergalactic distances," says Lingam.

The team's findings are outlined in a paper titled, "Fast Radio Bursts
from Extragalactic Light Sails," which has been accepted for
publication in the Astrophysical Journal Letters. To accelerate a
spaceship's light sail, the device would need to constantly aim its
beams of light at the craft. On Earth, we would see this from time to
time as a quick flash of high intensity radio waves rather than a
sustained signal because the movement of distant galaxies and planets
means the laser would only line up with our planet for a split second.

The fast radio burst that we located earlier this year actually was
detected nine times over the course of six months, which, if the
signal is coming from an alien power plant, could be an indication
that the device lines up with us regularly, or we could be seeing the
planet-sized laser system being switched on and off.

Of course, this is all highly speculative theory. The new study simply
outlines the fact that it is possible that FRBs are from an alien
propulsion system according to our current laws of physics. Our
species is nowhere near achieving such advanced technology, but
perhaps a more advanced race has unlocked large-scale interstellar
travel.

Loeb was asked whether he really believes FRBs come from an advanced
alien civilization, to which he responded: "Science isn't a matter of
belief, it's a matter of evidence. Deciding what's likely ahead of
time limits the possibilities. It's worth putting ideas out there and
letting the data be the judge."

Source: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a25609/fast-radio-bursts-alien-space-travel/