At the risk of jeopardizing the professional reputation of a research team of Chinese and American scientists, it claims that so-called narrowband radio signals have been identified that may have originated from an alien extraterrestrial civilization. However, the claim is disputed by many, he writes futuristic Scientific portal.
Chinese experts say the unusual signal, captured by the world’s largest telescope, the China’s 500-meter-diameter Globe-Aperture Telescope (FAST), could be the first message to come from a plausible way for extraterrestrial life. The situation is somewhat different by the fact that the advertisement is not in a peer-reviewed magazine, but in South China Morning Newspaper However, researchers from the University of California, California (Berkeley) also spoke out to support this paper.
According to the study, the signal came from a planet eerily similar to our own, Kepler-438b, discovered in 2015. This planet is located 473 light-years away and orbits in the settlement region of a red dwarf star, which means that it may contain liquid water on its surface. The same research group acknowledges that it is possible that this is just radio interference, and not a message from a foreign civilization, but both options are being explored at the moment.
The signs were revealed as part of a project specifically looking for extraterrestrial civilizations. The program began in November 2020 and ended in September 2021. Based on the data, the signals are very unlikely to come from a natural source, they are more likely to be targeted or leak radio signals.
In the publication, the authors also wrote that the signal can be received for 20 minutes and come from a rotating orb due to frequency drift, i.e.
No source near the FAST telescope would interfere with the telescope’s observation.
Overall, the researchers caution for the time being and will continue to study the signal.
