8 ms·

Breakthrough Listen observations of HD 164595

• mmastrac 10y ago
  From the PDF linked: "If the transient claimed by Bursov et al. (2016) originates from beyond the Earth, then, given what we currently know of the parameters of the RATAN search, such events ought to be common. The fact that they are not frequently seen in continuum imaging surveys suggests that the RATAN transient is likely due to instrumental interference or to some other artifact of human technology. While absence of evidence for extraterrestrial intelligence is by no means evidence of absence, our GBT observations did not detect ongoing emission from the direction of HD 164595..."
• devy 10y ago
  "There are other possibilities for a wide-band signal such as this, and they’re caused by natural sources (or even terrestrial interference)."[1] And "the signal is in a military frequency band, and that it could have been a satellite downlink, implying that some such systems may be kept secret and therefore would be unknown to SETI scientists." [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_164595 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_164595
  • dogma1138 10y ago
    If it was military and it was a downlink signal you could be able to decode it to some extent they are still using pretty standard protocols. 11Ghz is in the Ku Band, it's not uncommon in civilian use for both terrestrial and non-terrestrial transmissions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ku_band https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ku_band But yeah it certainly looks like equipment malfunction or maybe a rogue signal.
• mvf0 10y ago
  "The overall parameters (area surveyed, sensitivity, etc.) of the RATAN search are not reported by Bursov et al. ..." I find this incredible. They rushed to get credit for an ET candidate but didn't even bother to mention the details needed for others to be able to verify. Great work by the Berkeley people. Skepticism is healthy and vital to science.