13 ms·
Possible Radio Emission from Exoplanet Detected
- mhh__ 6y agoNot LGM sadly
- shrimp_emoji 6y agoLGP
- WJW 6y agoFrom a Jupiter-like gas giant type exoplanet, which generate radio emissions through entirely natural processes just like the gas giants in our own solar system. The title is a tad more spectacular than the actual discovery.
- Koiwai 6y agoI'd like to suggest that "suggesting" is a better word here.
- a3n 6y agoActually I read the title exactly as what the article described. In fact I wasn't going to read it at all -- "meh" -- until I realized there was a small chance that it might be about something interesting rather than natural.
- leokennis 6y agoCame into the comment section expecting a cold shower. Was not disappointed.
- disown 6y agoNothing like the comment section to snap you back to reality.
- autocorr 6y agoI suppose... but often the top comment is wrong or mis-leading in some way: "the middle-brow dismissal" HN is famous for. I usually find the most enlightening commentary on HN a few replies down from the top comment where a true expert chimes in to show why the middle-brow dismissal is in fact incorrect and adds their own nuance to the conversation.
- kortilla 6y ago> "the middle-brow dismissal" HN is famous for. Famous amongst what group?
- autocorr 6y agoThe site guidelines and @dang suggest "shallow dismissal" is now the preferred term. Paul Graham, cofounder of YC explains in a comment, back when he still posted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4693920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4693920
- coolspot 6y agoI guess significance here is that if we can isolate radio signals from naturally-emitting planet, we potentially can isolate radio signals from artificially-emitting planet.
- wcoenen 6y agoI was going to reply that it might be difficult to match the power of something like Jupiter's radio signals. However, it turns out that Jupiter's decametric radio emissions are only about the equivalent of a megawatt antenna[1]. The US air force already has a radar with a peak power of 32 megawatts[2]. So with sufficient motivation, in principle we or an alien civilization could certainly send regular signals like that. [1] https://www.space.com/26419-jupiter-radio-waves-alien-life.html https://www.space.com/26419-jupiter-radio-waves-alien-life.h... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eglin_AFB_Site_C-6 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eglin_AFB_Site_C-6
- xenophonf 6y agoNot only could we send those kinds of signals, we already have done it using the Arecibo Telescope (RIP), which h̶a̶s̶ had EIRPs ranging from 200 megawatts to 22,000,000 megawatts depending on the transmission frequency. In 1974, we beamed a short message to the Messier 13 globular cluster with a transmission power of just under half a megawatt. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message
- formerly_proven 6y agoConverting the output of a narrow-beam transmitter to EIRP for comparison with radiation sources in the universe makes the assumption that the user of the transmitter knows where to point it.
- flobosg 6y agoThis comment left me wondering: What's the astronomy equivalent of “in mice”?
- checkyoursudo 6y agoGotta be something like "(but it's probably not aliens)", right?
- rob74 6y agoCould you use "non-biogenic" (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/biogenic https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/biogenic) for a thing like radio emissions?
- DaiPlusPlus 6y agoThat still suggests a _machine race_ could have sent it.
- cercatrova 6y agoWe could define intelligent life as being any of a sapient species, regardless of physical composition. That's helps do away with only carbon-based lifeforms.
- MichaelZuo 6y agoWhat would be the definition of sapience for a machine civilization?
- cercatrova 6y agoSame as for humans. Or a hive mind, or some other type.
- MichaelZuo 6y ago
- modzu 6y agoyes, what is novel here is that the exoplanet was detected using radio (in other words the discovery of the planet is what is significant, not the signal)
- ojnabieoot 6y agoThe title is in an odd spot where, on the face, it is completely anodyne, and not at all misleading or “clickbait.” Yet even sensible readers (like me!) see “radio” and “exoplanet” in the same sentence and think “ALIENS!” Very awkward spot for the science PR people writing this. It’s almost like it needs extra words to prevent people from adding “Possible (But Definitely Non-Alien) Radio Emission From Exoplanet (Which Cannot Support Life) Detected”
- chongli 6y agoIt’s a radio emission, not a radio transmission. That’s a key distinction that may be lost on a lay reader (or anyone not paying enough attention). Astronomers, amateur astronomers, and astronomy enthusiasts all tend to be aware of the fact that radio is just another part of the spectrum we can use to look at the universe. It’s a strange quirk of our culture that the word radio carries connotations of technology and thus connotes intelligence.
- solstice 6y ago> It’s a strange quirk of our culture that the word radio carries connotations of technology and thus connotes intelligence. Counterpoint: "radio wave fart from exoplanet detected". No connotation of intelligence IMO
- Apocryphon 6y agoThough, perhaps, of biology.
- 8bitsrule 6y agoNot quite as whack as the rash of headlines a while back referring to FRB as 'mysterious radio signals' from 'deep space'.
- standardUser 6y ago"Natural Radio Emission" seems to clarify things just fine.
- autocorr 6y agoThat's funny because as an astronomer the title is both very exciting and completely fair. We've known about long-wavelength radio emission from Jupiter for ages. Astronomers have been looking for the same thing in exoplanet systems probably since shortly after their discovery! But because they are so far away, the emission is faint and hard to detect. This is also very long wavelength radio (in the tens of megahertz) which is a difficult portion of the spectrum to work in. I suppose it is less spectacular if one makes the immediate connection "radio <-> techno-signature", but that's unwarranted and not a fault of the press release or the author, in my opinion. Jupiter's auroral emissions are mainly caused by volcano's on Io, so it's not unrealistic to think we can learn a lot about planetary mass objects (the moons) from observations like these.
- piracy1 6y agoComments like these are why I mostly only read the comments and headline.
- tantalor 6y agoIt's not aliens. It's never aliens.
- tpmx 6y agoExcept when it is aliens.
- bluehex 6y agoIs “signal” the correct word to use for naturally occurring radio bursts? I thought that word implied radio waves used to convey meaning.
- joshspankit 6y agoI’ve seen many stretch the term over the years, but many in the scientific community know it’s watered down enough to mean “something was emitted”
- thrill 6y agoSignal is the emission of interest, however it occurs. Noise is the other stuff. In common use though people mentally (and literally) drop the first word from "modulated signal" and seize upon signal. It's normal and writers should make an effort to use unmodulated or, probably better, natural in such descriptions. Emission isn't a bad word for this context, but it's still all encompassing and easy to mentally go the wrong direction when reading it.
- anonymfus 6y agoIs not the signal in question modulated by the motion of the source, as most signals in astronomy are?
- spenczar5 6y agoIt probably depends on the domain. For telescope people, a “signal” is anything other than noise and systematic error in your measurements. I’d speculate that this terminology came from telephony or radio communications - even the term “noise” is a giveaway. But it has migrated into astronomical language in a slightly different way.
- skocznymroczny 6y agoIt seems that we expect an alien civilization, if it exists, to follow a similar discovery path as we did. As such we listen for radio signals as a way of communication, because that's what we are doing. How likely is it for another civilization to follow the same path? Some of our breakthrough scientific advances happened by accident. What are the odds that we missed some big new technologies because we haven't happened upon the accident yet, even though it was right here all the time?
- rossdavidh 6y agoWhile your basic point stands, I have to point out that "wireless telegraphy", like many other inventions, was almost simultaneously invented on different sides of the Atlantic. There are many inventions which have American and European "inventors", because the news of one had not gotten across the Atlantic to the other before they invented it as well. Which suggests, that once an invention is possible, it is likely to be discovered, whether an accident is involved or not.
- ojnabieoot 6y agoI think this is getting the causality backwards: > As such we listen for radio signals as a way of communication, because that's what we are doing. It’s not because we expect aliens to be using radio communication or to follow the same path we did. It’s more because electromagnetic radiation is the only thing we can reasonably detect. If the aliens are communicating with gravity waves somehow, our sensors are probably not good enough to determine it. And if it’s some new physics we haven’t discovered, how would we even know what to look for? EM waves are really the only good option we have right now. That said, it is reasonable to assume that a technologically advanced civilization is using some fashion of electromagnetic devices, which therefore generate radio waves and could be detected. But I don’t think anyone is claiming that every technologically advanced civilization will have a detectable radio signal. It’s just the best tool we have.
- V-2 6y agoI can't see a good reason to assume an alien civilization would be industrial to begin with, whatever discovery path might lead one there. And I don't even mean they could be underwater creatures etc., which is also a possibility. Imagine Earth as we know it, inhabited by humans as we know them, but no fossil fuels (due to a different geological history), very few metal ores (making every metal as scarce as, say, platinum) - and you're stuck in an eternal stone age, possibly with more advanced social organization, but never getting beyond our ancient or medieval standards.
- SideburnsOfDoom 6y ago> The signal is from the Tau Boötes system, which contains a binary star and an exoplanet. So, different to the signals from Proxima Centauri? https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/dec/18/scientists-looking-for-aliens-investigate-radio-beam-from-nearby-star https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/dec/18/scientists-l...
- uhtred 6y agoCut to the chase, have we found aliens?
- logosmonkey 6y agoNo, we just found a new way to identify exo planets. Specifically large Jupiter like ones. Though feasibly the methodology could be used to identify other types of exo planets as well.
- person_of_color 6y agoWhat would be a radio frequency that couldn't possibly be natural?
- lsllc 6y agoPosted earlier today (theguardian.com version): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25464817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25464817 EDIT: Whoops, different radio emissions from a different place ! (but I'll leave this here because it's interesting anyway).
- xwdv 6y agoIt’s crazy that a radio emission could in theory and out of random luck be decoded into a coherent message, sent by no one. Very improbable though.
- papito 6y agoI am going to spoil this - it's not aliens. The gap between Occam's Razor explanations and THAT one is absolutely vast.
- biggestlou 6y agoI'm still looking for intelligent life on this planet!
- mckirk 6y agoJust remember that you're standing on a planet, that's evolving, and revolving at 900 miles an hour...
- dpcan 6y agoFirst, they really missed an opportunity to rick roll everyone with this article. (just kidding) But seriously, this went way over my head. If anyone can explain this to me like I'm 5, that would be awesome, I'm really interested in the subject but lack any real knowledge of the science.
- mikewarot 6y agoAs charged particles fly past a planet, sometimes they whistle, and make other low frequency signals... the Earth does it, with a coil and an audio amplifier, if you live in a rural enough area, you can hear them. These folks managed to pick up those types of signals, of a large planet orbiting a different star. I'm impressed that they were able to get that done.
- rhendz 6y agoOccam’s razor telling me this isn’t aliens :/
- kawfey 6y agoRadio JOVE is a STEM project that explores the radio emission of our own Jupiter, which is very similar to what has been detected in Tau Boötes. It's a very fun backyard amateur radioastronomy project that's great for kids. https://radiojove.gsfc.nasa.gov/ https://radiojove.gsfc.nasa.gov/
- freeflight 6y agoWow, that sent me down a short rabbit-hole of listening to Jupiter [0] [1] and other space radio emissions [2]. Makes me wonder if these sounds were ever remixed into music? Would certainly be an interesting concept along the lines of the German Space Night TV program. [0] https://youtu.be/slE2i0O0pDY https://youtu.be/slE2i0O0pDY [1] https://vimeo.com/173638603 https://vimeo.com/173638603 [2] https://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/features/halloween_sounds.html https://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/features/halloween_soun...
- croissants 6y agoThere is "The Space Project", a 2014 album of songs by various artists using "electromagnetic radiation fluctuations in the magnetosphere of the celestial bodies studied by the Voyager probes" [1]. I like Spiritualized's track on it [2]. [1] https://www.discogs.com/Various-The-Space-Project/release/5674332 https://www.discogs.com/Various-The-Space-Project/release/56... [2] https://youtu.be/GksfQN1_LsM https://youtu.be/GksfQN1_LsM
- hindsightbias 6y agoA few years back, a researcher told me they were looking at when known exoplanet systems like Trappist have pairs that line up/eclipse with Earth. They’d then look for interplanet comms/laser signals. Wonder how that’s turning out.
- dr_dshiv 6y agoThis is a first step for being able to distinguish natural from artificial radio emissions
- scioto 6y agoProbably reruns of I Love L'ucy
- lifeisstillgood 6y agoThere is a part of me who just thinks "pah - click bait". But then there is another, better, part of me that thinks it is so awesome we live in a time when people can build a machine that listens to "sounds" made deep in a giant planet in another fricking solar system. To the team who built that machine and shared it with us - thank you. nice one.
- PenisBanana 6y agoAlso, in addition to this being an emission not a transmission: > “There remains some uncertainty that the detected radio signal is from the planet. The need for follow-up observations is critical,” he said. So, in the terms used in everyday life, we do not (_c.f._ we do) have an indication that the signal is from the exoplanet.