{"id":441472,"date":"2025-11-23T11:10:46","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T16:10:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=441472"},"modified":"2025-11-24T12:16:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T17:16:12","slug":"technosignatures-hold-clues-to-advanced-extraterrestrial-life-441472","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/technosignatures-hold-clues-to-advanced-extraterrestrial-life-441472\/","title":{"rendered":"Are aliens real? Do aliens exist? Technosignatures may hold new clues"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-embed\">\n<div class=\"wp-embed-wrap\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Ever Wonder: Do Aliens Exist?\" width=\"1062\" height=\"597\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/P713hCgxWLw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>URochester astrophysicist Adam Frank searches for traces of advanced technology\u2014and, by extension, alien life\u2014on exoplanets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":912,"featured_media":684722,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[116],"tags":[16792,18662,41792,29242,16072,41012],"class_list":["post-441472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sci-tech","tag-adam-frank","tag-department-of-physics-and-astronomy","tag-ever-wonder","tag-exoplanets","tag-school-of-arts-and-sciences","tag-videos"],"acf":{"external":"","hide_featured_image":true,"related":"show_related","style":[527122,510542,322232],"content_modules":[{"acf_fc_layout":"text","anchor":"","css_class":"pt-0","title":"<h2>URochester astrophysicist Adam Frank searches for traces of advanced technology\u2014and, by extension, alien life\u2014on exoplanets.<\/h2>","content":"In 1995, a pair of scientists discovered a planet outside our solar system orbiting a solar-type star. Since that finding\u2014which won the scientists a portion of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nobelprize.org\/prizes\/physics\/2019\/summary\/\">2019 Nobel Prize in Physics<\/a>\u2014researchers have discovered more than 5,000 exoplanets, including some Earth-like planets that have the potential to harbor life. These are worlds in the \u201chabitable zone\u201d where liquid water could exist and may be the key to answering questions about whether life exists beyond Earth.\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_684752\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"250\"]<img class=\"wp-image-684752\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/inline-do-aliens-exist-are-aliens-real-dryeen.jpg\" alt=\"Illustration of a slug-like alien sporting a toga and gesturing with its arms.\" width=\"250\" height=\"344\" \/> Illustration by Michael Osadciw[\/caption]\r\n\r\nIn order to detect if planets are harboring life, however, scientists must first determine what features indicate that life is (or once was) present.\r\n\r\nOver the last decade, astronomers have expended great effort trying to find what traces of simple forms of life\u2014known as \u201cbiosignatures\u201d\u2014might exist elsewhere in the universe. But what if an alien planet hosted intelligent life that built a technological civilization? Could there be \u201ctechnosignatures\u201d that civilization on another world would create that could be seen from Earth? And, could these technosignatures be even easier to detect than biosignatures?\r\n<h3><strong>A NASA technosignature grant could <\/strong><strong>help answer the questions: Are aliens real? Do aliens exist?<\/strong><\/h3>\r\nIn 2020, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/news\/adam-frank\/\"><strong>Adam Frank<\/strong><\/a>, a professor of physics and astronomy at the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/\"><strong>University of Rochester<\/strong><\/a>, received a grant from NASA that has enabled him to probe these questions by studying technosignatures\u2014detectable signs of past or present technology used on other planets. The grant was the first NASA non-radio technosignature grant ever awarded, representing an exciting new direction in the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.seti.org\/\"><strong>search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI)<\/strong><\/a>. The grant has allowed Frank\u2014along with collaborators including<a href=\"https:\/\/science.psu.edu\/astro\/people\/jtw13\"><strong>Jason Wright<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0from Pennsylvania State University, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fit.edu\/faculty-profiles\/l\/lingam-manasvi\/\"><strong>Manasvi Lingam<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0from Florida Institute of Technology, and <a href=\"https:\/\/science.gsfc.nasa.gov\/sci\/bio\/ravikumar.kopparapu\"><strong>Ravi Kopparapu<\/strong><\/a> from the Goddard Space Flight Center\u2014to produce the first entries in an online technosignature library, a tool that future astronomers can use when scanning promising exoplanets for alien technology.\r\n\r\n\u201cSETI has always faced the challenge of figuring out where to look,\u201d Frank says. \u201cWhich stars do you point your telescope at and look for signals? Now we know where to look. We have thousands of exoplanets including planets in the habitable zone where life can form. The game has changed.\u201d\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_487582\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"1000\"]<img class=\"size-full wp-image-487582\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/fea-nasa-technosignature-frank-1.jpg\" alt=\"Several planets and star in space prompt researchers to answer the questions, are aliens real and do aliens exist.\" width=\"1000\" height=\"600\" \/> <strong>THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE\u2014WAY OUT THERE:<\/strong> Scientists have discovered more than 5,000 planets outside our solar system. astrophysicists including URochester's Adam Frank are seeking the physical and chemical signatures that would indicate advanced technology. (NASA\/JPL-Caltech)[\/caption]\r\n\r\nThe nature of the search for alien life has changed as well. A civilization, by nature, will need to find a way to produce energy, and, Frank says, \u201cthere are only so many forms of energy in the universe. Aliens are not magic.\u201d\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_684762\" align=\"alignleft\" width=\"250\"]<img class=\"wp-image-684762\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/inline-do-aliens-exist-are-aliens-real-sarand.jpg\" alt=\"Illustration of an alien with claw-like legs, insect-like body, and metallic sheen. \" width=\"250\" height=\"285\" \/> Illustration by Michael Osadciw.[\/caption]\r\n\r\nAlthough life may take many forms, it will always be based on the same physical and chemical principles that underlie the universe. The same connection holds for building a civilization; any technology that an alien civilization uses is going to be based on physics and chemistry. That means researchers can use what they\u2019ve learned in Earth-bound labs to guide their thinking about what may have happened elsewhere in the universe and to answer the question, do aliens exist\u2014and to begin looking for specific, measurable atmospheric and surface features rather than vague anomalies.\r\n\r\nThe information is gathered in an online library of technosignatures that astrophysicists will be able to use as a comparative tool when gathering data to answer the questions, do aliens exist and are aliens real.\r\n\r\n\u201cOur job is to say, \u2018this wavelength band is where you might see certain types of pollutants, this wavelength band is where you would see sunlight reflected off solar panels,\u2019\u201d Frank says. \u201cThis way astronomers observing a distant exoplanet will know where and what to look for if they\u2019re searching for technosignatures.\u201d\r\n<h3><strong>Signs from a distant world<\/strong><\/h3>\r\nWhile unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs) often capture popular imagination, Frank cautions that the most promising scientific path lies in the rigorous analysis of data from exoplanets, not in ambiguous sightings.\r\n\r\nThe search for life outside Earth recently took a promising leap with the study of a planet called K2-18b, about 124 light-years away from Earth. This \u201csub-Neptune\u201d planet is roughly eight times the mass of Earth and may have a thick hydrogen atmosphere overlying an ocean that is hundreds of miles deep.\r\n\r\n\u201cIt\u2019s an entirely new class of planet,\u201d Frank says. \u201cThere\u2019s no kind of planet like this in our solar system.\u201d\r\n<div class=\"pullquote\"><span style=\"font-size: 400%;\">\u201c<\/span>When we think about alien life, we should be prepared to be surprised\u2014and grossed out.\u201d<\/div>\r\nAstronomers using advanced telescopes detected tentative evidence of dimethyl sulfide in K2-18b\u2019s atmosphere, which is a chemical on Earth that is only produced by ocean plankton.\r\n\r\nIf this result were to hold up, \u201cthat would be very exciting,\u201d Frank says, \u201clike we are really in the game<strong>.\u201d<\/strong>\r\n\r\nStill, Frank emphasizes the need for caution and more data to confirm these findings.\r\n<h3><strong>The odds of life beyond Earth<\/strong><\/h3>\r\nAsked whether he believes aliens exist, Frank responds with a scientist\u2019s perspective:\r\n<blockquote>\u201cAs a scientist, I don\u2019t want to believe, I want to know. That\u2019s why I went into science. But my intuition is that the universe is big and the universe is old, and we are not the first time in the history of the universe that intelligent life has formed.\u201d<\/blockquote>\r\nHe suggests microbial life may be common across the cosmos, but intelligent civilizations could be rare and short-lived. For scientists to find another civilization, he says, \u201cwe have to overlap with them in time.\u201d If technological civilizations last only a short time, the galaxy could lack technological civilizations at any given moment.\r\n\r\nAs for what aliens might look like, Frank warns against expecting familiar human forms.\r\n\r\n\u201cThe idea of shoulders with a head and two eyes is evolution,\u201d he says. \u201cThere are too many accidents that led to our specific human form. When we think about alien life, we should be prepared to be surprised\u2014and grossed out.\u201d\r\n<h3><strong>The challenge of contact<\/strong><\/h3>\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_684772\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"250\"]<img class=\"wp-image-684772\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/inline-do-aliens-exist-are-aliens-real-maziancol.jpg\" alt=\"Illustration of a blob-like alien holding technology and advancing forward by stretching its gelatinous appendages.\" width=\"250\" height=\"308\" \/> Illustration by Michael Osadciw[\/caption]\r\n\r\nBut the challenge of contact remains daunting. Even if scientists detect intelligent life 124 light years away, the time for messages to travel\u2014in this case, 124 years each way\u2014means meaningful conversation between humans on Earth and beings on other planets is unlikely.\r\n\r\nInstead, Frank says, what is more likely is that we will observe other civilizations from afar and learn about their history and behavior through their technosignatures.\r\n\r\nThanks to advances in telescope technology, growing exoplanet catalogs, and focused research on biosignatures and technosignatures, humanity is entering an unprecedented era in the quest to answer whether we are alone in the universe, Frank says.\r\n<blockquote>\u201cWe are on the road, after 2,500 years of speculation, to actually scientifically having the answers to the most profound question you could ever ask: Is there life elsewhere in the universe?\u201d<\/blockquote>\r\nThe work is a continuation of Frank\u2019s previous research on theoretical astrophysics and SETI, including\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/astrobiology-alien-apocalypse-can-any-civilization-make-it-through-climate-change-322232\/\"><strong>developing a mathematical model<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0to illustrate how a technologically advanced population and its planet might develop or collapse together;\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/climate-change-aliens-261972\/\"><strong>classifying hypothetical \u201cexo-civilizations\u201d<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0based on their ability to harness energy; and a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/astrobiology-we-think-were-the-first-advanced-earthlings-but-how-do-we-really-know-311002\/\"><strong>thought experiment<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0asking if a previous, long-extinct technological civilization on Earth would still be detectable today.\r\n\r\n<hr \/>\r\n\r\n<em>This story was originally published on June 18, 2020. It has been updated and republished.<\/em>","background_color":"#ffffff","width":"width-medium"},{"acf_fc_layout":"card_grid","anchor":"","css_class":"pt-0","title":"","description":"","background_color":"#FFFFFF","width":"width-medium","columns":"1","cards":[{"card_title":"<p class=\"u-card-title\">Astrophysicist Adam Frank<\/p>","card_text":"A self-described \u201cevangelist of science,\u201d Frank regularly writes and speaks about subjects like intelligent life forms in the universe, high-energy-density physics, space exploration and missions, climate change, and more.\r\n<p class=\"card_cta\">Get to know URochester\u2019s own Carl Sagan<\/p>","card_background_color":"#00205b","card_hover_color":"#283faf","card_link":{"title":"","url":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/news\/adam-frank\/","target":""},"card_hover_arrow":"","card_image":654432,"card_image_size":"image_thumbnail","card_image_placement":"image_left","card_image_hover_state":"hover_fade","card_image_link":""}]}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Are aliens real? 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