The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation ’s ( CSIRO ) Parkes Observatory radio scope in Australia is now part ofBreakthrough Listen , the largest research program looking for alien civilizations , it has been announce .
The Parkes observatory joins two American radio telescopes , Green Bank in West Virgina and the Automated Planet Finder in California , in improver toChina ’s FAST , the world tumid radio receiver telescope . Parkes will provide something completely new : a very sensitive pinna in the Southern Hemisphere .
Breakthrough Listen will have access to 25 percent of the skill metre available on the Parkes scope over the next five year . The project meditate stars for any radio set waves that are out of the ordinary and possibly an indicator of extraterrestrial intelligence , with no luck so far . But hunting forward-looking civilizations is only part of the deputation .
“ The detection system on Parkes will be simultaneously explore for naturally occurring phenomenon such as pulsars and fast radio burst , which are a gravid part of Parkes ’ present work , ” Dr Bailes , Breakthrough Listen ’s Australian science coordinator , enounce in astatement .
" The Australian science residential area welcomes the opportunity to portion out the Breakthrough Listen information for other ongoing research projects . "
On November 8 , the Parkes scope had its prescribed “ first light ” for Breakthrough Listen after 14 days of commission and trial observations . The choose fair game to lionize the beginning of cognitive process was no other thanProxima b , the recently attain exoplanet around the closest whizz to the Sun , Proxima Centauri .
Proxima b is an dry land - sized planet orbiting in the habitable geographical zone of its star , which is located just 4.2 light - years from us , a tiny distance in interstellar terms . The researchers were not expected to discover much , as the chances of finding biography on a single planet are incredibly small .
“ But once we knew there was a planet right next door , we had to ask the question , and it was a fitting first observation for Parkes , " say Dr Andrew Siemion , Director of Berkeley SETI Research Center and drawing card of the Breakthrough Listen science program , in the statement .
" To observe a civilization just 4.2 tripping age away would change everything . "
Parkes radio scope . 2005 Shaun Amy
The projection is financed by Russian net entrepreneur Yuri Milner and is part of theBreakthrough go-ahead , a serial of task that aim to serve humanity make “ the great bound to the stars . ” Milner was very pleased that the Parkes scope is now part of Breakthrough Listen , along with the others .
" These major instruments are the auricle of planet Earth , and now they are listening for signs of other civilisations , ” he say .
