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Scientists have created a Star-Trek-like detector that can spot aliens traveling at warp speed.
“To boldly go where no man has gone before.” These are the famous words uttered by Captain James T. Kirk, a fictional character from the popular 1960s cult franchise. Taking inspiration from “Star Trek,” scientists have created a detector that is capable of sounding an alarm if fellow otherworldly travelers were to make an entrance into our space.
The research team of the study on the pre-print server arXiv analyzed the device’s capabilities as an extraterrestrial detector. Named LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory), the device is capable of sensing gravitational waves and could identify alien mega-technology. LIGO consists of three detectors. Two are at Hanford, Washington, and one is at Livingston in Louisiana.
The alien spacecraft need only come within about 326,000 light-years of Earth for LIGO to spot their waves. Machines with even greater sensitivity are already in the works and would further boost the detection range.
“With trillions of stars out there, you are telling me that one doesn’t have aliens that haven’t done this? Just one? I think the odds are in our favor,” lead author Gianni Martire, CEO of Applied Physics, said as quoted by StudyFinds.
Vehicles capable of moving through the cosmos would have to be ginormous, perhaps even the size of planet Jupiter, experts opine. A ship of this stature will have to travel at the speed of almost 20,000 miles a second, as per the study.
“I wouldn’t want to be on the team figuring out how to build a Jupiter-sized spacecraft, but the odds aren’t zero,” Martire said, according to the outlet.
The warp drive made famous by U.S.S. Enterprise’s missions in the popular TV program could be detected by the LIGO device. A warp drive distorts the fabric of space and time and creates “wrinkles” as it moves through the universe.
“How do you know the difference between a comet and the starship Enterprise?” Martire said. “You can tell between a rock and a warp drive the same way you can tell whether a jet ski went past or a boat. They both create waves, but they have a particular signature in their wake.”
If the scientists stumble upon something other than alien voyagers, the find would be no less significant. “Even if it’s not aliens, it’d be something new. It would be exciting no matter what it is,” Martire noted.
In other news, white lights streaming across the Wisconsin sky were observed by many earlier this month and were initially attributed to a UFO. “We just couldn’t wrap our heads around what we were seeing… There was no sound to it. It was a pretty clear and normal Wisconsin night without any crazy weather,” Kimberly, a salon owner from West Bend said. However, the unexplainable lights were just ground-based lights, according to analysts.
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