The Hunt for Alien Life Just Got Serious

A Dyson Sphere under construction

If you had $200,000, what would you do with it? According to Paul Gilster of Centauri Dreams, a scientist named Geoff Marcy has just received a $200,000 dollar grant to search for extraterrestrial life, and he's putting it to good use.

Marcy isn't just searching for any old slimy alien civilization, he's searching for an advanced race. More specifically, a Kardashev Type II civilization, by searching for Dyson Spheres.


Marcy plans to observe thousands of stars for tell-tale signs in the light signals we could expect to receive from them. Certain permutations would indicate a Dyson Sphere under construction. In addition, he will also be using the funding to monitor the prime candidates for laser communication. That's right- if there are phasers set to kill, we'll know about it.

Marcy's techniques are unique because they specifically would help to identify alien races potentially advanced enough to communicate with us across vast distances of space.

"Technological civilizations may communicate with their space probes located throughout the galaxy by using laser beams, either in visible light or infrared light. Laser light is detectable from other civilizations because the power is concentrated into a narrow beam and the light is all at one specific color or frequency. The lasers outshine the host star at the color of the laser." -Geoff Marcy

Contact with an advanced alien race would no doubt create new possibilities for the expedient technological advancement of humanity.

Now that's a good way to spend two hundred large.