What is the latest message 'A Beacon in the Galaxy' to inform intelligent life forms that may be beyond the universe about the earth?
The
Arecibo message sent from Earth to space in 1974 marks the 50th anniversary, and a research team led by Jonathan H. Jiang , an astrophysicist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, is working on space. I have published a paper on the updated message ' A Beacon in the Galaxy (BitG) ' to deliver to intelligent life forms somewhere in the universe. BitG's message is intended to tell you 'we are here' to send a bottle mail to the ocean.
The Arecibo message, the first message that humankind sent to space in 1974, is to help extraterrestrial intelligent life understand the Earthlings, such as the atomic numbers and DNA chemical formulas of the Earth, and the height of the Earthlings. We translate the population, the map of the solar system, etc. into binary data and send it. The latest BitG is based on the Arecibo message, but has been greatly improved by including a map showing the more accurate position of the earth and a time stamp of when it was sent. That thing.
First, the Arecibo message sent a map that can identify the position of the earth based on the position of a rotating star called a
pulsar , but the position of the pulsar is not constant for a long period of time, and it is in a vast galaxy. There was a flaw in which multiple pulsars were not clearly distinguished in. Therefore, BitG makes it possible to create a clear and stable map by using the globular cluster of the Milky Way as a guide. The paper explains that the blue dots in the image below indicate the center of the Milky Way, and the red dots indicate the sun, that is, the solar system in which we are, and the position of the earth is indicated by transmitting such relative position information. It has been.
Also, regarding time stamps, there was the issue of how to convey 'when the message was sent' to aliens, whose time measurement method is likely to be significantly different from that of the earth. So, message co-designer Qitian Jin of the Hanse University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands turned to the hydrogen atom.
Neutral hydrogen that collided with other atoms and electrons enters a high-energy state, and when it transitions to a low-energy state 10 million years later, 'how long has it passed before the message was sent from the Big Bang?' It seems that it can be communicated.
The Arecibo message was sent to
the globular cluster M13 in Hercules , which is said to have strong symbolic implications for technological development. It is unlikely that there are intelligent life forms in M13, and since M13 and the Earth are about 25,100 light-years apart, they are still only 0.2% mobile after 50 years. On the other hand, BitG is supposed to radiate to a group of stars about 10,300 light-years away from the center of the Milky Way, and Jiang said, 'To the sea of space,'Hey, we are here.'' I want to send you an email, but in a few years we will not be here anymore, 'he told Live Science with hope and anxiety.
BitG is in the announcement stage about message construction, and the technology for sending messages has not been established. Researchers are asking, 'Should this A Beacon in the Galaxy message be sent to space?'
