Name: Using Pollution to Find Aliens
Uploaded: undefined
Duration: undefined

Nova

The hunt for pollution in other planets’ atmospheres may determine whether or not we are alone in the universe.

The hunt for pollution in other planets’ atmospheres may determine whether we are alone.

Can We Use Pollution to Find Aliens?

the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation

The John Templeton Foundation

The National Science Foundation

Can We Use Pollution to Find Aliens? Hero

<div class="rich-text">Astrophysicist Avi Loeb wants to hunt for pollution in other planets&rsquo; atmospheres to determine whether or not we are alone in the universe.
</div>

<div class="rich-text">The hunt for pollution in other planets’ atmospheres may determine whether or not we are alone in the universe.</div>

Using Pollution to Find Aliens

Space & Flight

<div class="rich-text"><h3>
 Can We Use Pollution to Find Aliens?
</h3>

 Published May 23, 2018


 
 Onscreen:
 
 What’s the best way to track down an alien civilization?


 
 Avi Loeb:
 
 The sign of intelligence is that it produces a signal or a structure that nature at random could not produce.


 
 Onscreen:
 
 Avi Loeb wonders whether we can use industrial pollution to identify intelligent life on other planets.


 
 Loeb:
 
 If another civilization had billions of years to develop its science and technology, the sky’s the limit.


 
 Onscreen:
 
 Imagine an advanced civilization that consumed its planet’s resources to power life, and produced gases as by-products. Just like us.


 
 Loeb:
 
 Artificially-produced molecules like CFCs could potentially last for 50,000 years, and they are very resilient.


 
 Onscreen:
 
 CFCs are man-made molecules that don’t break apart easily. They’re produced by chemicals found in air conditioners, refrigerators and aerosol cans. These and other pollutants could be red flags for alien industrialization.


 The James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled for launch in 2020, might be able to detect those molecules in the atmospheres of distant exoplanets. But if we find them, does that mean we’ve found new neighbors?


 
 Loeb:
 
 The environmental impact of a civilization can in principle outlast the civilization itself. We might find evidence for graveyards of preexisting civilizations that either created conditions on their planet that are not habitable or they decided to move on to another place, another location.


 
 Onscreen:
 
 In other words, pollution could be detectable in a planet’s atmosphere for millennia, long after intelligent life has gone extinct. This could be true on distant planets, and potentially, for any aliens out there looking for company on this one.
</div>

Koch Foundation

NOVA Science Trust Logo

Brilliant.org

Canada

United States

Northern Mariana Islands

Puerto Rico

American Samoa

Guam

U.S. Virgin Islands

U.S. Minor Outlying Islands

US, US Territories, Canada

US & Territories

Follow along as NASA launches the Mars 2020 Mission, perhaps the most ambitious hunt yet for signs of ancient life on Mars. In February 2021, the spacecraft blazes into the Martian atmosphere at some 12,000 miles per hour and lowers the Perseverance Rover into the rocky Jezero Crater, home to a dried-up river delta scientists think could have harbored life. Perseverance will comb the area for signs of life and collect samples for possible return to Earth. Traveling onboard is a four-pound helicopter that will conduct a series of test flights—the first on another planet. During its journey, Perseverance will also test technology designed to produce oxygen from the Martian atmosphere, in hopes that the gas could be used for fuel—or for humans to breathe—on future missions. (Premiered February 24, 2021)

NASA launches its most ambitious search yet for traces of ancient life on Mars.

Looking for Life on Mars

A person is tested for COVID-19 at a drive-thru testing site in Florida in July 2020. Image Credit: Paul Hennessy/NurPhoto, Getty Images

Figuring out when to get tested after exposure requires understanding what happens once the virus enters your body. We’ve got you covered.

Figuring out when to get tested after exposure requires understanding what happens once the virus enters your body. We’ve got you covered.

I’ve been exposed to Covid-19. When should I get tested?

A statue of Zheng He at the Sam Poo Kong Temple in Java, Indonesia. Image Credit: Budianto Santosa, Shutterstock

In the 1400s, Zheng He sailed thousands of miles around Asia and Africa in ships the size of soccer fields, spreading Chinese innovations like compasses and gunpowder in the process.

In the 1400s, Zheng He sailed thousands of miles around Asia and Africa in ships the size of soccer fields, spreading Chinese innovations like compasses and gunpowder in the process.

Transcript

Credits

Support Provided By