Can aliens make contact via Gamma-ray bursts? MIT astronomer says so

From 'Zoo Theory' and radio signals to GRB: Astronauts explain alien communication

U.S. and European scientists said on January 26 that they had caught their first ever "live" picture of a gamma-ray burst
U.S. and European scientists said on January 26 that they had caught their first ever "live" picture of a gamma-ray burst in 1999 NASA

The mysteries related to aliens and extra-terrestrial signals from outer space have triggered the interest of the human civilization over the years. Astronomer John A. Ball has taken the curiosity to another level when he sensationally claimed that the Gamma-ray bursts (GRB) are nothing but alien signals sent out by the ETs to make contact with humans.

Even though the gamma-ray bursts last no longer than few seconds or minutes, it has been considered the biggest explosion of light ever observed in the universe.

According to The Conversation, some of these phenomena are so luminous that they can be seen with naked eyes. "GRB 080319B", the burst discovered by NASA's Swift GRB Explorer mission 10-years ago, was one of the brightest events.

On the other hand, while some scientists did not know the cause of such intense gamma-ray bursts, the astronomer from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Ball, who proposed the "Zoo Theory" on alien contacts, has given his own hypothesis on the event.

The astronomer believes that the gamma-ray bursts could be a result of alien activity, as these kind of bursts are quite powerful to carry enough information.

In a paper entitled "Gamma Ray Bursts The ETI [extraterrestrial intelligence] Hypothesis", Ball explained how ET civilization might have used these bursts to transmit their signals. According to him, it is not impossible, as a two-millisecond gamma-ray burst could carry 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 bits of information.

While explaining the facts on alien contact, Ball said that we know the fact that "gamma rays offer the widest practical communications bandwidth in the electro-magnetic spectrum and the only feasible way to send large quantities of information over intergalactic distances."

According to him the messages in the bursts might be "spores that thrive and multiply when they land in an appropriately nurturing environment. They propagate enormous numbers of spores and expect only a minute percentage to survive."

However, the astronomer earlier took a step ahead to explore the reason behind the communication gap between humans and aliens, as every year several parts of this world witness UFO or alien sightings but there is no such news about a contact between both these civilizations.

Earlier, Ball said that even though there is news on alien life, they are avoiding humans because they don't want to interfere in our daily activity and want to monitor us like a zookeeper of a cosmic 'zoo'.

In addition to that, apart from the bursts, there are some mysterious radio signals, which originated in outer space and are captured by researchers, such as unexplained 'WOW! Signal', radio signal received by SETI in 1967, SHGb02+14a and many more.

This article was first published on January 18, 2018
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