The Colossus telescope, worth around $1 billion, which may help detect alien life on other planets, may be ready in the next 5 years.
This powerful telescope, which is twice the size of any existing lens, may help detect cities and signs of life on other planets upto 70 light years away. What's more is that this telescope won't rely on any alien signals, but will detect local heat created by extraterrestrial beings.
This privately-funded project, involving a team of scientists will put together a 250-foot telescope, within a span of five years, which may prove to be a remarkable discovery in the field of space sciences.
It would be named Colossus, and its aperture would be more than twice the size of the biggest lens today, according to space.com.
"If we had an investor come and say 'look, here are the resources you need,' we could have the telescope built within five years," astronomer at the University of Hawaii's Institute of Astronomy, Jeff Kuhn, explained.
Jeff Kuhn is also on the Colossus proposal team, and has revealed that the start date for this project is yet to be decided.
In order to cut down the costs for the buildup of this unique telescope, thin mirror technology would be used.
"We do that by using the fact that the planet has to rotate, and that civilization is clustered either by the formation of continents or the use of land, which is agrarian versus organized into population centers. The assumption we make is that civilizations will cluster their heat use. It won't be uniform; they distribute it," Kuhn explained.
According to Kuhn, this telescope would detect local heat that would clearly indicate presence of extraterrestrial life.
Despite decades of searching and studies, scientists have not yet been able to find any clear evidence of the presence of alien life on other planets. This new telescope may help make it easier.
Scientists have been looking out to hear signals from extraterrestrial life; however this greatly relies on our ability to actually detect them. What's more, Stephen Hawking had already warned humans about sending out messages and signals into space, which may give possible aliens a clue about our existence, which may prove to be dangerous too.
Thankfully, the Colossus telescope wouldn't include this risk, as it will not be giving away information about our location.
Looks like five years later, we may be looking at pictures of our fellow alien neighbors.
