Did a Russian telescope just communicate with aliens? We're not sure yet.
In May of last year, two scientists at Russia's Ratan-600 telescope detected a "strong signal" from "deep in space" believed to have originated on star HD164595, in the Hercules constellation.
The star, which is the size of the Earth and about 95 light years away (relatively close to us humans when compared to the entire universe), contains a planet within it, HD164595b, which is the size of Neptune and appears to have the "right conditions for supporting life."
How did the discovery come about? After detecting the signal, the Russian scientists held a presentation about it. Claudio Maccone, of Italy's Turin University, attended the talk and passed on the information to author Paul Gilster, who maintains a blog, Centauri Dreams, about "deep space exploration, with an eye toward interstellar possibilities."
"No one is claiming that this is the work of an extraterrestrial civilization," wrote Gilster on his blog post. "But it is certainly worth further study. Working out the strength of the signal, the researchers say that if it came from an isotropic beacon, it would be of a power possible only for a Kardashev Type II civilization."
A Type II civilization harnesses energy from its own star—a more advanced ability than the community on Earth, a Type I civilization that harnesses energy from the sun.
So, did we just receive a signal from aliens? Eric Korpela, an astronomer with Berkeley Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI), claimed to be "unimpressed" in a note published online. "Because the receivers used were making broad band measurements, there's really nothing about this 'signal' that would distinguish it from a natural radio transient. There's also nothing that could distinguish it from a satellite passing through the telescope field of view. All in all, it's relatively uninteresting from a SETI standpoint."
Following our Stranger Things binge, we are particularly invested in this discovery.