ET hunters using AI to find strange phenomena in space

As the search for alien civilizations continues, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute is turning to artificial intelligence and machine learning to power the search for signs of “engineered phenomena.”

“The amount of data we're generating grows exponentially every year, and you can't keep track of that kind of data using standard analytics,” Bill Diamond, president and CEO of the SETI Institute, told Decrypt. “AI and machine learning are being used extensively — and increasingly used — in SETI, as well as in the other types of science we do.”

Diamond AI is being used at the facility's largest array in New Mexico, processing three terabytes of data per second. SETI researchers train the facility's systems to react when a narrowband carrier or other engineering phenomenon in the radio spectrum detects seemingly unnatural but specific characteristics.

So, has AI helped to discover rare anomalies in space?

“Yes, they have — but nothing has yet reached the level of a proven technology signature,” Diamond said. “In the case of anomalous events that may be natural in origin, these may yield published research results at some point, but at this point it is a work in progress.”

By training AI on known signals and simulated data, the researchers want to develop models that can reliably identify even the weakest of suspicious distributions. Instead of training AI systems to look for specific, predefined signals, the institute is taking a more open-ended approach.

“Instead of looking for something like a narrow band carrier, we can say, ‘Show me something different. Show me something different from the norm,'” Diamond explained.

Mitch Horowitz, author, historian and curator of Discovery's “Alien Encounters: Fact or Fiction,” acknowledges that advances in artificial intelligence and quantum computing will make AI a valuable tool in the search for alien civilizations.

“I appreciate the aggressiveness of SETI, and I'm glad they're doing what they're doing,” he said, but he's skeptical of how many AI models can connect humans to alien intelligence.

“We as a human race have a long history of creating things that inform and mislead us,” he said. He cites one example of Amazon's AI describing his book “American Occultism” as not being about the Holocaust in the United States, but about the Holocaust.

“It gives me pause, so I approach everything with great caution at the moment,” he said.

Teams using artificial intelligence to detect other celestial phenomena NASA announced in October that the Nancy Grace Rome Telescope, once launched in 2027, will use AI. Northwestern University researchers use AI to detect supernovae faster.

In July, NASA's AI-powered Perseverance rover found a rock in Jezero Crater on Mars, which scientists named “Cheyava Falls” and which NASA has covered in patterns resembling tiger spots. This is possible and indicates an ancient chemical reaction.

In the year Founded in 1984 by Jill Tartar and Thomas Pearson, SETI is a non-profit organization dedicated to finding signs of extraterrestrial civilizations. Tartar was the inspiration for Jodie Foster's character, Dr. Eleanor “Ellie” Arroway, in the 1997 film “Contact.”

Despite reported sightings of unidentified flying objects and renewed interest in extraterrestrials, neither SETI nor anyone else has yet found any proof of life beyond our planet.

Edited by Andrew Hayward.