Discovered earlier this year, the curios find was hailed as the first object to have entered into our solar system from somewhere else in space. Along with sparking the imagination of UFO enthusiasts, Oumuamua unique origin story also apparently caught the attention of astronomers with the Breakthrough Listen project.
The SETI endeavor backed by a Russian billionaire has announced plans to 'listen' to the historic asteroid starting this coming Wednesday...in an attempt to see if they can detect radio signals emanating from him.
In a rather remarkable email, reported by the Atlantic, the head of Harvard's astronomy department who serves as an advisor to the project made an observation that is likely to send ET fans' hearts souring.
''The more I study this object, the more unusual it appears, making me wonder wether it might be an artificially made probe which was send by an alien civilization,'' professor Avi Loeb wrote. ''Perhaps the aliens have a mothership that travels fast and releases baby spacecraft that freely fall into planetary systems on a reconnaissance mission.''
''Even if we find an artefact that was left over - some space device or junk from an alien civilization - and there are no signs of life on it, that would be the greatest thrill I can imagine having in my lifetime,'' he says. It's really one of the fundamental questions in science, perhaps the most fundamental: are we alone?''
Source: dailymail
