Gravitational Wave Observatories Could Search for Warp Drive Signatures

Scientists at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory made the first confirmed detection ofGWs. This discovery confirmed a prediction made a century before by Einstein and his Theory of General Relativity, opening the door to a whole new field of astrophysical research. By studying the waves caused by the merger of massive objects, scientists could find new particles around black holes.

The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) could be used in the future according to new research. In their paper, they state that LIGO and other observatories have the ability to look for GWs created by Rapid and/or Massive Accelerating spacecraft. We could create a system that could look for signs of warp-drive-like signatures by combining the power of these and next- generation observatories.

The leader of the team was a graduate research assistant from the University of California Los Angeles. He was joined by researchers from five different universities. Their paper will be published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

The name RAMAcraft is a good choice for fans of science fiction. The term is an allusion to one of the most well-known novels of the 20th century. In the near future, a mission is dispatched to explore the interior of a massive extraterrestrial spaceship that is entering the Solar System. The idea of a worldship was popularized by the story because it was large enough to hold an entire population and have a rotation that mimicked gravity.

Worldships are a good candidate for SETI surveys since they would produce technosignatures. Waves in the fabric of spacetime would be generated by a huge object speeding through space. The team used a range of possible mass and accelerations for their calculations. According to Sellers, the signals would be detected by LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA.

“Any system that involves the bulk acceleration of mass emits gravitational waves (GWs). Furthermore, the shape of the emitted signal is entirely dependent on the way in which the object is moving. Therefore, if you know what you want to look for, you know exactly what the GW signal will look like. This is what allows us to search for RAMAcraft.”

Sellers and his colleagues showed how existing LIGO data could be used to find objects that are the same mass as Jupiter. SETI researchers could use LIGO data to search nearby star systems for objects similar to the Moon. It is possible that these signals are evidence of a type II civilization on the Kardashev scale.

Depending on how far away a survey is, a wide range of RAMAcraft could be searched for. The sellers said that.

“Some of the numbers quoted in the study are from quite massive structures, though you can also see smaller things if they are closer to Earth. The range in the paper is that we can see Jupiter-masses up to around 10-100 kpc, which covers up to the entire Galaxy, but we can also see moon-sized objects up to 1-10 pc, which is within the range of the nearest stars, such as Proxima Centauri.”

A Dyson structure measuring 1AU in diameter, the distance between the Earth and the Sun, would have a mass of 2.17, according to research by the Future of Humanity Institute. Next- generation observatories like the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), the Deci-hertz Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (DECIGO), and the Big bang Observer will be able to offer this type of sensitivity.

There will be a million-fold increase in the search volume for RAMAcraft due to the increased sensitivity of these observatories. Researchers from the APL-AP presented the first general model for a warp drive. The physical model is based on positive energy and warp shells. According to their research, any warp drive would consist of a shell of regular or exotic material moving in a certain direction.

This could lead to a new frontier in SETI research and allow scientists to look at thousands of galaxies. There are implications that a RAMARADAR could have.

SETI studies look at radio waves for signs of intelligent life This is a useful effort and what we are proposing would provide some benefits.

1. Not all systems emit EM waves, but just about every system that involves the bulk acceleration of mass emits GWs.
2. EM waves are often absorbed in the cosmos/atmosphere, whereas GWs are not.
3. GW detectors don’t need to be `aimed’ like EM telescopes. GW detectors just sit there and detect what passes through them, making it much less likely to miss a signal.
4. For this ^ reason, GW detectors can look for all sorts of signals all at once, eliminating the opportunity cost of looking for one signal vs. another that is present for EM telescopes. 
5. GW signals decrease proportionally to 1/R, where R is the distance from the source. EM signals decrease proportionally to 1/R^2, so GW signals decrease much less rapidly.“

The paper is the first in a series that looked at how GWs could be used to find evidence of advanced life. Sellers and his colleagues will discuss how LIGO data can be used to detect smaller objects closer to home. We looked at objects far away. The signal for objects closer to us will be stronger. We will be looking through past LIGO data to find the signals.

Scientists were given a new tool to look at the Universe after the confirmed detection ofGWs. Testing the laws of physics in extreme environments is one of the proposed applications. Scientists can use searching for evidence of advanced civilizations to test theories of what advanced civilization might do.

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