Chenoa Tremblay
October 19, 2023
Zoom recording
Abstract:
Within the fields of astrobiology, planetary science, and radio astronomy there are teams around the world constantly looking for signs that life exists on other planets than Earth. The search for complex life through technosignatures, observational manifestations of technology, aims to constrain the prevalence and distribution of potential of technologically advanced life in the Universe. Significant advances in real-time data analysis, driven by the reduced costs of computation, have led to the development of the Commensal Open-Source Multimode Interferometer Cluster (COSMIC) on the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico, USA. As such we are performing one of the largest technosignature surveys of all time with a real-time and autonomous workflow. In this presentation, I will provide an overview of COSMIC, where it sits in the landscape of technosignature searches, and what we have learned in the first 6 months of commensal observing with the VLA as well as some of our first results.