NASA wants to use the Sun to search for aliens - already allocated $2 million

By: Maksim Panasovskiy | 08.08.2022, 11:28

It seems NASA has found an unusual way to use the only star in the solar system.

What we know

Experts at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have launched a new project that proposes to use the Sun as a giant lens to peer into the distant corners of space. The goal is to search for alien life.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has already allocated $2 million for the project. Scientists want to use several relatively compact satellites that will autonomously assemble at the point of the solar gravitational lens.

The exoplanet chosen as a target will emit light, and the Sun will be able to amplify it, allowing the satellites to look further than the new James Webb Space Telescope. Note that the distance to the point will be 1,000 times the distance between the Earth and the Sun.

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