- Sat Aug 13, 2011 12:25 pm
#3069
Donors keep SETI open to listen for alien signals.
An array of 42 radio telescopes in Northern California that seek signs of intelligent life in the universe will continue that work after private donors raised enough money to keep them going, officials from the group said.
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or SETI, Institute received more than $200,000, including donations from actress Jodie Foster.
The array was originally a joint project between the SETI Institute and the UC Berkeley Astronomy Laboratory, which pulled out earlier this year because of the loss of National Science Foundation grants and state budget cuts.
Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, said he was gratified the money could be raised during such tough economic times.
"People still think this very fundamental question - is there somebody out there as intelligent or more so than us? - is important and worth doing," he said.
Jodie Foster who starred in Contact also donated.
The telescopes at the Hat Creek Radio Observatory near the city of Mount Shasta (Siskiyou County), were funded by a $30 million gift from Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen.
They will be turned back on in September, recalibrated and operated 24 hours a day for the rest of the year as more funds are sought.
The array costs $2.5 million a year to operate with a full staff of 10 people. As a whole, the SETI Institute has an $18 million budget and 140 employees. The funding which comes from donors, NASA and the National Science Foundation.
SETI Institute CEO Tom Pierson told supporters in a letter that his goal is to raise $5 million so that the radio dishes can be pointed at 1,235 new so-called exoplanets that were announced in February by NASA's Kepler mission.
The array is not only used to search for extraterrestrials, but is also contributing to research into black holes, pulsars and magnetic fields in the Milky Way.
SETI
The San Francisco Chronicle
An array of 42 radio telescopes in Northern California that seek signs of intelligent life in the universe will continue that work after private donors raised enough money to keep them going, officials from the group said.
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or SETI, Institute received more than $200,000, including donations from actress Jodie Foster.
The array was originally a joint project between the SETI Institute and the UC Berkeley Astronomy Laboratory, which pulled out earlier this year because of the loss of National Science Foundation grants and state budget cuts.
Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, said he was gratified the money could be raised during such tough economic times.
"People still think this very fundamental question - is there somebody out there as intelligent or more so than us? - is important and worth doing," he said.
Jodie Foster who starred in Contact also donated.
The telescopes at the Hat Creek Radio Observatory near the city of Mount Shasta (Siskiyou County), were funded by a $30 million gift from Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen.
They will be turned back on in September, recalibrated and operated 24 hours a day for the rest of the year as more funds are sought.
The array costs $2.5 million a year to operate with a full staff of 10 people. As a whole, the SETI Institute has an $18 million budget and 140 employees. The funding which comes from donors, NASA and the National Science Foundation.
SETI Institute CEO Tom Pierson told supporters in a letter that his goal is to raise $5 million so that the radio dishes can be pointed at 1,235 new so-called exoplanets that were announced in February by NASA's Kepler mission.
The array is not only used to search for extraterrestrials, but is also contributing to research into black holes, pulsars and magnetic fields in the Milky Way.
SETI
The San Francisco Chronicle
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." R.Buckminster Fuller