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AnonTechie [soylentnews.org] writes:

Since their discovery ten years ago, fast radio bursts have confounded astronomers. These intergalactic pulses of radio energy have defied explanation, but a new theory suggests a technological origin, whereby aliens use these beams to propel their ships through space. Extremely speculative stuff, to be sure, but it’s an idea worth pursuing given just how weird these pulses are.

The idea that Fast Radio Bursts are produced by advanced alien civilizations in order to drive spacecraft through interstellar space sounds like something a UFO conspiracy site might cook up—but it’s actually the serious suggestion of a new paper published by Avi Loeb and Manasvi Lingam from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Of course, much more evidence is needed before we can attribute this unexplained phenomenon to artificial sources versus a natural astrophysical process.

With no good theory to go by, Loeb and Lingam wondered if extraterrestrials might be involved—and not without good reason. In a word, FRBs are weird. Like really weird.

http://gizmodo.com/wild-new-theory-suggests-radio-bursts-beyond-our-galaxy-1793130515 [gizmodo.com]

[Also Covered By]:
ScienceBlog.com [scienceblog.com]
Phys.org [phys.org]

[Source]: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics [harvard.edu]

[Abstract]: Fast Radio Bursts from Extragalactic Light Sails [arxiv.org]

Original Submission