FIVE THINGS ABOUT ALIEN SHIPS

1 THEY MAY BE FIRING UP

A team from Harvard University has speculated that mysterious energy flashes detected in galaxies far, far away may be caused by a species of super-advanced aliens firing up their interstellar spacecraft. Scientists at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics came up with the possible explanation for Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) discovered a decade ago. FRBs are intense radio pulses that last no more than a millisecond that emanate from galaxies billions of light years away.

2 THEY MAY BE SAILING

Prof. Avi Loeb and Dr. Manasvi Lingam say the FRBs could be evidence of aliens and the bursts may be leaked energy from powerful transmitters capable of sending giant solar “sail ships” between stars.

3 THEY MAY BE HUGE

The hypothetical alien ship would be gigantic. Loeb and Lingam calculated a solar-powered radio transmitter capable of producing FRBs would beam sunlight at an area about twice the diameter of Earth. If a solar sail were massive enough to catch these rays, it would propel a million-ton payload — about equal to three Empire State Buildings.

4 ARTHUR C. CLARKE PREDICTED THEM

Solar sailing has been a science-fiction concept for decades. Arthur C. Clarke described solar ships in his short story “Sunjammer,” in 1964.

5 THEY MAY NOT EXIST

Some scientists have proposed FRBs are from massive neutron stars, suns that collapsed into dense cores. Perhaps there exist stellar flares capable of spitting out a radio wave that far. Or maybe vanishing black holes spewed the FRBs our way.