U.K. physicist Stephen Hawking joins Russian billionaire in hunt for alien life

LONDON —Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking has joined a Russian billionaire to launch a major new effort to listen for aliens in the search for extraterrestrial life.

Hawking has offered his support to tech entrepreneur Yuri Milner’s Breakthrough Initiatives project — a $100 million quest to see if extraterrestrial intelligence exists. Milner, who made a fortune through investments in companies like Facebook, said the power and innovation of Silicon Valley could be harnessed to search the entire Milky Way and 100 nearby galaxies.

“There is no bigger question,” Hawking said, using a computer-generated voice to communicate because of his motor neurone disease. “It is time to commit to finding the answer to search for life beyond Earth.”

As well as using some of the world’s most powerful telescopes, the Breakthrough Listen project will support a University of California, Berkeley computing platform.

The project will harness computer power, having nine million volunteers working in tandem by donating spare computing power to a worldwide network, scanning the skies and looking for life.