From: dreher@bkyast.berkeley.edu Subject: SETI Shutdown Summary: Sky Survey dead, Targeted Search seeks funding Keywords: SETI HRMS NASA Date: Thu, 21 Oct 93 17:45:05 PDT Last week, the Project Manager of the High Resolution Microwave Survey, NASA's SETI project, received formal notification from the NASA Administrator to shut down the HRMS project over 60 days, pursuant to the action by the US Congress earlier this month. Informed opinion is that there is almost no chance of reviving the NASA project for the foreseeable future. Background: The HRMS was the most ambitious SETI project to date. The Sky Survey segment of the Project was based at JPL and had the goal of searching the entire sky at all frequencies between 1 and 10 GHz using DSN antennas, an enormous task. For comparison, the Harvard META project searched the whole sky over about 2 MHz, and the Berkeley SERENDIP project, currently running at Arecibo, surveys ~10 MHz over a substantial part of the northern sky. All these surveys suffer from relatively poor sensitivities; they fail by many orders of magnitude to be able to detect the emissions of planets with technologies similar to ours. The META project, for example, requires a transmitter with EIRP of 7,000,000 GW at 1000 light years (a typical stellar distance in an all-sky survey) to produce a candidate signal. The HRMS Targeted Search, run out of Ames Research Center, had a different strategy: with long integrations on individual stars using the largest antennas in the world, it would have achieved a sensitivity (at Arecibo) sufficient to detect an EIRP of 0.4 GW at 10 ly (a typical distance to a nearby star). The frequency range from 1 to 3 GHz was to be searched for about 1000 of the nearest selected solar-type stars. Current Status: 1) The Sky Survey has built and is using a prototype system at L and X band. Observations will cease. The equipment will be stored, probably at a DSN telescope. 2) The Targeted Search was deployed at Arecibo last year with a 10 MHz pre-production system. This system is now back at Ames, being upgraded into a 20 MHz production system, in preparation for deployment to the 64 meter Parkes antenna in Australia next year.. Unfortunately, this upgrade means that everything has been taken apart. We hope to be able to reassemble the 10 MHz system and get it into some kind of working condition before the shutdown completes. 3) JPL was nearing completion of an innovative feed/cryogenic amplifier system that spanned 1 to 3 GHz in just two packages. We hope to salvage some of this gear. 4) The HRMS was partially supporting SETI efforts at Harvard, Berkeley, and Ohio State; much, possibly all, of this funding will be lost. 5) A number of university scientists were being funded as part of the Investigators' Working Group; these too will get the ax. 6) The joint NSF/HRMS curriculum development project at the SETI Institute can, we hope, be saved by reprogramming at NASA. Future Prospects: Since the Sky Survey depends largely on NASA antennas and JPL personnel, prospects for the SS seem bleak. The Targeted Search, on the other hand, was run primarily through the non-profit SETI Institute (under a NASA Cooperative Agreement) and planned to use non-NASA telescopes, so there is still a _chance_ to do something. The SETI Institute has begun an emergency appeal to foundations and wealthy individuals to fund deployment of the Targeted Search. In the longer term, the Institute is seeking stable private funding to allow continued development and sustained use of SETI instrumentation, both internally and by support of external groups. We hope to be able to improve the sensitivity by a factor of 5- 10 and the search speed by a factor of 10-30 within a decade. John Dreher Targeted Search System Scientist dreher@bkyast.berkeley.edu -- Rod Beckwith |$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$| The Datacom I/S |"The great obstacle of progress is not ignorance,| Nite rodb@corp.sgi.com|but the illusion of knowledge." | Net |$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$| Knight