Astronomers target dark side of the Moon in search for alien life
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Telescopes placed on the dark side of the Moon could pick up the first signs of intelligent alien life, and peer back in time to view the universe before even light existed, scientists believe.
Astronomers consider the Moon a perfect spot to search for faint techno-signatures from advanced civilisations, or pick out the clouds of hydrogen which swirled soon after the Big Bang, and which would eventually burst into stars.
The idea of locating observatories on the dark side has been discussed in astronomy for decades, but it has only recently resurfaced as a plausible idea as humans prepare to return to the lunar surface.
Nasa, the European Space Agency (Esa), and the National Astronomical Observatory of China, all already have plans for radio telescopes on the far side of the Moon – a dark and quiet spot which is shielded from Earth’s radio transmissions.
Nasa first proposed placing telescopes on the Moon in the 1960s but after the Apollo programme was cancelled, projects on the lunar surface were mothballed.
Now with the success of the first Artemis launch, humans are expected to return to the Moon this decade, opening up the lunar surface once more for exploration and, potentially, astronomy.
Because it takes the Moon the same amount of time to rotate once on its axis as it does to orbit once around the Earth, the same side of the Moon faces Earth at all times – thereby leaving the far side always facing away from the Earth.
A radio telescope on the far side of the Moon would be so isolated it could pick up faint, very low-frequency radio waves left over from the dawn of the universe before the lights turned on – a period known as the cosmic dark ages.
Hydrogen clouds which formed shortly after the Big Bang, but had not yet collapsed into stars, could be spotted as shadows or ripples against the Cosmic Microwave Background – radiation released as the universe burst into existence.
