Comet Enthusiast

Assuming that an alien civilization would strive to optimize costs, limit waste and make its signaling technology more efficient, Jim Benford, founder and president of Microwave Sciences Inc., proposes that these signals would not be continuously blasted out in all directions but rather would be pulsed, narrowly directed and broadband in the 1-to-10-gigahertz range. The physics professor says. “Whatever the life form, evolution selects for economy of resources. Broadcasting is expensive, and transmitting signals across light-years would require considerable resources.”