Epsilon Algorithms to Search for Life as We Don’t Know It to Cosmic Ruins at Milky Way’s Edge (The Galaxy Report)

“The Galaxy Report” brings you news of space and science that has the capacity to provide clues to the mystery of our existence and adds a much needed cosmic perspective in our current Anthropocene Epoch. Today’s stories range from The Guardian asking ‘Something’s coming’: is America finally ready to take UFOs seriously to the James Webb Space Telescope may solve the growing rift between astronomers over how fast the universe is expanding, and much more.

‘Something’s coming’: is America finally ready to take UFOs seriously? reports The Guardian. “Last year was a breakthrough time for UFOs, as a landmark government report prompted the possibility of extraterrestrial visitors to finally be taken seriously by everyone from senators, to a former president, to the Pentagon. But 2022 could be even more profound, experts say, as the clamor for UFO disclosure and discovery continues to grow, and as new scientific projects bring us closer than ever to – potentially – discovering non-Earth life.

Epsilon Machines to Search for Life as We Don’t Know It–Scientists at the California Institute of Technology and their colleagues have devised a way they suggest could find aliens even if they are not life as we know it. This new strategy depends on so-called “epsilon machines.”

The First Quadruple Asteroid: Astronomers Spot a Space Rock With 3 Moons –Astronomers had already spotted two other rocks orbiting the asteroid known as 130 Elektra, and think more quadruple systems are out there, reports The New York Times.

The Secret of Massive Stars Found Far From Their Birthplace in Milky Way’s Disk —Astronomers have found an explanation for the strange occurrence of massive stars located far from their birthplace in the disk of our Milky Way Galaxy: the secret seems to lie in the merging of medium-mass stars reports Max Moe for The Daily Galaxy.

The James Webb Space Telescope Could Solve One of Cosmology’s Deepest Mysteries –The observatory’s unprecedented infrared measurements might at last bridge a growing rift between astronomers over how fast the universe is expanding, reports Scientific American.

Is the ‘fine-tuned universe’ an illusion? asks the Foundational Questions Institute –“For decades physicists have been perplexed about why our cosmos appears to have been precisely tuned to foster intelligent life. But recent studies propose that intelligent life could have evolved under drastically different physical conditions.

The Extraterrestrial-Contact Paradox (YouTube Episode) –“British physicist Stephen Wolfram believes extraterrestrial intelligent life is inevitable, but with a caveat. Although intelligent life is inevitable, we will never find it -at least not by searching in the Milky Way. We have a slim chance, he suggests, of distinguishing an ET artifact from a natural celestial object.

Mars Meteorite Upends Beginning of Life Theories –In 2011, a piece of Mars crash-landed in the Western Sahara Desert. The Martian meteorite encapsulated the history of the Red Planet within its different layers, revealing the sequence of events that took place during Mars’ past, reports Inverse.

Top 10 space stories of 2021 –Over the past year, researchers mourned the loss of Arecibo and applauded the first helicopter flight on Mars. Plus, commercial spaceflight really took off, reports Astronomy.com

Riding a laser to Mars, reports David Appell for Phys.org–“The laser, a 10-meter wide array on Earth, would heat hydrogen plasma in a chamber behind the spacecraft, producing thrust from hydrogen gas and sending it to Mars in only 45 days.”

Cosmic Ruins Found at Milky Way’s Edge. A stream of stars scattered across 15 degrees of sky was once part of a globular cluster torn apart by our galaxy’s gravity. The stars represent some of the oldest in the Milky Way, reports Sky & Telescope.

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