The COSETI Observatory
SETI Time Pyramid.
- The following diagram illustrates the two main paths for Electromagnetic SETI since 1959, with only a few milestones shown for Microwave SETI (MSETI). It is expected that early in the next millenium there will be several active professional OSETI observatories and many amateur OSETI observatories.
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- The Microwave SETI base of the inverted pyramid is now so broad that it has been difficult in persuading MSETI scientists to revisit the optical approach to SETI. Optical SETI at a wavelength of 10.6 microns was first proposed by Nobel Laureate, Professor Charles Townes, just one year after the laser was invented. The assumptions made at the very beginning about ETI EIRPs determined the direction that SETI on planet Earth has taken for the past 37 years.
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- At the time is diagram was composed, the NASA SETI Program which was called the “High Resolution Microwave Survey” (HRMS) had just started. It was expected that it would one day become the High Resolution Microwave & Optical Survey (HRMOS). However, one year after HRMS started, funding for it was killed by Congress. HRMS then rose from the ashes as the new privatized Project Phoenix. However, the prediction that the professional microwave search will eventually give way to a professional optical search is as valid as ever.
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