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At the AMSAT-NA Board of Director's meeting in Pittsburgh two months ago, SETI League executive director H. Paul Shuch was caught in the act of studying our sister organization's Annual Report. Paul serves on the Boards of both organizations. "I steal all the good ideas I can from AMSAT," he freely admits. W3IWI photo

31 December 2005

Bertrand Pinel first received signals from the Mars Odyssey spacecraft in early October, 2005. He notes signals about one half dB out of the noise (much weaker than the other Mars probes he has detected), with immense Doppler shift, indicating a large relative motion between the spacecraft and Earth. (1073 kByte WAV file; 134 seconds) F5PL image

24 December 2005

Bertrand Pinel recovered 8420.4321 MHz signals from the Mars Express spacecraft some 81 million km from Earth, on 25 September 2005. He writes, "I received the telemetry carrier +5 dB over noise, a good and strong signal in the loudspeaker during more than an hour, and the tracking is in total accordance with the red planet data from NASA ephemeris. I think that I was lucky because, at the moment of this reception, no data were perhaps transmitted, so the carrier was receiving the full output on frequency." Bertrand's 3.5 meter dish produces +46 dBi of gain, and his system noise temperature is 65 Kelvin. You can hear the high rate of change in Doppler shift in the accompanying WAV file, by clicking on the speaker icon above. (1073 kByte WAV file; 133 seconds) F5PL image

17 December 2005

To reach the eyepiece of the 26 inch refractor telescope at the McCormick Observatory, University of Virginia (see last week's featured photo), executive director H. Paul Shuch had to hoist the observer's chair up with ropes and pulleys, just as was done when the observatory was commissioned in 1885. SETI League photo

10 December 2005

During a visit to NRAO headquarters at the University of Virginia last Autumn, executive director H. Paul Shuch had an opportunity to observe Uranus and the Ring Nebula through the 26 inch refractor telescope at the McCormick Observatory. "This was the most powerful telescope in the world, when it was completed in 1883," notes Shuch, "and the images through it are still spectacular!" SETI League photo

3 December 2005

Gian Camillo Gloriosi, who was native to Montecorvino Rovella, Salerno Italy, was Galileo's assistant. This modest observatory there, named for him, is the future home to the MStar radio telescope, presently being designed by SETI League members Stelio Montebugnoli and H. Paul Shuch. N6TX photo

26 November 2005

In the interest of attracting more paying gigs, and raising some much-needed revenue for The SETI League, our executive director has revamped his Dr. SETI ® website. During the past eleven years, H. Paul Shuch has given hundreds of Dr. SETI performances to thousands of enthusiasts in fifteen different countries. To learn how to book him for your campus, club, conference, or colloquium, follow the links at drseti.org. Dr. SETI image

19 November 2005

Project Argus Station FN54gj is on the air! For First Light on 1 September 2005, Rick Bishop did this hydrogen line drift-scan sweep around Decl. +44 degrees, RA 22 hours, with a 12-foot dish and SDR14 software defined receiver. Rick Bishop image

12 November 2005

At Project Argus Station JO89sn near Stockholm, Greger Gimseus first managed to image the Sun at 1720 MHz, using a modest 1.8 meter parabolic antenna. Greg has since upgraded his station to 1420 MHz, using a recently acquired 3 meter dish. Greg Gimseus image

5 November 2005

During the Universus 2005 conference in Montecorvino, Italy in July, these ten SETI enthusiasts took a little time off to tour the quaint village of Acerno. Fountains in the town square seem to be the norm in that part of the world. N6TX photo

29 October 2005

Bertrand Pinel F5PL first received X-band signals from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft on 22 August 2005. He writes, "Frequency ± 1 kHz = 8439.3315 MHz. Signal very tiny, just visible on the FFT screen, not in the loudspeaker. Doppler on the FFT screen not measurable, in accordance with NASA figures computed with Excel software. I assume the spacecraft working with a low gain antenna. About my antenna bearing, the signal is in total accordance with NASA ephéméris" F5PL image

22 October 2005

Two months ago, SETI League executive director H. Paul Shuch was appointed Principal Investigator of the Invitation to ETI project, by its founder and Chief Scientist, longtime SETI League member Allen Tough. This four-quadrant briefing chart summarizes the innovative Web-based SETI experiment. IETI image

15 October 2005

18.9 milion km from Earth, enroute to its rendezvous with a comet, the NASA Deep Impact spacecraft sent these X-band telemetry signals toward Earth on 16 March 2005. They were intercepted by Bertrand Pinel's 7 meter dish, only 4 dB above the receiver noise floor, on a frequency of 8435.3704 MHz. F5PL image

8 October 2005

On 15 March 2005, Charlie Suckling G3WDG became the first amateur to receive X-band signals from the NASA Deep Impact spacecraft, which was launched on 12 January 2005 on an intercept course with Comet Tempel-1. Click on the speaker icon above to hear the telemetry signals recovered during that reception. (509 kByte WAV file; 32 seconds) G3WDG image

1 October 2005

Last week, Jim Bird (right), Marketing Research Specialist with Bird Electronic Corporation, presented SETI League president Richard Factor with the unique gold-plated Bird® model 43 Thruline® power meter, prize in an equally unique Charity Auction which marked the 300,000th unit produced by Bird since 1952. See this Press Release for further details. SETI League photo

24 September 2005

The SETI League has won twice, acquiring both this unique gold-plated Bird® Model 43 Thruline® power meter, and a substantial cash contribution, in an unusual Charity Auction. See this Press Release. Bird Electronic Corp. photo

17 September 2005

One highlight of the annual SARA conference is that participants get to experiment with the 40-foot radio telescope at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, WV. In June, our executive director made this drift-scan hydrogen sweep of 3c273, his favorite quasar. N6TX image

10 September 2005

During a recent visit to the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, WV, executive director H. Paul Shuch got a close-up view of the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope -- from the apex of the Green Bank Telescope's 110 meter diameter reflector surface! N6TX photo

3 September 2005

Among the amateur radio astronomers elected to the SARA Board in June, posing here in front of Grote Reber's historic amateur radio telescope, are several SETI League members. SARA (the Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers) and The SETI League are mutually affiliated, sister organizations. Our own executive director (third from left) also serves as SARA's vice-president. N6TX photo

27 August 2005

The SETI League's W2ETI moonbounce beacon has been out of service for more than a year, due to a failed power amplifier. We are pleased to report that we have ordered this commercial half-kilowatt MOSFET linear amplifier, and expect to be back on the air shortly. Watch our EME Status page for updates. Kuhne Electronic photo

20 August 2005

By the first weekend in June, 2005, executive director H. Paul Shuch operated W6KYP's remote SETI station in its entirety, over the Internet. This display shows the spectrum analyzer and waterfall display on Paul's laptop, analyzing audio from Jim's receiver and antenna, both of which he is controlling from 4,000 km distant. It is now possible for a SETI League member to participate fully in Project Argus, even if he or she lacks a radio telescope. Details about the Remote SETI Client can be found on Jim's SETI Net server. N6TX image

13 August 2005

During the last weekend in May, 2005, Argonnaut Ray Shank (W5RAY) became the first person to operate W6KYP's entire SETI station remotely over the Internet. Jim Brown's Remote SETI Client is now essentially complete, allowing authorized users to not only steer his antenna, but also tune his WinRadio receiver and download its audio for local analysis. Details about the Remote SETI Client can be found on Jim's SETI Net server. N6TX image

6 August 2005

By the end of May, 2005, Jim Brown's Remote SETI Client had been linked to a star map. By clicking on a selected star, a participating remote user can now cause his dish to track it across the sky! Details about the Remote SETI Client can be found on Jim's SETI Net server. W6KYP image

30 July 2005

Are We Alone? At a recent University of Toronto lecture, Dr. SETI ® turns this fundamental question around, and considers it from an alien perspective. Cathy Rand photo

23 July 2005

Peter Wright from Scotland (by way of Germany) and Alexander Zaitsev from Russia were among the four SETI League volunteer Regional Coordinators in attendance at the San Marino SETI conference last March. A.L. Zaitsev photo

16 July 2005

At the San Marino SETI conference last March, executive director H. Paul Shuch and German regional coordinator Peter Wright had a few minutes for tourism. Here they are buying the obligatory postcards to send home. A.L. Zaitsev photo

9 July 2005

Russian volunteer coordinator Alexander L. Zaitsev and executive director H. Paul Shuch share a moment of fellowship last March, at the "We and SETI" conference in San Marino. A.L. Zaitsev photo

2 July 2005

This S-band (2296.851) reception of the Rosetta spacecraft, by Charlie Suckling in the UK, occurred on 4 March 2005, during the spacecraft's closest approach to Earth. Note the extreme slope seen on the waterfall display, indicating the high rate of Doppler shift due to Rosetta's extreme velocity. G3WDG image

25 June 2005

In order to detect the the Rosetta spacecraft during its flyby in March, Bertrand Pinel modified his X-band dish feed (cylindrical waveguide with choke rings), turning it into a conical waveguide horn antenna. The spacecraft's velocity as it flew past Earth would have made tracking with a parabiolic antenna all but impossible. Follow this link to see more of Betrrand Pinel's space probe detections. F5PL image

18 June 2005

Yet another X-band detection of the Rosetta spacecraft, by Bertrand Pinel (see also his images from the previous two weeks). This image was taken on 25 February 2005, during the close approach to Earth associated with its gravity-assist maneuver enroute to the asteroid belt. The slope seen on the waterfall display indicates the high rate of Doppler shift as Rosetta accelarates toward Earth. F5PL image

11 June 2005

Here is a second X-band detection from the Rosetta spacecraft, sent in by Bertrand Pinel. (See last week's Image of the Week for the first.) This image was taken on 10 February 2005, with the spacecraft some 7.5 million km from Earth. The spacecraft had actually been traveling toward Earth, to do a gravity-assist maneuver enroute to the asteroid belt. In the spectrum analyzer image, vertical axis is 10 dB/div and horizontal axis is 100 kHz/div. The observed signal to noise ratio (SNR) exceeds +20 dB in a narrowband (SSB) receiver. F5PL image

4 June 2005

Bertrand Pinel is probably the first amateur to detect the 8.42 GHz telemetry downlink from the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft. Launched on 2 March 2004 by an Arianne 5G rocket from Kourou, French Guianna, Rosetta is scheduled to reach Comet 67P/Churyomov-Gerasimenko in 2014. This detection was made on 1 February 2005, with the spacecraft 12 million km from Earth. In the spectrum analyzer image, vertical axis is 10 dB/div and horizontal axis is 200 kHz/div, indicating a total transmission bandwidth on the order of 600 kHz. From the observed Doppler shift, Bertrand was able to compute the spacecraft's velocity, to within 1% of NASA's published figure. F5PL image

28 May 2005

2005 Bruno Award recipient Jim Brown, W6KYP, continues to make great progress on his Remote SETI Client project. Last week, executive director H. Paul Shuch became the first person to steer Jim's 12-foot Paraclipse dish in azimuth and elevation, remotely via the Internet. Paul was in his living room in Pennsylvania, using his laptop computer via a WiFi connection to operate Jim's Project Argus station in Califorina. Details about the Remote SETI Client can be found on Jim's SETI Net server. W6KYP image

21 May 2005

Half a dozen of the presenters at the San Marino SETI conference in March were SETI League members. In attendance were two Regional Coordinators, a Committee Chairman, and our volunteer Executive Director (not seen in this photo). Salvo Pluchino photo

14 May 2005

James Brown, W6KYP (seen here with his Project Argus radio telescope and his 2005 Giordano Bruno Memorial Award) was honored at last month's SETI League annual meeting for 28 years of amateur SETI activity, including distribution of free tracking, coordination, and signal analysis software through his seti.net domain. See this Press Release for details. W6KYP photo

7 May 2005

The SETI League is saddened to report the passing last week of SETI patriarch Prof. Philip Morrison (seen here interacting with our Executive Director at a bioastronomy conference in Italy nine years ago). Please see this Remembrance of the man many of us considered the Father of Modern SETI Science. SETI League photo

30 April 2005

From The SETI League's 2005 Annual Membership Meeting in New Jersey last week, SETI League awards committee chairman David Ocame rang up this year's Giordano Bruno Memorial Award recipient by cellphone, to announce his award. James Brown, W6KYP, was honored for 28 years of amateur SETI activity, including distribution of free tracking, coordination, and signal analysis software through his seti.net domain. See this Press Release for details. SETI League photo

23 April 2005

Designed by artist Jon Lomberg in Hawaii, and produced by Canadian photographer Simon Bell, this compelling Portrait of Humanity was supposed to journey to Saturn's moon Titan aboard the recently triumphant Cassini/Huygens mission. Unfortunately, the image never flew. The full story about this abortive attempt to send an artifact into space is detailed in this article. Simon Bell photo

16 April 2005

Sun transit images before (top) and after (bottom) N1YVV made major upgrades to his Project Argus station last year. Dave's improvements include changing the antenna feed on his eight foot dish from a 3-turn helix to a cylindrical waveguide horn, replacing his Icom PRC-100 receiver with an Icom IC-R7000, disabling receiver AGC, and thermally stabilizing his downconverter crystal by adding a positive temperature coefficient thermistor. Sun noise now peaks at 7.44 dB, for a system G/T of 7 dB. N1YVV images

9 April 2005

G4PMK has been observing this strange, intermittent signal at his Project Argus station IO91ip. Roger writes, "These signals may appear for up to 20 minutes or so, up to several times a day, but a week or more may pass without getting any. They bear absolutely no relationship whatever to local or siderial time. What is characteristic is when put on the doppler display on SETIFOX, there are two peaks either side of the central one, at + - 22Hz, and these broad sidebands consist of a number of peaks. Experiment has established that they are coming in via the dish system and not from the IF or receiver electronics." Computer interference is suspected. G4PMK image

2 April 2005

Argonaut Harry Kimball has increased the instantaneous bandwidth of his Project Argus station from 96 kHz to 150 kHz, with 2.4 Hz bin resolution, by adding an RFSpace SDR-14 software-defined receiver. He writes, "I installed the SDR-14 as a direct replacement for the Time Machine (except that it connects to the USB port instead of the sound card) and have been running SpectraVue with best-guess parameters based on my experience with the Time Machine. So far it seems to be doing great." Information on Harry's earlier wide-bandwidth SETI receiver is found in Proceedings of SETICon04. N0TOU image

26 March 2005

Last night at a SETI dinner in Mountain View CA, executive director H. Paul Shuch presented The SETI League's 2005 Orville N. Greene Service Award to Prof. Rob Lodder, for his service as a Project Argus participant, Optical SETI advocate, volunteer Regional Coordinator, Strategic Planning Committee member, and Editor of Contact in Context, our online, peer-reviewed scholarly journal. Details may be found in this press release. SETI League photo

19 March 2005

Two weeks ago at the University of Toronto, member Allen Tough addressed students of the Astronomy and Space Exploration Society on the possibility of detecting advanced non-biological lifeforms in the cosmos. Cathy Rand photo

12 March 2005

The SETI League regrets to report the death on Thursday night of member Ben Aaron Wakes, father to executive director H. Paul Shuch. Mr. Wakes was a poet and artist who emigrated to the US from Poland (by way of England and Canada) in the mid-1930s. He was 86 years of age, and had been in failing health for only the past few months. (For those members curious about the difference in surnames, Dr. Shuch adopted his stepfather's name in 1958, but remained close to his natural father throughout his life. They were last together in California just over two weeks prior to Ben's death.) N6TX photo

5 March 2005

SETI League member Jon Lomberg is a prominent space artist, who was Carl Sagan's longtime illustrator and collaborator. "Approaching the Milky Way" was a key frame from the original COSMOS television series storyboards, showing the view as we enter the Milky Way at an oblique angle. This signed 1978 painting, gouache on paper, was the sketch from which the artist executed the final animation scene, one of the most vivid and widely reproduced from the entire COSMOS series. More of Lomberg's spectacular artwork is available here. H. Paul Shuch private collection

26 February 2005

Canadian members Allen Tough and George Raynault met with executive director H. Paul Shuch, at an informal SETI soire George hosted at his home near Toronto last August. Paul and Allen will be meeting again this week, for a joint presentation at the University of Toronto. Gloria Rong Zhang photo

19 February 2005

A lighter moment at last year's Universus 2004 conference in Montecorvino Rovella, Salerno Italy, saw our executive director trying (unsuccessfully) to sing some of his SETI songs in Italian. Fortunately, professional translations of his lyrics by Franca Genta saved the day! Universus 2004 photo

12 February 2005

Harry Kimball has detected his first instance of a signal that could not immediately be discounted as terrestrial interference. He writes, "the signal occurred on 12/29/2004 centered at approximately 00:43 UT, which puts it at about RA 0 hr 53 min and dec +30. It is contained in 4 files which each hold 2 minutes and 52 seconds of data, however, the timestamps on the files show that one of them was written to continuously and the other three were written to over a longer period indicating that the signal fell below the 'write to file' threshold on the software (SpectraVue). Consequently, the duration of the signal may range from about 20 to 40 minutes start to finish. My 3 dB beamwidth is about 19 minutes at this declination. The signal was at about 1420.053 MHz and drifted down in frequency, at varying rates, while being observed. The df/dt ranged from as low as 0.05 Hz/s to about 0.38 Hz/s. I would expect to see about 0.11 Hz/s due to the rotation of the Earth at this declination (I have a fixed azimuth at ~180 deg). I have been observing this declination and frequency for quite some time and have not seen a signal like this." Follow-up observations by other Argonauts are hereby solicited. N0TOU image

5 March 2005

Last month, several SETI League members helped to test a claim of alien technology on Earth. Here the test subject (who prefers not to be identified) explains to investigators the mechanism of extraterrestrial contact which he believed himself to be experiencing. Unfortunately (but not surprisingly), rigorous electromagnetic testing in this case yielded a negative result. The experiment is documented in this Press Release, with further details posted to the Invitation to ETI news pages. Richard Factor photo

29 January 2005

Executive director H. Paul Shuch was Keynote Speaker last July at the Universus 2004 conference in Montecorvino Rovella, Salerno Italy. The Osservatorio Scientifico Astronomico Gian Camillo Gloriosi has invited him back for the 2005 conference, scheduled for 27 to 31 July 2005, at which Dr. Shuch will lecture on meteors and asteroids, as a transport mechanism for microbial life. Universus 2004 photo

22 January 2005

In addition to ham radio and satellite TV dishes, Roger Weeks, KC9BDL, shares at least one other interest with certain SETI League members. He writes, "I play the guitar, a 40 year old Gretsch, in the key of C and G, but it sound like H." KC9BDL photo

15 January 2005

Several SETI League members were among those gathered in Montecorvino Rovella, Salerno Italy last summer for the Universus 2004 conference. Executive director H. Paul Shuch is looking to return to Italy in July for their 2005 conference, sponsored by the Osservatorio Scientifico Astronomico Gian Camillo Gloriosi. Universus 2004 photo

8 January 2005

Front view of one of the five 18-meter dishes comprising the Bracewell Observatory at Stanford University. The nonprofit group Friends of the Bracewell Observatory, a cooperative effort of The SETI League, the Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers, the Society of Amateur Scientists, and others, is raising funds to preserve this unique and historic facility. Exactly six months remain to save these abandoned antennas from demolition! SETI League photo

1 January 2005

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