Have alien civilizations built cosmic accelerators from black holes? Physics World.com

[Ichingcarpenter]

Has an advanced alien civilization built a black-hole-powered particle accelerator to study physics at "Planck-scale" energies? And if such a cosmic collider is lurking in a corner of the universe, could we detect it here on Earth?


Brian Lacki of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, New Jersey, has done calculations that suggest that if such an accelerator exists, it would produce yotta electron-volt (YeV or 1024 eV) neutrinos that could be detected here on Earth. As a result, Lacki is calling on astronomers involved in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) to look for these ultra-high-energy particles. This is supported by SETI expert Paul Davies of Arizona State University, who believes that the search should be expanded beyond the traditional telescope searches.


Like humanity, it seems reasonable to assume that an advanced alien civilization would have a keen interest in physics, and would build particle accelerators that reach increasingly higher energies. This energy escalation could be the result of the "nightmare scenario" of particle physics in which there is no new physics at energies between the TeV energies of the Standard Model and the 1028 eV Planck energy (10 XeV) – where the quantum effects of gravity become strong. "The nightmare of particle physics is the dream of astronomers searching for extraterrestrials," says Lacki.

An important problem facing alien physicists would be that the density of electromagnetic energy needed to reach the Planck scale is so great that the device would be in danger of collapsing into a black hole of its own making. However, Lacki points out that a clever designer could, in principle, get round this problem and "reaching [the] Planck energy is technically allowed, if extremely difficult".


http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2015/mar/19/have-alien-civilizations-built-cosmic-accelerators-from-black-holes

I thought it was an interesting mind exercise from physicists on the Kardashev scale

[NBachers]

1. Looks like those advanced civilizations have solved the Republican Conundrum.

[sunnystarr]

2. My eyes glazed over

as I tried to read and make sense of what I was reading. Then I wondered if that's what happens to those every day Americans who pay no attention to politics, government and history when they encounter any news story which exposes the egregious actions by the Repugs that impact their lives. Their eyes glaze over and they just vote for the GGG meme every time.

[bananas]

3. This could also answer the Fermi Paradox. nt

[bananas]

4. 100,000 ocean hydrophones, or lunar observation

While the oceans are far too murky for physicists to detect the light given off by the showers, Lacki reckons that the sound of a shower could be detected by a network of hydrophones in the water. However, because these neutrinos are expected to be extremely rare, he calculates that about 100,000 hydrophones would be needed to have a chance of detecting the neutrinos.

Whole of the Moon

Another possibility, albeit less sensitive, is to use the Moon as a neutrino detector. Indeed, the NuMoon experiment is currently using a ground-based radio telescope to try to detect showers created when 10^20 eV neutrinos smash into the lunar surface.