Bridging Multi-Messenger Astronomy and SETI: The Deep Ends of the Haystack Workshop
Thank you to everyone who attended the workshop—we truly appreciate your participation and engagement. We're pleased to let you know that a PDF copy of the presentations shared during the workshop is now available for download on this webpage.
We hope you find the materials helpful and informative as you continue exploring the topics we covered.
High-energy and multimessenger astronomy, covering X-rays, gamma-rays, neutrinos, cosmic rays, and gravitational waves, has had little contact with the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). We hope this workshop will help build bridges between these two communities. Topics we hope to cover include:
- Potential technosignatures at high energy and with non-photon messengers, both deliberate attempts at communication and byproducts of industrial activities
- The use of SETI facilities for observations relevant to high-energy astrophysics and cosmology, like radio telescopes searching for dark matter annihilation lines or primordial black hole evaporation
- The use of high-energy or multimessenger facilities for "conventional" SETI, such as the use of Cherenkov telescopes for optical pulse SETI
- Prospects for searching for proposed technosignatures in existing datasets.
We invite people interested in these topics to present at the workshop. Discussion participants are also welcome.
We intend this workshop to be balanced between presentations and discussions. Presentations will include high-level reviews of fields and volunteered talks about specific topics. Discussions will consist of informal breaks, one or more "open floor" discussions, possibly one or more panel discussions, and an opportunity to participate in the Astronomy Coffee of Ohio State.
There will be a mix of senior and junior-level attendees at the workshop.
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE
Brian Lacki
John Beacom
Amy Connolly
Sofia Sheikh
Todd Thompson
This workshop is supported in part by Breakthrough Listen, sponsored by the Breakthrough Prize Foundation.
Workshop Materials
Paramita Dasgupta, CCAPP, OSU — "Experimental Searches for Ultra High Energy Particles"
Rosanne Di Stefano, Harvard — "X-Ray Astronomy: Implications for SETI"
Steve DiKerby, Michigan State U. — "Supermassive Black Holes as Singular Schelling Points"
Vishal Gajjar, SETI Institute & UC Berkeley — "On the Broadband Radio Technosignature Searches"
Jacob Haqq-Misra, Blue Marble Space Institute of Science — "Thermodynamic Limits and Search Strategies for Long-Lived Technospheres"
Jamie Holder, U of Delaware — "Using Ground-based Gamma-Ray Telescopes as Optical SETI Detectors, and Vice Versa"
C.J. Horowitz, Indiana U. — "Continuous Gravitational Waves and SETI"
Ravi Kopparapu, NASA Goddard — "The Science and the Landscape of Technosignatures"
Brian Lacki, Breakthrough Listen & Oxford — "Possibilities for High-Energy and Multi-Messenger SETI"
Brian Lacki, Breakthrough Listen & Oxford — "When Particle Physicists Become Cosmic Engineers"
Brian S McConnell — "The Interstellar Communication Relay"
Kohta Murase, Penn State — "High-Energy Multimessenger Particle Astrophysics"
Sofia Sheikh, SETI Institute — "The Nine Axes of Merit: One Framework for Prioritizing Technosignature Searches "
Matthew Szydagis, U of Albany SUNY — "Potential Signatures of Exotic Propulsion from Extraterrestrial Civilizations"
Chenoa Tremblay, SETI Institute/NRAO/UNM — "Exploration for Technological Signals Using Radio Telescopes"
Slava G. Turyshev, JPL (CalTech) — "Gravitational Lensing for Multi-Messenger Astronomy and SETI"
Clément Vidal, U of Brussel — "X-Ray Binaries as Candidate Technosignatures: Metabolism, Navigation and Migration"
WORKSHOP INFORMATION
EVENT DATES: Monday June 23 - Tuesday June 24, 2025
Workshop Schedule
CODE OF CONDUCT
Please read the CCAPP Code of Conduct.
ILLNESS POLICY
One of the key participants is immunocompromised. For this reason, we ask that all in-person attendees wear a mask in-session. Additionally, if you are feeling ill, we will set you up in a private room where you can participate by Zoom. Thank you for your help in protecting the health of our colleague.
WEATHER
The weather for Monday and Tuesday is predicted to be extremely hot and humid, with temperatures around 100 Fahrenheit (approaching 40 Celsius). Lunch and Monday dinner are scheduled to occur at the Physics Research Building itself, which has both indoor (air-conditioned) and outdoor seating.
VENUE
The workshop will be held in:
Room 4138
Physics Research Building
191 West Woodruff Avenue
Columbus, OH 43210
ZOOM LINK
If you are already registered and have not received the Zoom link, please e-mail astrobrianlacki@gmail.com to request it.
PRESENTATION LOGISTICS
If you are presenting in person, we will ask that you connect to Zoom to share your presentation rather than connecting to the room's HDMI cable. This is to ease the logistics of the hybrid conference and help allow for questions from within the room.
ASTRONOMY COFFEE
On Tuesday morning, we will be participating in Astronomy Coffee, the morning group discussion held by the OSU Astronomy department. This is held in 4054 McPherson, which is a few minutes' walk from the Physics Research Building. Please see this page for more information:
https://astronomy.osu.edu/coffee. We will be giving registrants the password for participation by Zoom on Monday.
DISCUSSION SESSIONS
There will be a mix of discussion sessions. In addition to the panel and open discussions, we have two other types of activity:
* Let's Build the Haystack: A group activity in which we will come up with all kinds of capabilities we have in different wavebands and messengers and brainstorm possible phenomena (natural and artificial) they might be used to find.
* Change My Mind: A fun exercise in which I will pose a thesis and we will see how it holds up to scrutiny.