Mission

The mission of UCLA SETI is to find evidence of other civilizations in the universe and extract information encoded in extraterrestrial signals.

Prospects for life elsewhere

Based on data from the NASA Kepler telescope, we know that there are billions of potentially habitable worlds in the Galaxy.

Prospects for establishing contact

Radio telescopes can detect signals emitted tens of thousands of light years away, enabling contact from a large fraction of the Galaxy.

Prospects for humanity

Imagine what we could learn if we received signals from an advanced civilization. Imagine the benefits to science, engineering, medicine, the arts, and philosophy.

Inspiration

Dr. Margot was inspired by Paul Horowitz’s SETI talk at Carl Sagan’s 60th birthday celebration at Cornell University, where Dr. Margot was a graduate student. Carl Sagan vigorously promoted SETI, and his position was endorsed by many other eminent scientists. Frank Drake conducted the first SETI search and was Dr. Margot’s thesis advisor’s thesis advisor. Jill Tarter devoted her career to SETI and has provided guidance about our search.

Get involved

We host a citizen science collaboration on Zooniverse. Please consider partnering with us to identify the most interesting signals in our data. Subscribe to our newsletter to stay informed about our progress. Past issues of our newsletter are available.

Watch a two-minute video about the UCLA SETI course or a 30-minute talk about the search for life in the universe.

Feel free to get in touch.

Background photo: central region of the Galaxy by Yuri Beletsky