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Extraterrestrial Technosignature Still a Viable Explanation for 'Oumuamua, was it an Interstellar Probe?

By biophysicist William Brown, research scientist at RSF

In 2019 we reported on the first interstellar visitor to our solar system and the interesting proposal by Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb that it could be a possible technosignature of extraterrestrial engineering. Loeb proposed this hypothesis to answer many of the anomalous observables of the interstellar visitor, named 'Oumuamua, such as its oscillating reflectivity— indicating that its profile is changing from a large area to a smaller one, so that it is either flat like a solar sail, or long and thin like a cigar shape and tumbling— the lack of any outgassing as it passed by the Sun, and its anomalous trajectory whereby it accelerated as it left the gravitational well of the Sun and our solar system.

Loeb further expounds that the sudden acceleration and deviation of 'Oumuamua from its expected orbit appeared to be the result of radiation pressure, which is precisely how solar sails achieve propulsion....

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