Questions About Contact in the Movie

[skredp]

Hello I am new here and my question is this:

Spatially, what is the distance EM travels through space before redshift alters the wave to the extent that a radio signal becomes a microwave signal?

Also when a radio signal containing information redshifts to the microwave band is the information retrievable still? Such as audio?

These questions are based off the movie contact.

is it correct that we cannot as yet, boost a signal, we can merely relay or jump a signal?
And finally what makes a signal strong as opposed to weak? The shorter a wavelength the higher the energy. This I understand but I do not understand when ones says we have a powerful broadcasting antennae.
If one has a receiver, why would one say the signal is faint when there isn't enough distance in order for redshifts effects to be pronounced

once these questions are answered I eventually want to determine whether there is A shell threshold distance aroundearth such that we can determine a distance of nem front which can rule out any other EM front conflicting with ours in the local region. What would happen when the noise front of ones planets radio and video signals clashes with another?

In the movie contact the star Vega received our signal which was 65 light years away or approximately but the signal wasn't redshifted did the movie assume that they were able toreconstruct the signal using technology or was there not enough distance involved in order for the signal to be red shifted??

Thank you

 

[Orodruin]

The redshift depends on the expansion of the universe during the travel of the light. Not only on the light travel time. Regardless, 65 years with the current expansion rate is way (waaaaaaay) to short for cosmological redahift to be noticable. Also note that 65 lightyears does not even get you out of the galaxy, which is a bound gravitational object. Cosmological redshift does not apply on these scales.

 

[skredp]

The redshift depends on the expansion of the universe during the travel of the light. Not only on the light travel time. Regardless, 65 years with the current expansion rate is way (waaaaaaay) to short for cosmological redahift to be noticable. Also note that 65 lightyears does not even get you out of the galaxy, which is a bound gravitational object. Cosmological redshift does not apply on these scales.

Thanks unfortunately I previously knewall the information in your reply. I know that 65 light years is relatively short but shift does occur in that distance albeit small. What I am trying to acertain in an understanding of the metrics here. Such as an EM signal will degrade by one bandwith number per x amount of travel time/space.
Thanks again

 

[Chronos]

Only peculiar motion would affect the redshift of Vega, as already noted. Vega is actually moving towards Earth at about 14 km/s which causes a slight blue shift in its spectrum.

 

[skredp]

What I am ultimately attempting to establish is if there is a way we can determine that there are no civilizations that have broadcasted in radio within a certain distance from us. I understand that radio begins at 3ghtz and becomes an infrared wave after 300ghts.

I would like to know the distance and/or time that a radio signal will travel, assuming its emminated at 3ghtz, for it to redshift to 301ghts

This is the distance from Earth which we can safely say no civilizations with similar technology to ours exist.

If redshift didn't exist, we could already rule out the entire universe.

 

[Janus]

What I am ultimately attempting to establish is if there is a way we can determine that there are no civilizations that have broadcasted in radio within a certain distance from us. I understand that radio begins at 3ghtz and becomes an infrared wave after 300ghts.

I would like to know the distance and/or time that a radio signal will travel, assuming its emminated at 3ghtz, for it to redshift to 301ghts

This is the distance from Earth which we can safely say no civilizations with similar technology to ours exist.

If redshift didn't exist, we could already rule out the entire universe.

Red shift isn't the issue, it's the falloff of signal strength. Signal strength falls off by the square of the distance. The distance at which a signal becomes unreadable is where its strength has fallen to the point where it is overwhelmed by the natural back ground radio noise.

 

[skredp]

thats answers my question partiality. So signal strength is main culpit. That makes the job of ruling out eti's more challenging radio communications isn't effective for long range communication. And directional lasers are also less effective at long range unless you know where the paths of least obstruction are in your local galaxy.

We may still be able to rule out a certain distance though based upon radio signal strength drop off assuming eti's are using high powered sophisticated radio.
Its my understanding that voyagers signal outside our solar system is almost undetectable. If advanced species are using radio, than they have fixed relay stations and/or far more powerful broadcasters on their probes/ships

Aif all these assumptions are true we would have heard something by now.
thanks for your replies

 

[skredp]

Also, you cannot hide your planets initial em front. So there are 5 possibilities for our non detection

1 their signals haven't reached us yet
2 they're to far away to detect their radio signals.
3 they have since stopped broadcasting in radio before humans started listening
4 they use radio but from the very start or soon after they found a way to mask it.
5 their radio is totally directional

 

[davenn]

What I am ultimately attempting to establish is if there is a way we can determine that there are no civilizations that have broadcasted in radio within a certain distance from us. I understand that radio begins at 3ghtz and becomes an infrared wave after 300ghts.

you seem to misunderstand red shifting
when an EM signal is red shifted it lowers in frequency, not increases

I understand that radio begins at 3ghtz and becomes an infrared wave after 300ghts.

you understand incorrectly

if that were the case, radio, TV and cellphone ( and many other) transmissions, which are all below 3 GHz wouldn't exist

Also please get used to using the correct scientific terms Hz, kHz, MHz, GHz etc

UHF ( Ultra High Frequency) radio signals go from 300 MHz to 3 GHz
SHF ( Super High Frequency) microwave radio signals go from 3 GHz to 30 GHz
EHF ( Extra High Frequency) microwave radio signals go from 30 GHz to 300 GHz
THF ( Tremendously High Frequency) microwave signals go from 300 GHz to 3 THz

Lower frequency bands below UHF include ELF, LF, MF, HF, VHF and a couple of other low ones

As Orodruin said, red shifting of EM signals within our galaxy isn't something that needs to be considered in any general calculations
that you would be dealing withDave

 

[davenn]

1 their signals haven't reached us yet

would depend on the age of that civilisation and its technological development

2 they're to far away to detect their radio signals.

a possibility if their signals are just too weak to detect against the background noise

3 they have since stopped broadcasting in radio before humans started listening

yes maybe, but that is also a technology thing and their older signals would still be traveling out into the galaxy anyway even is all the transmitters were shut off

4 they use radio but from the very start or soon after they found a way to mask it.

possibly but not likely

5 their radio is totally directional

that would be a disadvantage for their own use ... broadcast signals need to be non directional to make then useful for a good area coverageD

 

[sophiecentaur]

is it correct that we cannot as yet, boost a signal, we can merely relay or jump a signal?

I do not understand what you mean by the word "boost". You can relay a signal from the edge of reception from one transmitter by receiving it and re-transmitting it. You can either just use an amplifier (which amplifies all the shash and erroneous bits of the signal) or decode it, tidy it up , using error correction and then re-transmit it. That's (very nearly) as good as starting from scratch at your remote relay site.
It is not a difficult matter to compensate for red shift by merely setting your receiver to a slightly lower frequency. In optical terms, you can see, with a spectrometer, the characteristic lines from elements in a distant source and, by looking at the patterns - just red shifted by a bit, you can determine what elements are there and their relative abundance. That is effectively getting information from a red shifted signal.
If you are hoping to spot radio signals from extra terrestrials then any red shift would be pretty much ignored because you wouldn't know what the original carrier frequency was and you would just 'scan' your the signals from your radiotelescope to find 'some sense'.
So far, I am not aware that CETI or others have actually identified any thing.
If you want a more sensitive receiving system then the ultimate would have to be a massive receiving dish, out in space, which never points at any nearby interfering sources (Sum, Earth etc) and which could be a big and sensitive as you want (or can pay for). Problem is that sensitivity is always at the cost of directivity or bandwidth so you could look 'further' but with an incredibly narrow receive beam so you could miss something important that was just a smidgen away from where you were looking.

that would be a disadvantage for their own use ... broadcast signals need to be non directional to make then useful for a good area coverage

It would depend on where their transmitter is situated. If they used satellites to broadcast to a planet(s), then the 'broadcast' beam(s) would be pretty narrow and mostly blocked by the target planet. Omnidirectional antennas are mainly for terrestrial sites in the centre of a service area. (Even then, they are vertically directive.)

 

[davenn]

It would depend on where their transmitter is situated. If they used satellites to broadcast to a planet(s), then the 'broadcast' beam(s) would be pretty narrow and mostly blocked by the target planet. Omnidirectional antennas are mainly for terrestrial sites in the centre of a service area. (Even then, they are vertically directive.)

Yeah, I was thinking of ground based radio, TV other commercial and maybe even amateur type transmissions
or even those purposely aimed into space

 

[sophiecentaur]

Thinking about it, it is highly unlikely that we would pick up transmissions that were actually aimed at the local population of this new civilisation. What would be the point of them putting out enough TeraWatts (GoogleWatts) of power to reach Earth, if all they wanted to do was serve the locals (a few tens of millions of miles perhaps)? That would be really lousy Engineering and these guys would actually need to be pretty advance Engineers. The only reason we would be likely to receive a signal would be if it was deliberately beamed in our direction (by chance) and at the same time as our very sensitive and directional receive antenna happened to be pointing in their direction.
The other alternative would be if the signals were sent and received in such a ridiculously narrow bandwidth that they could be dug out of the noise. Then, you could imagine a 'sensible' power of transmitter could be picked up by a 'reasonable' receiver. Problem there is, however, that you'd be dealing with μBaud data rates and waiting for years until the signal could be decoded.

 

[skredp]

In the movie contact, "vegans" received our omnidirectional radio signal from hitlers olympic games broadcast. until recently, I never asked more questions about the premise that Earth has a 360 degree and 80 light year longem wave front. While this is true I didnt acount for background noise and signal strength.
and as was mentioned earlier, when distance is long enough for redshift to impact the signal, that there's no way to extrapolate what frequency it was originally broadcast on nor would it be decodable.

I believe the signals are out there but for any eti's including us to detect them we would need a vast sophisticated star trek like network of radio receivers.

Of course if they don't want to be detected lazers tranmitters using light to communication would be better since to be detected you would need to be within the beam itself.

I believe a work around exists to the no communication theorem

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-communication_theorem

 

[sophiecentaur]

While this is true I didnt acount for background noise and signal strength.

AS in the hokie kokie -That's what it's all about.

 

[skredp]

What? Is AS?

 

[skredp]

AS in the hokie kokie -That's what it's all about.

Whats hokie kokue?

 

[davenn]

What? Is AS?

as = a word = eg as in it was in the past

Whats hokie kokie?

or hokey cokey

 

[skredp]

Sorry I meant to post this on a physics forum not reddit, I see I am in the wrong place

 

[russ_watters]

and as was mentioned earlier, when distance is long enough for redshift to impact the signal, that there's no way to extrapolate what frequency it was originally broadcast on nor would it be decodable.

People have pointed out other errors, but that one is wrong too. TV and radio signals are sent at lots of different frequencies and are decoded in much the same way. All it takes is tuning into the right carrier frequency and figuring out how it is modulated. (which is basically how it went in the movie)

 

[Chronos]

Radio is an extremely low tech way to communicate across interstellar, much less intergalactic distances. It's like an ant pulsing piss signals on a a drop of water. Who do you expect will receive that message, much less understand it? It's not unlike shouting into the dark of a deep cavern in hope of reaching a search party.

 

[sophiecentaur]

Radio is an extremely low tech way to communicate

? It's as sophisticated as your pocket will allow. What's low tech about the techniques available today, even?

 

[russ_watters]

Probably referring to analog radio, as was I, as was the movie Contact. Indeed, the death of analog radio provides a good reason why SETI might fail: many more sophisticated technologies are more directional and use lower wattage, so there might be a narrow time window for detection due to the advancement of civilization.

 

[sophiecentaur]

I think the basic idea of Broadcast entertainment signals being any use at all for long distant contact is a non starter. Is there really much point in pursuing the ideas of a Hollywood film much further?
It would be more fruitful to advance with some serious Engineering opinions on the thread.

 

[ogg]

EMR does not (significantly) 'clash'. If it did, we'd not be here.
Radio doesn't redshift to micro. Also, Micro spectrum is part of radio spectrum. These are sloppy historical terms. Avoid them, be specific.
IF we know the encoding, any detectable signal is decodable.
For a photon E= hv. For a signal, E ~ number of photons collected (as well as frequency,v).
There are 3 'types' of redshift. Dopler (or velocity), General Relativistic (or gravitational) and Cosmological. Cosmological redshift isn't 'significant' below about 10 million lightyears.
You make far too many assumptions about ETIs. In order for us to detect their emr "waste" radiation, it has to have been emitted exactly long enough ago to be detectable today, here. For us to decode it, it needs to be broadcast at one or at most a few frequencies.But consider detecting our cell-phone signals from alpha-centuri. IS there a signal there, or just noise?

 

[sophiecentaur]

In order for us to detect their emr "waste" radiation, it has to have been emitted exactly long enough ago to be detectable today, here.

That's yet another factor which would affect our 'intersection' with any other civilisation. They have to be sending and we have to be looking in appropriate directions, they need to be sending and we need to be looking in the same frequency bands. Modulation systems must be compatible with demodulation and decoding and they need to be (or have been) sending at a time which fits in with the propagation delay. Even if the ETI was relatively nearby, the chances of their radiotelescopes and our radiotelescopes actually pointing towards each other during a transmission attempt is depressingly low.
There is also a 'relevance' factor. If we get a message from a source that is more than a civilisation's life span in light years then we cannot hold a conversation. In fact, more than a few hundred light years distance would make it a pretty stilted conversation and would not be very relevant to our lives (novelty factor excluded).
I still hold that 'waste' radiation is very unlikely to be a useful signal to detect because people (even little green engineers) just do not use that much excess transmitter power to give us a Signal to Noise Ratio for receiving their signals. All communication relies on adequate SNR and you can't get round that, even by compromising on bandwith, if you actually want to transmit a message.

 

[russ_watters]

I think the basic idea of Broadcast entertainment signals being any use at all for long distant contact is a non starter. Is there really much point in pursuing the ideas of a Hollywood film much further?
It would be more fruitful to advance with some serious Engineering opinions on the thread.

Given that the movie was based on the book by Carl Sagan, it is itself a serious engineering (scientific) opinion: "Contact" is no "2001". We just need to make sure to treat it with the appropriate seriousness.

As SETI goes, the movie is fairly plausible, but it is worth noting that the book was published in 1985; before the modern internet, cell phones, wifi, etc. -- much less digital TV/radio.

There is also a 'relevance' factor. If we get a message from a source that is more than a civilisation's life span in light years then we cannot hold a conversation.

Holding a conversation is not one of SETI's goals. Just answering The Question could be a world-changing discovery.

I still hold that 'waste' radiation is very unlikely to be a useful signal to detect because people (even little green engineers) just do not use that much excess transmitter power to give us a Signal to Noise Ratio for receiving their signals.

Earlier in the thread I suggested the OP should do that calculation. I have, and yes, it is possible for SETI to detect the type of transmissions we are sending, at reasonable distances (a few tens of light years at least). I can dig it out of no one else wants to do it.

 

[rootone]

A few tens of light years is almost right next to us on a cosmological scale though.
If intelligent life exists as close as that then it's almost guaranteed to be a commonplace occurrence,
and if that were the case I would expect we would have found more than the one unexplained and unrepeated "wow" signal by now.

 

[sophiecentaur]

Earlier in the thread I suggested the OP should do that calculation. I have, and yes, it is possible for SETI to detect the type of transmissions we are sending, at reasonable distances (a few tens of light years at least). I can dig it out of no one else wants to do it.

Yes. The actual numbers really do count and one thing that the Inverse Square Law does is to keep on going. You have to double to the distance (whatever it is), to cause the received power flux to drop to a quarter. Ditto for ten times the distance etc, etc and the dB scale is such a good one to use in such matters - What's a further 60dB in the eyes of a comms engineer? It just means taking a bit longer to do the measurement.
It would be truly exciting and scary if SETI actually came up with something that originates from not too far away. I wonder whether 'Governments' have planned for the possible civil unrest and panic, should SETI actually produce a result. Hollywood would not be able to produce anything close to the possible reality of the reactions. (the Orson Welles effect).
That could be interesting for PF.
I haven't read the Sagan Book so I can't comment on it. Do your sums agree with what he implies or states? His popular image is a bit 'Tesla' and I wonder whether he ever allowed himself to get caught up in the romance of it all - despite being an obviously clever guy ( and far more down to Earth than Nicola) and a great broadcaster.