Free Astronomy Magazine September-October 2020

32 ASTROBIOLOGY The search for traces of other life in our own solar system is experiencing a remark- able boost, and the automatic missions already started or close to launch could produce some significant evidence in the coming years. Finding those traces would mean very little compared to direct contact with another technological civilization, but the achievement of this further goal de- pends only minimally on our own will. In the mind of ET by Michele Ferrara revised by Damian G. Allis NASA Solar System Ambassador SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2020 A dam Frank, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Rochester in New York, recently re- ceived a grant from NASA for a SETI research project. At first glance it might not seem to be fascinating news, but since such a grant has not been awarded for more than twenty years, it may be useful to understand what has changed in the meantime. Let's start with SETI, which stands for Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. We can de- fine it as a collective term that includes all those scientific researchers aimed at discov- ering evidence of evolved civilizations be- yond the Earth. Although the SETI Institute