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Data from: A search for technosignatures from 14 planetary systems in the Kepler field with the Green Bank Telescope at 1.15–1.73 GHz

Margot, Jean-Luc, University of California Los Angeles, https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9798-1797
Greenberg, Adam H., University of California Los Angeles, https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8834-9423
Pinchuk, Pavlo, University of California Los Angeles, https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4736-4728
Shinde, Akshay, University of California Los Angeles
Alladi, Yashaswi, University of California Los Angeles
MN, Srinivas Prasad, Breathe California of Los Angeles County
Bowman, M. Oliver, University of California Los Angeles
Fisher, Callum, University of California Los Angeles
Gyalay, Szilard, University of California Los Angeles
McKibbin, Willow, University of California Los Angeles
Miles, Brittany, University of California Los Angeles
Nguyen, Donald, University of California Los Angeles
Power, Conor, University of California Los Angeles
Ramani, Namrata, University of California Los Angeles
Raviprasad, Rashmi, University of California Los Angeles
Santana, Jesse, University of California Los Angeles
Lynch, Ryan S., West Virginia University
jlm@epss.ucla.edu
Published Aug 03, 2020 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5068/D1309D

Cite this dataset

Margot, Jean-Luc et al. (2020). Data from: A search for technosignatures from 14 planetary systems in the Kepler field with the Green Bank Telescope at 1.15–1.73 GHz [Dataset]. Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5068/D1309D

Abstract

This dataset describes candidate signal detections obtained at the Green Bank Telescope in 2016 and reprocessed with the 2020 UCLA SETI Group data processing pipeline.

Analysis of Kepler mission data suggests that the Milky Way includes billions of Earth-sized planets in the habitable zone of their host stars. Current technology enables the detection of technosignatures emitted from a large fraction of the Galaxy. We describe a search for technosignatures that is sensitive to Arecibo-class transmitters located within ∼420 ly of Earth and transmitters that are 1000 times more effective than Arecibo within ∼13000 ly of Earth. Our observations focused on 14 planetary systems in the Kepler field and used the L-band receiver (1.15–1.73 GHz) of the 100 m diameter Green Bank Telescope. Each source was observed for a total integration time of 5 minutes. We obtained power spectra at a frequency resolution of 3 Hz and examined narrowband signals with Doppler drift rates between ±9 Hz s −1 . We flagged any detection with a signal-to-noise ratio in excess of 10 as a candidate signal and identified approximately 850,000 candidates. Most (99%) of these candidate signals were automatically classified as human-generated radio-frequency interference (RFI). A large fraction (>99%) of the remaining candidate signals were also flagged as anthropogenic RFI because they have frequencies that overlap those used by global navigation satellite systems, satellite downlinks, or other interferers detected in heavily polluted regions of the spectrum. All 19 remaining candidate signals were scrutinized and none were attributable to an extraterrestrial source.

Methods

Please see journal article for methods.

Usage notes

The field descriptions are as follows:

  • ID: a unique integer identifier for the signal
  • NAME: the name of the source
  • SCAN: the scan index number (1, 2) for the source
  • MJD: the Modified Julian Date at the start of the scan
  • FREQ: the frequency (Hz) at the start of the scan
  • DFDT: the rate of change in frequency (Hz/s)
  • Z: the signal power integrated over the scan duration aka Z score (standard deviations of the noise)
  • BW: an estimate of the bandwidth (FWHM) of the signal (Hz)
  • FSNR: a flag set to Y if signal power exceeds detection threshold
  • FDOP: a flag set to Y if DFDT is not zero
  • FBTH: a flag set to Y if signal is detected in both scans of this source
  • FOTH: a flag set to Y if signal is not detected in scans of other sources
  • FAND: a flag set to Y if FSNR=FDOP=FBTH=FOTH=Y
  • PARTNER: the ID of the signal in a subsequent scan of this source, if known
  • RFICODE: an identifier for the probable source of RFI
  • NOTES: additional notes

The field names and types are as follows:

+---------+--------------+
| Field   | Type         |
+---------+--------------+
| ID      | int(11)      |
| NAME    | varchar(50)  |
| SCAN    | int(4)       |
| MJD     | double(16,8) |
| FREQ    | double(20,6) |
| DFDT    | double(14,8) |
| Z       | double(15,3) |
| BW      | double(8,1)  |
| FSNR    | char(1)      |
| FDOP    | char(1)      |
| FBTH    | char(1)      |
| FOTH    | char(1)      |
| FAND    | char(1)      |
| PARTNER | int(11)      |
| RFICODE | char(5)      |
| NOTES   | text         |
+---------+--------------+