Alien Megastructure On Distant Star

So a while ago scientists found a star by the name of KIC 84628532 which was showing some weird dimming patterns.

Ever since KIC 84628532 was spotted in the Kepler Space Telescope’s dataset, astronomers have puzzled over what the heck could be responsible for the star’s logic-defying light curve. Over four years of observational data, KIC 8462852 flickered erratically, its light output sometimes dropping by as much as 20%. That’s highly unusual stellar behavior, and it can’t be explained by a transiting planet.

Initially they could not explain what was causing the dimming, but then they thought it could be caused by comets. Now scientists are saying that it can't be comets.

But according to a study just released arXiv, the comet hypothesis is now falling flat, too, and the mystery of KIC 8462852 has deepened considerably. While Kepler only has a few years of data on the star, astronomer Bradley Schaefer of Louisiana State University decided to look at photographic plates of the sky dating back to the late 19th century. To his amazement, he learned that over the last hundred years, KIC 8462852's light output has steadily faded by about 19%, something that’s “completely unprecedented for any F-type main sequence star.”

Just thought I'd share this with you ATS. What do you guys think, could it be an alien megastructure? Or something even more bizarre.

Article

a reply to: beyondtheskys

Someone posted this the other day.

Said somthing about it taking 670,000 comits 200km across each to block that much light.

Seems really unlikely to me.

So back to alien megastructure as the best explanation so far.

a reply to: beyondtheskys

To be fair, this topic has just recently been discussed a lot. It was about as viral as astrophysics can ever be.

The Gizmodo article is about this brand new paper: KIC 8462852 Faded at an Average Rate of 0.165+-0.013 Magnitudes Per Century From 1890 To 1989.

Rather than the 'alien megastructures' that caught our imaginations, this paper studies decades worth of photographic plates to show that this star has diminishing light across the century as well as day-long fluctuations. It remains interesting because they haven't seen this behaviour in stars before. The popular explanation, at the time, was a comet swarm; this paper argues that the explanation does not work.

(that's off a quick skim of the paper)

ETA - this is the original thread (160+ flags) from mid-October

Ohhhh Beyondtheskys, oh where have you been, beyond the skys?
What could it be what could it be. I'm waiting for more information just like you.

Topics of potential interest:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

It is indeed very tantalizing. Alas, so far they have yet to determine what is causing the dimming definitively, but are presently leaning towards a comet swarm (though an unprecedented one, if the articles are to be taken at face value, would be required to account for what was observed.)

Peace.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

We all hope its aliens, its probably not but we can dream!

a reply to: beyondtheskys

It was posted already. But always great to see other post, it's VERY interesting!!!

Couldn't the star's apparent dimming be due to transient clouds of interstellar dust and gas? Seems more likely than "alien megastructure"...

Please continue your discussions here - www.abovetopsecret.com...

Thanks!