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Dyson Sphere

Astrobiology and the Search for Life

A Dyson sphere is a hypothetical megastructure that would encompass a star and capture a large percentage of its power output, proposed as a signature that a sufficiently advanced civilization's energy needs might leave behind. Physicist Freeman Dyson suggested that searches for such structures could be conducted by looking for unusual infrared emission, since waste heat from a fully enclosed star would radiate at infrared wavelengths.

Facts
Concept Domain
Astrobiology 1
Formulated Year
1960 1
A similar idea appeared earlier in Olaf Stapledon's 1937 novel Star Maker, which Dyson credited as an influence.
Proposed By
Freeman Dyson 1
Connections

Associated With

Source Wikipedia (space and spaceflight articles)
Source Wikipedia (space and spaceflight articles)
Great Filter, Concepts
Source Wikipedia (space and spaceflight articles)
Sun, Celestial Objects
Source Wikipedia (space and spaceflight articles)
Sources
1. Wikipedia (space and spaceflight articles)
Wikimedia Foundation
  • Dyson sphere, history section
    The same concept was later used by physicist Freeman Dyson in his 1960 paper 'Search for Artificial Stellar Sources of Infrared Radiation'.
  • Associated With: Fermi Paradox
  • Associated With: Great Filter
  • Associated With: Von Neumann Probe
View the Source
Dyson sphere (Wikipedia)
  • Dyson sphere, lead section
    A Dyson sphere is a hypothetical megastructure that encompasses a star and captures a large percentage of its power output.
  • In Group: The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, Lead sentence
    A Dyson sphere is a hypothetical megastructure that encompasses a star and captures a large percentage of its power output.
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