Scientists suggest that an advanced civilization could adapt quantum technology to a grandiose scale. The researchers immediately propose looking for evidence of large-scale quantum computing as a potential techno-signature for SETI, the community’s search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

Why black holes?

The research is based on the idea that black holes are the most efficient storage of quantum information, but devices (called “saturons”) created by non-gravitational interactions while also saturating information storage capacity have been proposed. Black holes may be the primary computational source for advanced extraterrestrial civilizations and may explain the apparent lack of activity we observe as we gaze into space.

The research was led by theoretical physicist Gia Dvali from the Department of Physics at Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich and the Max Planck Institute for Physics, and Zaza Osmanov, professor of physics at the Free University of Tbilisi and researcher in Tbilisi. Kharadze Georgian National Astrophysical Observatory.

This research is a new direction for the SETI community because it suggests we need to expand our techno-signature research beyond focusing on traditional radio broadcasts and look for other methods such as directed energy, neutrino emission, quantum communications, and gravitational waves.

Today we mainly study radio signals, and several attempts have been made to scan the sky for megastructures built around stars called Dyson spheres. On the other hand, the SETI problem is so complex that it makes sense to test all possible options.
– note the authors.

This idea stems from physicist Roger Penrose’s hypothesis that black holes may be an unlimited source of energy that can collect in the ergosphere, the region around the event horizon of black holes. Many researchers have assumed that technologically advanced civilizations did this.