A new telescope has detected ‘hundreds’ of mysterious radio bursts from space, prompting a string of theories about where they’re coming from. 

Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) are very short but very intense pulses of radio waves that were first discovered in 2007. Lasting as little as a fraction of a millisecond, they are thought to travel to Earth from other galaxies far out in the universe and could be coming from other civilisations, according to Harvard scientist professor Avi Loeb.

This news comes on the back of reports that UFO’s may not be as fanciful as they were previously believed to be. But do aliens actually exist? There would seem to be three main possibilities.

• They don’t exist. Our planet hosts the only life in the universe.
• Other planets do host life, but they are all less advanced than us or have not reached a stage in their development where interstellar travel or communications is an option for them, so we don’t know they are there.
• The most chilling possibility is that there were more advanced life forms than us, but they destroyed themselves, leaving no trace that they ever existed.

This latest report reinvigorates the ongoing debate.