Milky Way likely ‘littered with dead alien civilisations’ – and scientists know where to find them

DEAD alien civilisations could be littered all over our galaxy, according to a new study.

Researchers used astronomy and statistical modelling to estimate how much intelligent life could have lived and died out in the Milky Way.

Researchers think aliens could have killed themselves offCredit: Alamy

The study has been published to the arXiv database.

It builds on a famous 1960s equation that Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence founder Frank Drake created.

The new model was written by three Caltech physicists and a high school student.

It looks at when and where life is most likely to live in the universe and also takes into account the idea that intelligent beings seem to end up destroying themselves.

A graph from the study shows the age of the Milky Way in billions of years compared to distance from the galactic centre and 13,000 light-years away is thought to be the sweet spot for lifeCredit: Cornell University

The researchers looked at rocky earth-like planets outside our Solar System that are near Sun-like stars.

Even if these planets are now un-habitable due to radiation or other factors, the scientists considered whether there would have been a time period when life could have formed there.

They modelled the evolution of the Milky Way and think intelligent life could have emerged 8 billion years after the Milky Way formed.

The Milky Way is now thought to be around 13 billion years old.

They think this life could have been 13,000 light-years from the galactic centre.

In comparison, the Earth is 25,000 light-years from the galactic centre.

The study suggests that even if civilisations out in the galaxy reached their peak 5 billion years ago, it’s likely they annihilated themselves.

Factors of self-annihilation could be something like nuclear war or climate change.

The researchers are now waiting for their work to be peer reviewed.

Milky Way facts

Here’s some things you might not have known about our galaxy…

The Milky Way is almost as old as the Universe itself with recently estimates suggestings that the Universe is around 13.7 or 13.8billion years old and the Milky Way is thought to be about 13.6billion years old
the Milky Way is disk shaped and measures about 120,000 light years across
It has a supermassive black hole in the middle called Sagittarius A*
It contains over 200 billion stars
It is thought to have an invisible halo made of dark matter

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