English

A Gravitational Wave Transmitter

Popular Physics 2018-06-22 v4 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology

Abstract

We consider how an advanced civilization might build a radiator to send gravitational waves signals by using small black holes. Micro black holes on the scale of centimeters but with masses of asteroids to planets are manipulated with a super advanced instrumentality, possibly with very large electromagnetic fields. The machine envisioned emits gravitational waves in the GHz frequency range. If the source to receiver distance is a characteristic length in the galaxy, up to 10000 light years, the masses involved are at least planetary in magnitude. To provide the energy for this system we posit a very advanced civilization that has a Kerr black hole at its disposal and can extract energy by way of super-radiance. Background gravitational radiation sets a limit on the dimensionless amplitude that can be measured at interstellar distance using a LIGO like detector.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1806.02334,
  title  = {A Gravitational Wave Transmitter},
  author = {A. A. Jackson and Gregory Benford},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1806.02334},
  year   = {2018}
}

Comments

19 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-23T02:21:34.332Z