Key figures
The Harvard astronomer behind the Galileo Project and the Oumuamua light-sail idea. 14 events, newest first.
Select any year above to see what happened that year.
Government19 Dec 2025
Interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS came no closer to Earth than about 270 million km (1.8 AU), on Dec. 19, 2025, per NASA, posing no danger. Astrophysicist Avi Loeb kept pointing to anomalies, while NASA treated it as a natural comet.
Photo: NASA, ESA, STScI, D. Jewitt (UCLA), M.-T. Hui, Public domain
Media6 Aug 2025
Omer Eldadi, Gershon Tenenbaum and Avi Loeb posted a 0-10 scale for rating how anomalous an interstellar object is, from natural (0) to confirmed artificial (8-10). They rated 'Oumuamua and 3I/ATLAS a 4; Loeb has said 3I/ATLAS is most likely a natural comet.
Photo: Christopher Michel, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media16 Jul 2025
Weeks after the interstellar object 3I/ATLAS was found, Avi Loeb and two co-authors posted a non-peer-reviewed paper asking whether it could be alien technology. NASA describes it as a comet, and astronomers quoted in the press said the evidence points to a natural object.
Photo: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/B. Bolin, CC BY 4.0
Whistleblowers22 Nov 2024
The Sol Foundation, a UAP think tank founded by Stanford academics, held its second annual symposium on Nov. 22-23, 2024. Speakers included former NOAA head Tim Gallaudet, a former Senate Armed Services staffer, and scientists Garry Nolan, Avi Loeb and Jacques Vallee.
MediaMar 2024
Johns Hopkins seismologist Benjamin Fernando's team told the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference that the Manus Island seismic signal Avi Loeb's group used to find the 2014 fireball changed direction along a road, likely a passing truck. Loeb disputed the coverage.
Photo: Avi Loeb and Frank Laukien (study authors), CC BY 4.0
Media29 Aug 2023
Avi Loeb and 33 co-authors posted a preprint saying some seafloor spherules from their June 2023 expedition off Manus Island had an unusual 'BeLaU' composition suggesting an extrasolar source. Other researchers argued the grains matched coal ash or ordinary sources; Loeb disputed that.
Photo: Christopher Michel, CC BY-SA 4.0
MediaJun 2023
Harvard's Avi Loeb led a June 2023 search off Papua New Guinea for fragments of the 2014 fireball IM1, recovering tiny metal spherules he said might be interstellar or even technological. Other scientists disputed it, attributing the material to coal ash and the seismic trace to a passing truck.
Photo: NASA, Public domain
Government7 Mar 2023
Pentagon UAP office director Sean Kirkpatrick and Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb released a draft, 'Physical Constraints on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena'. It was not peer-reviewed or an official Pentagon document; a speculative passage on a mothership releasing small probes drew wide headlines.
Photo: Christopher Michel, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media2023
Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb published 'Interstellar' (HarperCollins), a popular book following his earlier 'Extraterrestrial' and tied to his search for interstellar objects and possible alien technology.
Photo: Aviloeb, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media30 Oct 2021
Harvard's Galileo Project, led by Avi Loeb, named former Pentagon intelligence official Christopher Mellon and former AATIP figure Luis Elizondo as research affiliates, to help choose sites for its sky-watching instruments and weigh the implications of any findings.
Photo: Max Moszkowicz, CC BY 3.0
Close encounters26 Jul 2021
Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb announced the Galileo Project, a privately funded effort to search systematically for evidence of extraterrestrial technological objects, including UAP and interstellar visitors, using purpose-built instruments and publishing data openly.
Photo: Christopher Michel, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media26 Jan 2021
Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb's book argued that the interstellar object 'Oumuamua could be an artifact of another civilization. Reviewers called it provocative, but many scientists were unconvinced, noting the object can no longer be observed to test the idea.
Photo: Christopher Michel, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media15 Apr 2019
Harvard's Amir Siraj and Avi Loeb posted a paper arguing that a small meteor that hit the atmosphere near Papua New Guinea on January 8, 2014, recorded in U.S. government fireball data, had an orbit showing it came from outside the solar system. The claim remains debated.
Photo: Aloeb, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media12 Nov 2018
Harvard astronomers Shmuel Bialy and Avi Loeb argued in a peer-reviewed letter that sunlight pressure could explain the first known interstellar object's odd acceleration if it were a very thin sheet, raising the possibility of an artificial light sail. Most astronomers favored natural explanations.
Photo: Alan Fitzsimmons (Queen's University Belfast), Isaac Newton Group, Public domain
