House to alien seeker '

amsterdam - The Chinese government will be more people out of their homes for large infrastructure projects. Often these are highways or major suburbs to be crushed in no time from the ground. The latest wave of evictions has a very different reason: Beijing looks for extraterrestrial life.

And therefore the more than 9,000 Chinese people have to move living within five kilometers of a brand new telescope. Otherwise, there is no 'optimal environment for electromagnetic radiation,' said a spokesman for the Communist Party. Each household will receive 12 000 yuan (1,650 euros) in compensation, Xinhua news agency knows.

The telescope itself is in the southwestern province of Guizhou and has a diameter of half a kilometer. That he is significantly larger than the Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico, with 300 meters to date was the most extensive. For China, the alien seeker 'scientific prestige which 1.2 billion yuan (170 million euros) has been cleared.

A scientist who works on the project compares the new radio telescope 'a giant ear that alien radio messages filtered from the cosmic background noise. Compare it with listening to crickets during a thunderstorm. 'The device should be finished in September.