{
  "id": 3659199,
  "title": "NASA’s Webb Telescope Rules Out Two New Dyson Sphere Candidates",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/27/nasas-webb-telescope-rules-out-two-new-dyson-sphere-candidates",
  "topic": "science",
  "section": "Science",
  "published": "2026-08-27T03:56:03.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Universe Today",
    "slug": "universe-today",
    "url": "https://www.universetoday.com/articles/nasas-webb-telescope-rules-out-two-new-dyson-sphere-candidates"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has ruled out two new candidates for Dyson Spheres, hypothetical megastructures built around stars to harness radiation energy. Project Hephaistos, a Uppsala University-led initiative, used the Webb telescope to observe two M-dwarf stars in a survey of one million stars within 1000 light years of Earth. The infrared excess observed in these stars was found to be caused by background galaxies, not Dyson Spheres or other radiation mechanisms. This difficulty in identifying techno signatures, whether from advanced civilizations or Kardashev I- or II-type civilizations, highlights the challenges in searching for such structures. Future infrared surveys with better spatial resolution, potentially available in the 2030s, may help overcome this issue.",
  "summary": "Recent searches for the technosignatures of hypothetical Dyson Spheres again turn up empty.",
  "key_points": [
    "NASA's Webb Telescope ruled out two M-dwarf stars as Dyson Sphere candidates.",
    "Infrared excess observed in stars was caused by background galaxies.",
    "Identifying techno signatures of advanced civilizations remains challenging."
  ],
  "editors_take": "The difficulty in identifying techno signatures from advanced civilizations highlights the challenges in searching for Dyson Spheres, but future infrared surveys may help overcome this issue.",
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}