Jodrell Bank astronomer: 'How we'll search for signs of alien life'

Scientists from 11 British institutions are pooling their efforts to look for alien life among the stars, coming together in their part of the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (Seti).

British researchers and facilities have had occasional involvement in Seti projects down the years, the most significant being the 1998-2003 use of Cheshire's Jodrell Bank Observatory. It ultimately found nothing.

Jodrell has since been updated, linking it via fibre optics into a 217km-long array with six other telescopes across England known as eMerlin, making a far more powerful tool to scan the skies.

Jodrell's associate director Tim O'Brien explains how the process will work.