Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb was appointed by the White House to lead a scientific advisory council studying potential national security risks tied to unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAP, as President Donald Trump’s administration moved to release more information on the issue.
Loeb, a cosmologist and former chair of Harvard’s astronomy department, said his team would report to a new White House panel focused on UAP. “It’s like a detective story,” Loeb said in an interview. “It’s a lot of fun, as long as you don’t pay too much attention to the critics.”
Loeb became widely known in 2017 after arguing that an interstellar object passing Earth could have been a thin “light sail” from an alien spacecraft, rather than a comet or chunk of ice. He later founded Harvard’s Galileo Project to search for possible artifacts from alien civilizations.
His work has drawn criticism from some scientists. Steve Desch, an Arizona State University astrophysicist, said Loeb uses flawed methods and that putting him in charge could undermine the effort. “I don’t know what’s going to come of this, but we’re not going to get any closer to answering these questions with him in charge,” Desch said.
Loeb said he would take a national security approach and begin with the assumption that the objects were human-made. He said better government data collection could help resolve debate over their origins. “Let’s keep our eyes on the orbs,” he said, “not the social media.”
His team included more than a dozen scientists and UFO activists, including retired Rear Adm. Timothy Gallaudet, who has said “nonhuman intelligence” controls some UAP, and Ben Lamm, a billionaire working to revive extinct species.
After its first meeting last month, the group asked the Pentagon for more than 50 videos, images and other records tied to known UAP incidents. Loeb said the group met privately but would brief the public and create a website to share findings.
Earlier this year, Trump directed his administration to increase transparency on UFOs and possible alien life. The order led to a UAP Governance Board overseen by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which first met in June. The Pentagon has released several batches of records, including older FBI reports and military videos. A Pentagon office investigating UAP said it has found no evidence of alien life.
Loeb said he did not believe the government was hiding such evidence.