Step-by-Step Observation Protocol: How to Search for Sirius Signals Tonight

OBSERVATION PROTOCOL

STEP 1: LOCATE SIRIUS

Coordinates:

Visual: Follow Orion's belt down-left to the

Software: Use Stellarium (free) to confirm. Best months: December through March. Best time: when Sirius is highest in your sky

STEP 2: SET UP HYDROGEN LINE RECEIVER

Connect: Dish → LNA → (filter) → RTL-SDR → USB Point dish at Sirius (use Stellarium for azimuth

Open SDR# or GNU Radio. Tune to 1420.405MHz. Set bandwidth: 250kHz (to see context). Set FFT size: 65536 or higher (for resolution). Set integration time: 60 seconds minimum.

FIRST: Verify your system works by pointing at

STEP 3: HIGH-RESOLUTION SPECTRAL ANALYSIS

Now the critical part: Narrow your analysis window to ±100Hz around

Use FFT with very high resolution (0.1-1Hz bins). This requires long integration: 10+ seconds per

Record raw IQ data to disk for offline analysis.

WHAT TO LOOK FOR:

STEP 4: CROSS-CORRELATE WITH SCHUMANN

Run ELF receiver simultaneously. Measure local Schumann resonance peaks. Cross-correlate: do the 1420MHz sidebands

If yes AND the signal is only from Sirius direction:

Repeat on multiple nights to confirm.