Call it empathetic astronomy.

Astronomers are suggesting a new approach for finding advanced alien civilizations: look in the areas of the sky where the aliens would have the easiest time detecting us.

Just as human astronomers can only find planets that are lined up just-so with our telescopes, prospective aliens from across the galaxy would have the same problem. By searching the thin elliptical slice of the sky where hypothetical alien astronomers could have easily detected earth and its habitability, a Johns Hopkins astronomer argues that we're more likely to find signals from alien civilizations. Richard Conn Henry, presented the idea at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society, saying in a release:

those civilizations ... that inhabit star systems that lie close to the plane of the

Earth's orbit around the sun will be the most motivated to send communications signals toward Earth because those civilizations will surely have detected our annual transit across the face of the sun, telling them that Earth lies in a habitable zone, where liquid water is stable. Through spectroscopic analysis of our atmosphere, they will know that Earth likely bears life.

Applying the empathetic approach to the search for alien life could focus human efforts on a mere 3 percent of the sky. Working with this smaller set of targets, Henry, with colleagues at SETI, hope to use the new Allen Telescope Array to search more effectively for signals beamed across the universe by civilizations that stumbled upon the earth and realized our potential.

Image: The Allen Telescope Array. Courtesy of SETI.