Eurydice is an apparently interstellar object, having several distinct features. It has three prominent “limbs”. Two have lens-like apparatuses at their ends. The third is a branching shape. In Eurydice’s the center is a series of nested hollow cylinders. Each cylinder has on it’s surface a pattern of long grooves, bumps, and circular indentations.

Eurydice was found in an impact crater. Radioisotope dating suggests the object is 541 million years old. It is of such complexity that researchers feel it is not a naturally occurring object. Nothing is known about the construction of Eurydice, save that it happened at least 541 million years ago, and likely at least 541 million light years from where it was found.

The patterns on the nested cylinders are thought to be a code or language. Researchers have been working for decades to decipher this pattern. Recently, efforts to interpret the pattern as a ternary numeral system have shown great promise.

Eurydice is considered evidence of extraterrestrial life, but researchers urge caution. Due to the nature of the expanding universe, a theoretical intelligence which constructed Eurydice may be unreachable, long extinct, or even beyond the limit of the observable universe

A team of artists has been employed to interpret this data for display. The illustrative images are produced in collaboration with artists interpreting fragmentary data. The black and white photographic images presented are directly decoded, and presented alongside speculative colorizations. Because nothing is knowable about where or when they were captured, researchers cannot say what the images depict.

Lydia Oseman