Extraterrestrial life, also called alien life (or, if it is a sentient or relatively complex individual, an "extraterrestrial" or "alien"), is life that occurs outside of Earth and that probably did not originate from Earth. These hypothetical life forms may range from simple prokaryotes to beings with civilizations far more advanced than humanity. The Drake equation speculates about the existence of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. The science of extraterrestrial life in all its forms is known as exobiology.
Since the mid-20th century, there has been an ongoing search for signs of extraterrestrial life. This encompasses a search for current and historic extraterrestrial life, and a narrower search for extraterrestrial intelligent life. Depending on the category of search, methods range from the analysis of telescope and specimen data[3] to radios used to detect and send communication signals.
