On Sunday, January 18, ALMA welcomed a delegation from Congreso Futuro, Chile’s flagship science and ideas festival. The visit connected the public conversations held in Santiago with the frontier of astronomical research on the Chajnantor Plateau, bringing together science, society, and long-term thinking.

Among the visitors were Guido Girardi, founder of Congreso Futuro, and Michael Garret, Professor at the University of Manchester, and a leading figure in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project.

For Girardi, the visit embodied the spirit of Congreso Futuro: bringing people closer to where knowledge is created. He stressed that science must be experienced, not only discussed, and that opening world-class facilities like ALMA to broader audiences helps anchor big ideas—about technology, humanity, and the future—in real places and real work.

Garrett, visiting ALMA for the first time after many years of collaboration with colleagues in the field, highlighted both the observatory’s uniqueness and its relevance to some of science’s most profound questions.

“ALMA is a fantastic telescope—there’s nothing else like it anywhere in the world,” he said.

He explained that ALMA’s extreme sensitivity at millimetre and submillimetre wavelengths opens an almost unexplored window for SETI research. Together with a PhD student, Garrett recently published the first study using ALMA archival data to search for artificial signals, a first step toward technosignature studies at these frequencies.

“So far, almost everything can be explained by astrophysics,” he noted. “But one day we may find something that no longer fits—and that’s when things get really interesting.”

Beyond the technical aspects, Garrett emphasized the societal dimension of the search for life beyond Earth, describing it as one of the fundamental questions science owes the public.

The visit was hosted by the ALMA Director, Sean Dougherty, who welcomed the delegation to the array and its high-altitude operations.

“ALMA is pushing the boundaries of human understanding of the universe every day. With the Congreso Futuro visit, we can showcase how frontier science and society can meet—linking curiosity, innovation, and discovery.”

Set against the dramatic Andes landscape, the Congreso Futuro visit underscored ALMA’s role not only as a premier scientific facility, but also as a powerful bridge between cutting-edge research and the wider society it ultimately serves.