To This Distant Shore

In To This Distant Shore, Sheldon Silva, eccentric computerguru and amateur radio astronomer, accidentally receivesand records an unknown signal. He performs his own analysison the data and makes some small progress in discoveringits nature. When the signal is determined to be extraterrestrial,Silva is recruited to participate in an effort to understand it andrespond. However, the signal is not merely a message fromanother intelligence, it IS another intelligence an alien minddeconstructed down to the atom and modeled to yield anencoded data set and software which, when reconstituted on ourcomputer systems, became sentient. Although able to instantiateitself, it analyzed our technology as insufficient for its needs until it finds the SSC. Once the intelligence found the cyclotron, itbegan to reprogram and reconfigure it for an unknown purpose.