caption birth_place citizenship image_size nationality field birth_date known_for image article_title name alma_mater
frank drake chicago , illinois united states of america 150px american astronomy 28 may 1930 seti drake equation frank drake - edit.jpg frank drake
 frank drake cornell university harvard university
frank drake

frank donald drake -lrb- born may 28 , 1930 -rrb- is an american astronomer and astrophysicist .
he is most notable as one of the pioneers in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence , including the founding of seti , mounting the first observational attempts at detecting extraterrestrial communications in 1960 in project ozma , developing the drake equation , and as the creator of the `` arecibo message , '' a digital encoding of an astronomical and biological description of the earth and its lifeforms for transmission into the cosmos .
