(Daily News Scan - DNS English) What is Sonification Project of NASA
NASA has unveiled a new project named as ‘SONIFICATION’ project. We are already aware about the fact that telescopes offer glimpses of outer space by translating digital data into images. With this new project NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Center (CXC) has moved a step further. The new Sonification’ project transforms data from astronomical images into audio. All the data has been collected by NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory, Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope.
In this edition of DNS we will talking about Sonification project in detail and how is it useful.
The most intriguing fact about the Sonification project is that we will now be able to listen to the sounds of the space.
about data sonification
Data sonification refers to the use of sound values to represent real data. Basically, it is the auditory version of data visualisation. In NASA’s recent Chandra project, data is represented using a number of musical notes. With this data sonification project, users can now experience different phenomena captured in astronomical images as an aural experience. The birth of a star, a cloud of dust or even a black hole can now be ‘heard’ as a high or low pitched sound.
How these astronomical images are converted into sound?
NASA’s telescopes in space collect digital data, in the form of ones and zeroes, before converting them into images. The images are the visual representations of light and radiation of different wavelengths in space that cannot be seen by the human eye.
The Chandra project has created a celestial concert of sorts by translating the same data into sound.
Pitch and volume are used to denote the brightness and position of a celestial object or phenomenon. Till now, the astronomers behind Project Chandra have released three samples made using data collected from some of the most distinct features in the sky — the Galactic Centre, Cassiopeia A, and Pillars of Creation Nebula.
The Galactic Centre
This is the first example among the three. This is the rotational centre of the Milky Way galaxy. It comprises of a collection of celestial objects — neutron and white dwarf stars, clouds of dust and gas, and most notably, a supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A*, that weighs four million times the mass of the sun.
Based on data gathered by the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes, an image is rendered using X-ray, visible and infrared light before being translated into sound.
The translation begins on the left side of the image and then moves to the right. Stars and other compact sources are represented using individual short notes, while a longer humming sound is used to denote clouds of gas and dust. It all builds up to a crescendo, which takes place around the bright region to the lower right of the image where Sagittarius A* is located.
Cassiopeia A
Located around 11,000 light years away from Earth in the northern Cassiopeia constellation, Cassiopeia A is one of the most well-known remnants of a once-massive star that was destroyed by a supernova explosion around 325 years ago.
The image depicts the supernova remnant as a ball of different coloured filaments. Each colour represents a particular element — red is used for silicon, yellow for sulphur, purple denotes iron, while green is used for calcium. Each of these are also assigned its own unique sound.
Here the sounds move outwards from the centre of the circular structure.
The Pillars of Creation
The iconic Pillars of Creation is located in the centre of the Eagle Nebula, also known as Messier 16.
Here also different colours are used to represent elements — blue for oxygen, red for sulphur and green for both nitrogen and hydrogen.
Like the Galactic Centre, this sound translation also plays from left to right. However, the sound has an eerie effect, with sharp whistles representing stars and low howls indicating the presence of gas clouds.
Why is this sonification project useful?
The sonification project was led by the Chandra X-ray Center in collaboration with NASA’s Universe of Learning Program. It aims to “incorporate NASA science content into the learning environment effectively and efficiently for learners of all ages”.
NASA has been working towards making data about space accessible for a larger audience.
Sonification projects like this will allow audiences along with visually-impaired communities to experience space through data.
