Explore soundscapes of other planets

You might know what other planets look like, like the rusty orange, dusty surface of Mars, or the vibrant teal of Uranus. But what do those planets look like?

A. Timothy G.Lighton of the University of Southampton in the UK designed the software program which produces extraterrestrial environmental sounds and predicts how human sounds may change on distant worlds. Show your work in 184th Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America On Thursday, May 11th.

The show is part of a special session bringing together the acoustics and planetary science communities. Acoustic studies became essential during the Huygens probe’s descent into Titan’s atmosphere in 2005 and the more recent Mars InSight and Mars 2020 missions. These successful missions have carried custom active and passive acoustic sensors operating over a wide range, from very low frequencies (ultrasound, below the threshold of human hearing) to ultrasonics (above human hearing).

“For decades, we’ve sent cameras to other planets in our solar system and learned a lot from them. However, we didn’t really hear what another planet looked like until the very recent Mars Perseverance mission,” Leighton said.

Scientists can harness sound on other worlds to learn about properties that would otherwise require a lot of expensive equipment, such as the chemical composition of rocks, how the temperature of the atmosphere changes, or the roughness of the Earth.

Extraterrestrial sounds can also be used in the search for life. At first glance, Jupiter’s moon Europa may appear to be a hostile environment, but beneath its icy envelope lies an ocean potentially sustaining life.

“The idea of ​​sending a probe on a seven-year voyage through space, then drilling or melting into the sea floor presents mind-boggling challenges in terms of finance and technology. The ocean in Europe is 100 times deeper than Earth’s Arctic Ocean, and the ice sheet is more about 1,000 times thicker.” “However, instead of sending a physical probe, we can let sound waves travel to the seafloor and back and do the exploration for us.”

The unique atmospheres of the planets affect the speed and absorption of sound. For example, Mars’ thin, carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere absorbs more sound than Earth’s, so distant noises sound fainter. Anticipate how important sound transmission is in the design and calibration of equipment such as microphones and loudspeakers.

Hearing sound from other planets is useful not only for scientific purposes, but also for entertainment. Science fiction films contain vivid depictions of imitating the appearance of other worlds but often lack the immersive quality of how those worlds appear.

Leighton’s program displays predictions of otherworldly sounds in planetariums and museums. In the case of Mars, it includes actual sounds thanks to the US/European Perseverance team and China’s Zhurong mission.

The Special Course, chaired by Leighton and Andy Petculescu, is the third forum in phonetics at the Planetology Organized at the meeting of the American Vocal Society.

“The success of the first two ASA special sessions on this topic has led to quite a few collaborations between the two communities, a trend we hope will continue,” said Pitculescu.