Eerie Sounds of Saturn's Radio Emissions

[n2doc]

Saturn is a source of intense radio emissions, which have been monitored by the Cassini spacecraft. The radio waves are closely related to the auroras near the poles of the planet. These auroras are similar to Earth's northern and southern lights. This is an audio file of radio emissions from Saturn.

The Cassini spacecraft began detecting these radio emissions in April 2002, when Cassini was 374 million kilometers (234 million miles) from the planet, using the Cassini radio and plasma wave science instrument. The radio and plasma wave instrument has now provided the first high resolution observations of these emissions, showing an amazing array of variations in frequency and time. The complex radio spectrum with rising and falling tones, is very similar to Earth's auroral radio emissions. These structures indicate that there are numerous small radio sources moving along magnetic field lines threading the auroral region.

Time on this recording has been compressed, so that 73 seconds corresponds to 27 minutes. Since the frequencies of these emissions are well above the audio frequency range, we have shifted them downward by a factor of 44.

link with .wav file :

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimedia/pia07966.html


Sounds like something from an old Outer Limits episode!

[mikelgb]

1. crazy, my cat was talking back to it then at the end he went nuts

[BeHereNow]

3. LOL! Too funny! My cat just sauntered in to listen too!

Wonder what they hear?

BHN

[mikelgb]

5. I think it is clear that sentient feline Saturnians are attempting contact.

[BeHereNow]

8. LOL!!! I think you are on to something!

Be careful not to leave your Skype running while you are out.
The kitties may be calling Saturn now that they have the number
as transmitted by this audio file into millions of earth homes.

BHN

[rbixby]

23. I for one welcome our new furry overlords

NT

[BeHereNow]

2. That is CREEPY!!!! Great Halloween music though!

Someone should loop it and sell it for trick-or-treat music.
That's what it reminds me of; we have tape some where we
always play while the kids come at Halloween.

Thanks for sharing that- it is strangely beautiful in a creepy way.

K&R

BHN

[nykym]

4. Translation

Move along earthlings nothing here to see!

[pokerfan]

12. Translation

ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT TITAN
ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE

[Beartracks]

13. ROFL Nice. n/t

[pokerfan]

15. and what do we do?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huygens_probe">

[MineralMan]

6. I am so going to save that and make a loop of it to play

outside my door next Halloween.

[RKP5637]

7. Thanks for posting this - Interesting - And the sound track is something else, Captain Kirk! n/t

[rasputin1952]

9. That was really cool!

Thanks!

Now, if I can just readjust this...

:D

[An_Opened_Hand]

10. Forbidden Planet sound track?

If you remember Forbidden Planet, the sound track sounded just like this. Even the music of the Krell, the planet's extinct race, sounded like this. The composers (Louis and Bebe Barron) were closer to the reality of space than John Williams ever was.

[Beartracks]

14. Weren't the eerie soundtracks...

... or at least the sound effects used for years in sci-fi movies, themselves inspired by the undulating radio waves you can listen to on, say, short wave radio, as you adjust the frequency up and down the dial?

The song of Saturn is amazing. I guess I would've expected something more like static even as the emissions were sped up. Well, supersonic static, of course.

[Fumesucker]

17. Yep, exactly, 1950's science fiction movie sounds..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIuc1_Qg4A8

[FiveGoodMen]

11. Sounds like an echo loop was added

Does anyone know if the repeats are part of the original "sound"?

[Canuckistanian]

16. Very spooky

I just heard it and looked at it's spectrum on Audacity.

It reminds me of the VLF Radio sounds from auroral activity, such as S.P. McGreevey's recordings
http://www.spaceweathersounds.com/sndbites.htm

[Fumesucker]

21. A much better program for looking at spectra than Audacity is Spectrum Lab

Freebie like Audacity is ..

http://www.qsl.net/dl4yhf/spectra1.html

I've used Spectrum Lab with an FM receiver to detect meteors by reflection of FM signals from a transmitter over the horizon.

[Canuckistanian]

24. I've got that already

It's great. Even though it's intended for Ham radio, it's a fantastic program for analyzing sound. I use it it for recording nature sounds.

[DesertRat]

18. Very cool, thanks for posting! n/t

[tuvor]

19. Sounds like background noise from Plan 9 from Outer Space

[Omar4Dems]

20. Saturn has all kinds of radio emissions?

Cool! Wonder if any of them are commercial-free?

[Shallah Kali]

22. here is a site that sells cds of the nasa space sounds

one of these days I might buy one.

http://www.neuroacoustic.com/nasa.html