The soundtracks — which include translations of images of the Carina Nebula and the Southern Ring Nebula — use sound waves to turn images and data into audio experiences. “Music touches our emotional centers,” said musician Matt Russo, a professor of physics at the University of Toronto who worked on the project. “Our goal is to make Weber’s images and data intelligible through sound — helping listeners create their own mental image.”
The “Cosmic Cliff” of the Carina Nebula – a stunning celestial body filled with stars, gas and dust – makes for a shimmering, symphonic sound palette. Gas and dust have a drone-like tone. The orange and red in the lower part of the screen are melodic. Bright spots have a higher pitch.
The Southern Ring Nebula takes on an eerie sound, like experimental electronic music made with string hands tuned in a tunnel. The two-part sound represents Webb’s different infrared observations of the nebula, where bright stars make clear sounds.
The team of scientists and musicians didn’t just turn images into audio. Webb also turned data from the atmosphere of the gaseous giant exoplanet WASP-96 b into a sci-fi soundscape filled with falling tones and drip-like effects. These droplets represent water signatures in the atmosphere.
The sound waves brought a new dimension to Webb’s discovery, and they made it easy for blind and low-vision space enthusiasts to understand the telescope’s work. “When I first heard sound waves, it struck me in a visceral, emotional way, and I imagine people with normal vision would have the same experience when looking up at the night sky,” said the Webb Sound Project. Christine Malec, member of the Blind and Low Vision Group.
Webb’s audio experience is both alien and familiar. They show that there are broader ways to explore the universe beyond what we see with our eyes.