Name: Earth’s Reverse Magnetospheric Harp by NASA
Duration: 3 s

Measurements collected by the Waves instrument aboard NASA’s Juno spacecraft during its close flyby of Jupiter’s moon Europa on Sept. 29, 2022 have been converted to an audible frequency. The variation of frequency of the plasma waves observed near Europa can be heard as the plasma density varies.
For more information about NASA’s Juno mission, visit: http://nasa.gov/juno and https://missionjuno.com 
Details about the Europa flyby can be found at: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/nasa-s-juno-will-perform-close-flyby-of-jupiter-s-icy-moon-europa
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/Univ of Iowa

Audio from NASA’s Juno Mission: Europa Flyby

Between Earth and the Sun, space is not truly empty but is filled with a soup of charged particles called plasma. This plasma comes from the Sun, pumped out in a steady stream called the solar wind and sporadically blasted away in explosive solar eruptions. When this solar plasma strikes Earth, it causes the magnetic field lines and plasma around Earth to vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp, producing ultralow-frequency waves. 

In 2007, NASA launched five satellites to fly through Earth’s magnetic “harp” – its magnetosphere – as part of the THEMIS mission (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms). Since then, THEMIS has been gathering a bounty of information about plasma waves across Earth’s magnetosphere. 

The frequencies of the waves THEMIS measures are too low for our ears to hear, however. So a NASA citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has sped up the waves recorded by THEMIS to convert them to sound waves.

In this clip from February 21-22, 2012, whistle sounds are repeatedly heard over ambient background whooshes and crunches. The whistles decrease and increase in pitch as a THEMIS spacecraft moves toward and away from Earth on one orbit, with a maximum altitude of about 50,000 miles. These sounds are related to Earth’s magnetic harp, which has longer magnetic strings and lower pitches farther away from Earth.

Earth’s Magnetic Harp

Between Earth and the Sun, space is not truly empty but is filled with a soup of charged particles called plasma. This plasma comes from the Sun, pumped out in a steady stream called the solar wind and sporadically blasted away in explosive solar eruptions. When this solar plasma strikes Earth, it causes the magnetic field lines and plasma around Earth to vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp, producing ultralow-frequency waves.

In 2007, NASA launched five satellites to fly through Earth’s magnetic “harp” – its magnetosphere – as part of the THEMIS mission (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms). Since then, THEMIS has been gathering a bounty of information about plasma waves across Earth’s magnetosphere. 

The frequencies of the waves THEMIS measures are too low for our ears to hear, however. So a NASA citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has sped up the waves recorded by THEMIS to convert them to sound waves.

In this clip from March 19-20, 2012, whistle sounds are repeatedly heard over ambient background whooshes and crunches. The whistles change in pitch as a THEMIS spacecraft moves toward and away from Earth on one orbit, with a maximum altitude of about 50,000 miles. These sounds are related to Earth’s magnetic harp. We normally expect the whistles to have lower pitches farther away from Earth where the harp strings are longer, but the first part of this clip goes against this trend: the pitch increases or stays the same as the satellite moves away from Earth. 

 Thanks to volunteers on the HARP project who uncovered this pattern, researchers are now able to study these unusual vibrations and their connection to space weather.

Earth’s Reverse Magnetospheric Harp

Between Earth and the Sun, space is not truly empty but is filled with a soup of charged particles called plasma. This plasma comes from the Sun, pumped out in a steady stream called the solar wind and sporadically blasted away in explosive solar eruptions. When this solar plasma strikes Earth, it causes the magnetic field lines and plasma around Earth to vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp, producing ultralow-frequency waves.

In 2007, NASA launched five satellites to fly through Earth’s magnetic “harp” – its magnetosphere – as part of the THEMIS mission (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms). Since then, THEMIS has been gathering a bounty of information about plasma waves across Earth’s magnetosphere. 

The frequencies of the waves THEMIS measures are too low for our ears to hear, however. So a NASA citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has sped up the waves recorded by THEMIS to convert them to sound waves.

In this clip from February 19-22, 2012, whistle sounds are repeatedly heard over ambient background whooshes and crunches. The whistles change in pitch as a THEMIS spacecraft moves toward and away from Earth on three orbits, with a maximum altitude of about 50,000 miles. These sounds are related to Earth’s magnetic harp, which has longer magnetic strings and lower pitches farther away from Earth. These three orbits happened when the solar wind was blowing past Earth at a speed of about 1,200,000 miles per hour, which is fast even by solar wind standards! There’s often more harp activity during fast solar wind conditions. The solar wind also causes many other types of magnetic vibrations, most of which sound like background whooshes and crunches.

Multiple Passes through the Magnetospheric Harp on February 19-22, 2012

Between Earth and the Sun, space is not truly empty but is filled with a soup of charged particles called plasma. This plasma comes from the Sun, pumped out in a steady stream called the solar wind and sporadically blasted away in explosive solar eruptions. When this solar plasma strikes Earth, it causes the magnetic field lines and plasma around Earth to vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp, producing ultralow-frequency waves.

In 2007, NASA launched five satellites to fly through Earth’s magnetic “harp” – its magnetosphere – as part of the THEMIS mission (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms). Since then, THEMIS has been gathering a bounty of information about plasma waves across Earth’s magnetosphere. 

The frequencies of the waves THEMIS measures are too low for our ears to hear, however. So a NASA citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has sped up the waves recorded by THEMIS to convert them to sound waves.

In this clip from March 2-5, 2012, whistle sounds are repeatedly heard over ambient background whooshes and crunches. The whistles change in pitch as a THEMIS spacecraft moves toward and away from Earth on three orbits, with a maximum altitude of about 50,000 miles. These sounds are related to Earth’s magnetic harp, which has longer magnetic strings and lower pitches farther away from Earth. These three orbits happened when the solar wind was relatively quiet, but it’s still able to pluck the strings of Earth’s magnetic harp while also causing many other types of magnetic vibrations, most of which sound like background whooshes and crunches.

Multiple Passes through the Magnetospheric Harp on March 2-5, 2012

Between Earth and the Sun, space is not truly empty but is filled with a soup of charged particles called plasma. This plasma comes from the Sun, pumped out in a steady stream called the solar wind and sporadically blasted away in explosive solar eruptions. When this solar plasma strikes Earth, it causes the magnetic field lines and plasma around Earth to vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp, producing ultralow-frequency waves.

In 2007, NASA launched five satellites to fly through Earth’s magnetic “harp” – its magnetosphere – as part of the THEMIS mission (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms). Since then, THEMIS has been gathering a bounty of information about plasma waves across Earth’s magnetosphere. 

The frequencies of the waves THEMIS measures are too low for our ears to hear, however. So a NASA citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has sped up the waves recorded by THEMIS to convert them to sound waves.

In this clip from March 17-20, 2012, whistle sounds are repeatedly heard over ambient background whooshes and crunches. The whistles change in pitch as a THEMIS spacecraft moves toward and away from Earth on three orbits, with a maximum altitude of about 50,000 miles. These sounds are related to Earth’s magnetic harp, which has longer magnetic strings and lower pitches farther away from Earth. These three orbits happened near the end of a geomagnetic storm when the solar wind was blowing past Earth with speeds up to about 1,300,000 miles per hour, which is fast even by solar wind standards! There’s often more harp activity during fast solar wind conditions and geomagnetic storms. At the same time, many other types of magnetic vibrations occur during geomagnetic storms, most of which sound like background whooshes and crunches.

Multiple Passes through the Magnetospheric Harp on March 17-20, 2012

Between Earth and the Sun, space is not truly empty but is filled with a soup of charged particles called plasma. This plasma comes from the Sun, pumped out in a steady stream called the solar wind and sporadically blasted away in explosive solar eruptions. When this solar plasma strikes Earth, it causes the magnetic field lines and plasma around Earth to vibrate like the plucked strings of a harp, producing ultralow-frequency waves.

In 2007, NASA launched five satellites to fly through Earth’s magnetic “harp” – its magnetosphere – as part of the THEMIS mission (Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms). Since then, THEMIS has been gathering a bounty of information about plasma waves across Earth’s magnetosphere. 

The frequencies of the waves THEMIS measures are too low for our ears to hear, however. So a NASA citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has sped up the waves recorded by THEMIS to convert them to sound waves.

In this clip from June 10-11, 2009, whistle sounds are repeatedly heard over ambient background whooshes and crunches and a few high-pitch chirps. The whistles change in pitch as a THEMIS spacecraft moves toward and away from Earth on one orbit, with a maximum altitude of about 50,000 miles. These sounds are related to Earth’s magnetic harp, which has longer magnetic strings and lower pitches farther away from Earth. The high-pitch chirps are related to high-frequency plasma waves that are smaller than the harp waves yet can have an outsized impact on Earth’s radiation belts and space weather.

High-Pitch Chirps and Earth’s Magnetic Harp

Kepler: Star KIC12268220C Light Curve Waves to Sound

Kepler: Star KIC7671081B Light Curve Waves to Sound

New research from the up-close Grand Finale orbits of NASA’s Cassini mission shows a surprisingly powerful interaction of plasma waves moving from Saturn to its moon Enceladus. Researchers converted the recording of plasma waves into a “whooshing” audio file that we can hear -- in the same way a radio translates electromagnetic waves into music. Much like air or water, plasma (the fourth state of matter) generates waves to carry energy. The recording was captured by the Radio Plasma Wave Science (RPWS) instrument Sept. 2, 2017, two weeks before Cassini was deliberately plunged into the atmosphere of Saturn. 

For more information, visit: saturn.jpl.nasa.gov 

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Iowa

Sounds of Saturn: Hear Radio Emissions of the Planet and Its Moon Enceladus

Space becomes “sonified” in this visualization of a cluster of galaxies imaged by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Time flows left to right, and the frequency of sound changes from bottom to top, ranging from 30 to 1,000 hertz. Objects near the bottom of the image produce lower notes, while those near the top produce higher ones. Most of the visible specks are galaxies housing countless stars. A few individual stars shine brightly in the foreground. Stars and compact galaxies create short, clear tones, while sprawling spiral galaxies emit longer notes that change pitch. The higher density of galaxies near the center of the image — the heart of this galaxy cluster, known as RXC J0142.9+4438 — results in a swell of mid-range tones halfway through the video. Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3 acquired this image on Aug. 13, 2018. Video: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/13061

Credit: NASA/Hubble/SYSTEM Sounds (Matt Russo/Andrew Santaguida)

Sonification of a Hubble Deep Space Image

Hello, we’re NASA. You may have seen our astronauts, rocket launches, or Mars rovers — but have you heard our sounds? From interviews with astronauts and engineers to stories that take you on a tour of the galaxy, NASA’s audio offerings let you experience the thrill of space exploration without ever leaving Earth.

Earth’s Reverse Magnetospheric Harp

NASA

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