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AnonTechie writes:

“NASA produces a vast amount of data from its satellites. Exploring such large quantities of data can be difficult,” said Alexander. "Sonification offers a promising supplement to standard visual analysis techniques.” But one clever idea is to turn the measurements of space into sound and speed it up; a month of data might be scanned audibly in all of 10 minutes.

Alexander is a PhD candidate in design science at the University of Michigan. He is a sonification specialist who trains heliophysicists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, to pick out subtle differences by listening to satellite data instead of looking at it.

Sonification is the process of displaying any type of data or measurement as sound, such as the beep from a heart rate monitor measuring a person’s pulse, a door bell ringing every time a person enters a room, or, in this case, explosions indicating large events occurring on the sun. In certain cases, scientists can use their ears instead of their eyes to process data more rapidly -- and to detect more details – than through visual analysis. A paper on the effectiveness of sonification in analyzing data from NASA satellites was published in the July issue of Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics.

http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/more-than-meets-the-eye-nasa-scientists-listen-to-data/

[Abstract]: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2014JA020025/abstract

[Additional Coverage]: http://gizmodo.com/nasa-scans-through-vast-amounts-of-data-by-converting-i-1630766384

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-03938-x

Astronomy is inextricably associated with spectacular images and visualizations of the cosmos. But Wanda Diaz Merced says that by neglecting senses other than sight, astronomers are missing out on discoveries.

For 15 years, Diaz Merced, an astronomer at the International Astronomical Union (IAU) Office for Astronomy Outreach in Mitaka, Japan, has pioneered a technique called sonification. The approach converts aspects of data, such as the brightness or frequency of electromagnetic radiation, into audible elements including pitch, volume and rhythm. It could help astronomers to avoid methodological biases that come with interpreting data only visually, argues Diaz Merced, who lost her sight in her twenties.

Last month, she co-organized the IAU's first symposium dedicated to diversity and inclusion. The event, in Mitaka from 12 to 15 November, showcased, among other topics, efforts aimed at presenting cosmic data in formats that are accessible through senses other than vision.

Diaz spoke to Nature about how bringing these efforts to mainstream science would boost accessibility — and discoveries.

How one astronomer hears the Universe, (DOI: doi:10.1038/d41586-019-03938-x)

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

We often think of astronomy as a visual science with beautiful images of the universe. However, astronomers use a wide range of analysis tools beyond images to understand nature at a deeper level.

Data sonification is the process of converting data into sound. It has powerful applications in research, education and outreach, and also enables blind and visually impaired communities to understand plots, images and other data.

[...] Imagine this scene: you're at a crowded party that's quite noisy. You don't know anyone and they're all speaking a language you can't understand—not good. Then you hear bits of a conversation in a far corner in your language. You focus on it and head over to introduce yourself.

While you may have never experienced such a party, the thought of hearing a recognizable voice or language in a noisy room is familiar. The ability of the human ear and brain to filter out undesired sounds and retrieve desired sounds is called the "cocktail party effect".

Similarly, science is always pushing the boundaries of what can be detected, which often requires extracting very faint signals from noisy data. In astronomy we often push to find the faintest, farthest or most fleeting of signals. Data sonification helps us to push these boundaries further.

[...] Data sonification is useful for interpreting science because humans interpret audio information faster than visual information. Also, the ear can discern more pitch levels than the eye can discern levels of color (and over a wider range).