You Can Hear A Black Hole With These NASA Sonifications

For the sonification of the black hole at the heart of Messier 87, the Chandra team did not use the data from the famous Event Horizon Telescope project. Instead, they used data from other telescopes like Chandra, the Hubble Space Telescope, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array in Chile, which observed the black hole on a wider scale (via Chandra). Combining this data shows the black hole in the X-ray, visible light, and radio wave wavelengths. And these different wavelengths have been translated to the lowest, medium, and highest tones respectively.

All three wavelengths are shown in the visual accompanying the sonification. The brightest part of the visual, which is the loudest part of the sonification, is the black hole itself, out of which a jet of energetic material is flowing. These jets are created when material like dust or gas falls into the black hole and some of the material is ejected out at great speeds.

Chandra scientists like Visualization Lead Scientist Kimberly Arcand say that they created the sonifications to enable blink or low-vision people to be able to enjoy the wonders of space, by portraying scientific data in an accurate but accessible way. In addition, they have been popular with students and adults as a way to engage the public in space research –- especially for an instrument like Chandra, which captures data in a wavelength invisible to the human eye.