The internet went berserk as a whole when NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) released an audio of a black hole. The black hole’s music quickly gained popularity and was posted on numerous well-known social media sites and groups. The black hole’s soundtrack provided by NASA has a low drone sound that really makes us question the universe as a whole.
The Black Hole in question is located at the center of the Perseus Galaxy cluster, which lies about 240 million light-years away from Earth, and has long been associated with sound. However, the idea that there is no sound in space has been contradicted by the latest audio of the black hole released by NASA.
Space is not a complete vacuum
According to some reports, the sound has been slightly edited so that it can be heard by human ears. Nasa mixed it with “other data” and amplified it, saying that the idea that there is no sound in space was a misconception. The 34-second clip set social media ablaze, with many people gobsmacked that anything, let alone what sounds like an eerie, guttural moan, could escape a black hole.
However, the notion that there is no sound in space is false, according to the organization. On the other hand, a galaxy cluster has abundant amounts of gas that encircle hundreds or even thousands of galaxies inside it, providing a channel for the sound waves to travel. At the same time, most of space is a vacuum with no medium for sound waves to pass through.
You wouldn’t be able to hear what a black hole really sounds like
The so-called “sonification” was first made public by NASA earlier this year, with an explanation that the Perseus galaxy cluster’s black hole has been “connected” with sound since 2003. After 53 hours of observation, researchers with NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory discovered that this is due to the discovery by astronomers that pressure waves emitted by the black hole generated ripples in the hot gas within the cluster, which could be translated into a note 57 octaves below middle C, which is audible to humans.
Experts have cautioned that the sound in NASA’s remix isn’t exactly what you’d hear if you were somehow standing beside a black hole. Human ears wouldn’t be sensitive enough to be able to pick up those sound waves. It also points to future areas of research. The idea that these supermassive black holes sprinkled throughout the universe are belching out incredible songs is a very tantalizing prospect.
Twitter users describe the sound
The clip, which sounds something like a cosmic growl or an ominous wind tunnel, captured the internet’s attention, and many said it sounded exactly how they imagined a supermassive black hole would sound. Others turned to images of horror to describe it, and some commented on the sound’s ethereal nature.
NASA has produced similar sonifications of a distant galaxy and the sound of each time an exoplanet was discovered. The agency has even recorded the eerie, extraterrestrial sounds of Mars.