Crab Nebula Pulsar B0531+21

Sonification created for the film Rhythms of the Universe, by Mickey Hart and George Smoot, 2013, 360° Productions. (Please listen over high fidelity headphones to be able to hear nuances.) To see the film&presentation at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum: See also doi:10.1017/S1355771813000381 IMAGE: hubblesite.org DATA SOURCE: European Pulsar Network Database Browser Pulsars are spinning neutron stars, which we observe as regular pulses of electromagnetic energy. They are among the most rhythmically stable objects we know of. Some are as stable as atomic clocks. The dataset gives changes in intensity level for eight frequency ranges. These are transposed to audible frequency ranges, and the pulsing interval of about 0.03 seconds is stretched to 9 seconds. Eight sine wave oscillators are set to transpositions of the eight pitches, and their loudness changes with the same patterns as the pulsar. Thus, this sonification is a literal transposition of the pulsar’s electromagnetic frequencies.