ROSETTA’S COMET IS SINGING

14 November 2014

*Artists impression of the Rosetta space probe.*

Scientists from the Rosetta’s Plasma Consortium (RPC) space probe which landed this week on the Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko have noted the chuck of space rock is emitting a harmonious clicking.

Part of the tests taken by the scientists, was to see how the comet interacts with solarwind (a continuous stream of plasma from the sun). The scientists found that the comet’s song was taking the form of oscillations in the magnetic field surrounding the comet.

Karl-Heinz Glaßmeier, RPC’s principal scientist, said, “As the comet releases neutral particles into space, they become electrically charged due to a process called ionisation. But the precise physical mechanism behind the oscillations remains a mystery.”

Artist's impression of the 'singing comet' 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/NavCam — *Artist’s impression of the ‘singing comet’ 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/NavCam*

“It is being sung at 40-50 millihertz, far below human hearing, which typically picks up sound between 20 Hz and 20 kHz. To make the music audible to the human ear, the frequencies have been increased by a factor of about 10,000,” He continued.

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard sound from space, NASA recently released a huge number of audio files captured over the years (link).

You can listen to Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko’s singing below: