Buzz
Sound might seem simple – it's just noise that reaches your ears. Yet, sound waves can perform some truly mind-blowing tasks, with applications in fields like science, art, and medicine (and a few that are just downright wild). Here are some of the most unexpected things sound can do that you probably didn’t know about.
10. Eradicate It
In Minneapolis, Orfield Labs has built what they claim is the world’s quietest room, designed specifically to test the faintest sounds, like the hum of a lightbulb. The room’s walls are fully sound-absorbing, and the noise level has been recorded at -9 decibels, which is far beneath the level of human hearing, even dropping into negative numbers. It’s so quiet, you can actually hear your internal organs. This level of sensory deprivation intensifies all other senses, but it can also have bizarre effects on your mind and body. After prolonged exposure, people have reported experiencing symptoms akin to schizophrenia or even the bizarre sensation of tasting colors. As a result, the longest anyone has stayed in the room is just 45 minutes, likely due to the hallucinations that follow.
9. Escape Its Reach
Imagine you're camping on one side of a lake and spot another campsite on the other. During the day, you notice their lively party, but surprisingly, you can't hear the music. However, as night falls, you're able to overhear their ghost stories and chats, even though they seemed too far for you to hear the party earlier. What’s happening? This is due to a phenomenon where sound waves bend (refract) based on temperature shifts in the air. In the day, cooler air above the ground causes sound waves to travel upwards, creating a “Shadow Zone” right where you’re standing – meaning the sound waves are essentially passing over you. Since this is influenced by temperature, the same thing can occur in the ocean, and submarine operators can use these “Shadow Zones” to hide from sonar (and maybe even sea monsters).
8. Turn It Into a Weapon
As humans, we have a knack for transforming anything into a weapon. And so, we created a gun powered by sound. The Long Range Acoustic Device is one such invention. It may look like a black spotlight, but it’s capable of firing a “beam” of sound over hundreds of meters. This beam reaches up to 150 dB, which diminishes with distance. It’s primarily used for crowd control and breaking up riots, as the intensity of the sound (if you’re standing directly in front of it) is strong enough to cause excruciating pain and permanent damage. On a more positive note, these devices have been used on European cruise ships to fend off Somali pirates. Finally proving that shouting as loud as possible is an effective way to resolve conflicts.
7. Create Masterpieces
It turns out there is a way to visually perceive sound waves, and no, it doesn't involve those quirky glasses from The Magic School Bus. Instead, it’s about translating the waves into a visible form. By oscillating a plate covered with tiny particles (like sand), you’ll see the sound waves create distinct patterns, which can be used to produce mesmerizing symmetrical artwork. This field of study is called Cymatics. One of the earliest individuals to observe this phenomenon was Galileo in 1632. He was amazed to see that when he scraped a plate with a chisel, it produced a hissing sound, and the particles on the plate formed parallel lines.
6. End a Life
In theory, it's possible to be killed by sound pressure, but not in the way you might imagine. If an explosion is powerful enough, it can create blast overpressure, which is a sudden surge in atmospheric pressure following a massive detonation. This results in an ear-splitting noise, though you probably wouldn’t hear it because your eardrums would rupture at around 160 decibels. At 200 decibels, the pressure is sufficient to rupture a lung and cause severe internal injuries. This caused confusion during WWI, as soldiers were found dead with no obvious external injuries. So, that classic movie scene where the hero is thrown by a fireball but then gets up with just a slight ringing in his ears? Completely unrealistic. In real life, Rambo would be both deaf and dead.
5. Use It to Fight Crime
Quick, imagine you're tasked with preventing loitering at a subway station. Who would you hire? A security guard? A creepy clown? How about Mozart?
Many business and city officials have begun blasting classical music in high-crime areas, like parking lots, as a way to deter criminal activity. The reasoning is that the music is so annoying that people won’t want to linger around it. But it’s also backed by science: listening to music you dislike suppresses dopamine production, putting you in a bad mood and making you want to leave. Or maybe it just makes people more calm and passive. Either way, it seems to be effective: London began playing classical music in its subway stations in 2003, and within a year and a half, robberies and vandalism dropped by a third. And for country music fans, there’s a business somewhere using your favorite tunes to annoy people and drive them off their property.
4. Turn It Into A Laser Beam
Lasers are pretty amazing, aren’t they? They function by emitting light at a very specific wavelength. This makes them an efficient way to transfer energy, and because light can travel through a vacuum, lasers can work almost anywhere. For this reason, lasers have always been made with light waves. In contrast, sound waves require a medium to travel through, which made the concept of sound-powered lasers seem unlikely. However, in 2010, scientists in Japan developed a device that emits “phasers” at 170 kHz, eight times the highest frequency humans can hear. While this may not be as dazzling as a laser light show, it still serves useful purposes in medicine and computing.
3. Navigate With It (If You’re a Bird)
We know that many animals, such as bats, use supersonic sound waves for navigation. However, scientists were stumped for a while on how birds could navigate such vast distances and return home. In 1997, 60,000 pigeons got lost during a race from France to England after they crossed paths with a Concorde jet. Rather than questioning why people were racing pigeons for fun, geophysicist Jonathan Hagstrum theorized that the low-level sound from the jet (inaudible to humans) was disrupting the birds' navigation systems. Through a series of studies, Hagstrum concluded that birds use “sound maps” to find their way, and obstacles like irregular terrain or human-made structures could unintentionally throw them off course. So, if your friend dares you to a pigeon race, hit their birds with a Long Range Acoustic Device. That’ll teach them! Though it will probably kill it.
2. Travel Back In Time
One of the most fascinating emerging fields of historical research is Archaeoacoustics, which essentially involves using sound to explore archaeological sites. Think of it like how every room in your home has its own “sound” – depending on the layout and decoration, each room creates its own unique echoes. The theory is that historical sites also have a distinct “sound.” So, researchers at the University of Salford in the UK set out to discover what Stonehenge sounded like. They popped balloons, recorded the reverberations with field equipment, and analyzed the results using a computer model. The findings showed that Stonehenge had highly reflective acoustics, with a reverb time similar to that of a lecture hall, thanks to the flat surfaces of the stones. This could have even contributed to its spiritual significance in ancient times. And thanks to the magic of the Internet, you can explore Stonehenge from the comfort of your own chair.
1. Use Sound to Heal a Wound
Imagine finding yourself with a severe wound that needs urgent attention. What do you do? Simple: fire up a high-intensity focused ultrasound beam! A HIFU Transducer is a device that can concentrate acoustic energy to the point where it generates heat, much like how a magnifying glass can burn through the driveway by focusing sunlight. As a University of Washington professor of surgery explains, “It’s essentially the same concept, just with ultrasound.” This device can raise the temperature of an area as tiny as a grain of rice to several hundred degrees Fahrenheit, and in one experiment, it successfully sealed punctured lungs in pigs with a 95% success rate—within just two minutes. This marks a significant advance for non-invasive surgery. And for the creatively inclined suburban teens, it offers yet another way to torment ants.
