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    The loud sound of silence: Nasa's Mars rover records audio rumblings, space agency blames it on seismic activity

    Synopsis

    InSight has detected more than 100 audio signals since April.

    nasa marsAgencies
    hen the arm of the InSight’s seismometer moves, it picks up the sounds produced by disturbances.
    The sound of silence can be surprisingly loud, as NASA’s InSight rover found out this week. The sedentary probe, which is stationed on far-flung Mars, has recorded audio of rumblings beneath the Martian surface. InSight is equipped with a seismometer - the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure - that is sensitive to the gentle vibration, and also atmospheric disturbances.

    The Mars rover, launched from the Vandenberg Air Force Base in May 2018, took six months before landing on the Red Planet. It has hence been documenting the finer aspects of Mars’ geology and atmosphere. The seismometer was placed on the Martian surface in May, and InSight has hence been listening out for seismic activity (marsquakes), in an attempt to piece together a picture of Mars’ anatomy.

    However, it did not pick up any sounds till April 2019, when strange sounds were heard through the static. A seismic signal was recorded on April 6, which the InSight team reckons is a quake from deep within the planet, as opposed to a geological disturbance emanating from near the surface. The high frequency signal was the first of many to be observed, but subsequent quakes could not match the strength of the initial signal.



    InSight has detected more than 100 audio signals since April, and researchers at NASA estimate that 21 of them could be attributed to seismic activity. In December 2018, it picked up the sound of wind on Mars. The origins of some of the sounds that were observed are being studied, lending to speculative reports about the existence of extraterrestrial life.

    NASA made public some of the audio signals that were detected in May and July, both of which are outside the human range of hearing. These were digitally enhanced and processed so we could hear them. The first quake, which happened in May, had a magnitude of 3.7, and the subsequent July quake clocked 3.3 magnitude.

    Unlike the Earth, Mars does not have tectonic plates, meaning that marsquakes are caused by cooling and contraction, which leads to stress fractures on the crust. The Martian surface is pockmarked with craters, which allows quakes to last for as long as a minute, whereas on Earth, they persist for only a matter of seconds. Researchers associated with the project have been working on filtering out other ambient noises that the seismometer records.

    When the arm of the InSight’s seismometer moves, it picks up the sounds produced by disturbances. The incidence of wind is more during the day, leaving scientists free to concentrate for quakes at night. But the darkness of the Martian night comes with its own unique sounds, which the researchers called “dinks and donks.” These are mostly caused by the expansion and contraction of mechanical parts within the seismometer’s body, possibly caused by heat loss.

    An eerie whistling sound was also recorded, but the InSight team reckons it is due to interference with the electronics in the seismometer. The InSight mission, which is the acronym for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, has been given a two-year timeline to gather facts about Mars’ deep interior - a region which has hitherto been beyond the ambit of previous missions.

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