-
Not Synced
Once there was a star,
-
Not Synced
like everything else, she was born
grilled (?) to be about 30x
-
Not Synced
the mass of our sun
-
Not Synced
and lived for a very long time.
-
Not Synced
Exactly how long?
-
Not Synced
People cannot really tell.
-
Not Synced
Just like everything in life,
-
Not Synced
she reached the end of her
regular star days
-
Not Synced
when her heart, the core of her life,
exhausted its fuel.
-
Not Synced
But that was no end.
-
Not Synced
she transformed into a supernovae,
-
Not Synced
and in the process, releasing a tremendous
of energy,
-
Not Synced
outshining the rest of the galaxy,
-
Not Synced
and emitting, in one second,
the same amount of energy
-
Not Synced
our sun will release in 10 days.
-
Not Synced
And she evolved into another role
in our galaxy.
-
Not Synced
Supernovae explosions are very extreme.
-
Not Synced
But the ones that emit gamma rays
are even more extreme.
-
Not Synced
In the process of becoming
a supernovae,
-
Not Synced
the interior of the star collaposes
under its own weight.
-
Not Synced
And it starts rotating ever-faster.
-
Not Synced
Like an ice skater when pulling
their arms in close to their body.
-
Not Synced
In that way, it starts rotating very fast
and it increases, powerfully,
-
Not Synced
its magnetic field.
-
Not Synced
The matter around the star
is dragged around,
-
Not Synced
and some energy from that rotation
is transferred to that matter
-
Not Synced
and the magnetic field is increased
even further.
-
Not Synced
In that way, our star had extra energy
to outshine the rest of the galaxy
-
Not Synced
in brightness and gamma ray emission.
-
Not Synced
My star, the one in my story,
-
Not Synced
became what is known as a magnetar.
-
Not Synced
And just for your information,
-
Not Synced
the magnetic field of a magnetar
is 1,000 trillionx
-
Not Synced
the magnetic field of earth.
-
Not Synced
The most energetic events
ever measured by astronmers
-
Not Synced
carry the name Gamma Ray Bursts
-
Not Synced
because we observe them as bursts
or explosions
-
Not Synced
most strongly measured as gamma ray light.
-
Not Synced
Our star, like the one in our story
that became a magnetar,
-
Not Synced
is detected as a gamma ray burst
-
Not Synced
through the most energetic
portion of the explosion.
-
Not Synced
Yet, even though gamma ray bursts
are the stongest events
-
Not Synced
ever measured by astronomers,
-
Not Synced
we cannot see them with our
naked eye.
-
Not Synced
We depend, we rely on other methods
-
Not Synced
in order to study this gamma ray light.
-
Not Synced
We cannot see them with our
naked eye.
-
Not Synced
We can only see an itty bitty tinny
portion
-
Not Synced
of the electromagnetic spectrum
that call visible light.
-
Not Synced
And beyond that, we rely on other methods.
-
Not Synced
And as astronomers, we study a wider
range of light
-
Not Synced
and we depend on other methods to do that.
-
Not Synced
On the screen, it may look like this.
-
Not Synced
You're seeing a plot,
-
Not Synced
that is a light curve.
-
Not Synced
It's a plot of intensity of light
over time.
-
Not Synced
It is a gamma ray light curve.
-
Not Synced
Sighted astronomers depend on this
kind of plot
-
Not Synced
in order to interpret how this
light intensity changes over time.
-
Not Synced
On the left, you will be seeing
the light intensity without a burst,
-
Not Synced
and on the right, you will be seeing
the light intensity with the burst.
-
Not Synced
Early during my career, I could also
see this kind of plot.
-
Not Synced
But then, I lost my sight, I completely
lost my sight
-
Not Synced
because of an extended illness,
-
Not Synced
and with it, I lost the opportunity
to see this plot
-
Not Synced
and the opportunity to do my physics.
-
Not Synced
It was a very strong transition for me
in many ways.
-
Not Synced
And professionally, it left me
without a way to do my science.
-
Not Synced
I longed to access adn scrutinize
this energetic light
-
Not Synced
and figure out the astrophysical cost.
-
Not Synced
I wanted to experience the spacious
wonder, the excitement,
-
Not Synced
the joy produced by the detection
of such a titanic celestial event.
-
Not Synced
I thought long and hard about it.
-
Not Synced
When I suddenly realized that all
a light curve is
-
Not Synced
is a table of numbers converted
into a visual plot.
-
Not Synced
So along with my collaborators,
-
Not Synced
we worked really hard and we translated
the numbers into sound.
-
Not Synced
I achieved access to the data,
-
Not Synced
and today I'm able to do physics
at the level of the best astronomer
-
Not Synced
using sound.
-
Not Synced
And what people have been able to do,
mainly visually,
-
Not Synced
for hundreds of years,
-
Not Synced
now I do it using sound.
-
Not Synced
(Applause)
-
Not Synced
Listening to this gamma ray burst
that you're seeing on the --
-
Not Synced
thank you --
-
Not Synced
that you're seeing on the screen,
-
Not Synced
brought something to the ear
beyond the obvious burst.
-
Not Synced
Now I'm going to play the burst for you,
-
Not Synced
it's not music, it's sound.
-
Not Synced
(Sound of the plot)
-
Not Synced
This is scientific data converted
into sound
-
Not Synced
and it's mapped in pitch,
the process is called sonification.
-
Not Synced
So listening to this brought something
to the ear
-
Not Synced
besides the obvious burst.
-
Not Synced
When I examine the very strong
low frequency regions,
-
Not Synced
or base line,
-
Not Synced
I'm zooming into the base line now --
or the baseline,
-
Not Synced
we know that resonances that were
characteristic
-
Not Synced
of electrically charged gasses
like the solar wind.
-
Not Synced
And I want you to hear what I heard.
-
Not Synced
You will hear it as a very fast
decrease in volume.
-
Not Synced
And because you're sighted,
-
Not Synced
I'm giving you a red line indicating
to you
-
Not Synced
what intensity of light is being
converted into sound.
-
Not Synced
(Sound)
-
Not Synced
The (whistle) is frogs at home,
don't pay attention to that.
-
Not Synced
(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
(Sound)
-
Not Synced
I think you heard it, right?
-
Not Synced
So what we found is that the bursts
last long enough
-
Not Synced
in order to support wave resonances,
-
Not Synced
which are things caused by exchanges
of energy between particles
-
Not Synced
that may have been excited
that depend on the volume.
-
Not Synced
You may remember that I said
that the matter around the star
-
Not Synced
is dragged around?
-
Not Synced
It transmits power with frequency
and field distribution that
-
Not Synced
are ?? by the dimensions
-
Not Synced
And you may remember that
we were talking about
-
Not Synced
a supermassive star that became
a very strong magnetic field magnetar.
-
Not Synced
If this is the case, then outflows
from the exploding star
-
Not Synced
may be associated with this
gamma ray burst.
-
Not Synced
What does that mean?
-
Not Synced
That star formation may be
a very important part
-
Not Synced
of this supernovae explosion.
-
Not Synced
Listening to this very gamma ray burst
-
Not Synced
brought us to the notion that the use
of sound
-
Not Synced
as a adjunctive visual display
-
Not Synced
may also support sighted astronomers
in the search
-
Not Synced
for more information in the data.
-
Not Synced
Simultaneously, I worked on analyzing
measurements from other telescopes
-
Not Synced
and my experiments demonstrated
that when you use sound
-
Not Synced
as an adjunctive visual display,
-
Not Synced
astronomers can find more information
-
Not Synced
in this now more accessible data set.
-
Not Synced
And this ability to transform data
into sound
-
Not Synced
gives astronomy a tremendous power
of transformation.
-
Not Synced
And the fact that a field that is
so visual may be improved
-
Not Synced
in order to include anyone with interest
what in heaven lies
-
Not Synced
is a spirit-lifter.
-
Not Synced
When I lost my sight,
-
Not Synced
I noticed that I didn't have access
to the same amount
-
Not Synced
and quality of information
a sighted astronomer had.
-
Not Synced
It was not until we innovated
with the sonification process
-
Not Synced
that I regained the hope
of being a productive member
-
Not Synced
of the field that I have worked
so hard to be part of.
-
Not Synced
Yet, information access is not
the only area in astronomy
-
Not Synced
where this is important.
-
Not Synced
The situation is systemic
-
Not Synced
and scientific fields are not
keeping up.
-
Not Synced
The body is something changeable --
-
Not Synced
anyone may develop a disability
at any point.
-
Not Synced
And let's think about, for example,
scientists who are
-
Not Synced
already at the top of their careers,
-
Not Synced
what happens to them if they develop
a disability?
-
Not Synced
Will they feel excommunicated
as I did?
-
Not Synced
Information access empowers
us to flourish.
-
Not Synced
It gives us equal opportunities to display
our talents
-
Not Synced
and choose what we want to do
with our lives
-
Not Synced
based on interest and not based
on potential barriers.
-
Not Synced
When we give people the opportunity
to succeed without limits,
-
Not Synced
that will lead to personal fulfillment
and prospering life.
-
Not Synced
And I think that the use of sound
in astronomy
-
Not Synced
is helping us to achieve that
and to contribute to science.
-
Not Synced
While other countries told me
that the study of perception techniques
-
Not Synced
in order to study astronomy data
is not relevant to astronomy
-
Not Synced
because there are no bling astronomers
in the field,
-
Not Synced
South Africa said, "We want people
with disabilities
-
Not Synced
to contribute to the field."
-
Not Synced
Right now, I'm working at the
South African Astronomical Observatory
-
Not Synced
at the office of Astronomy
for Development.
-
Not Synced
There, we are working on
sonification techniques
-
Not Synced
and analysis methods
to impact the students
-
Not Synced
of the Athlone School for the Blind.
-
Not Synced
The se students will be learning
radio astornomy
-
Not Synced
and they will be learning
the sonification methods
-
Not Synced
in order to study astronomical events
like huge ejections of energy
-
Not Synced
from the sun, known as
coronal mass ejections.
-
Not Synced
What we learned from these students,
-
Not Synced
these students have multiple disabilities
and coping strategies
-
Not Synced
that will be accomodating.
-
Not Synced
What we learn with these students
will directly impact
-
Not Synced
the way things are being done
at the professional level.
-
Not Synced
I humbly call this development,
-
Not Synced
and this is happening right now.
-
Not Synced
I think that science is for everyone.
-
Not Synced
It belongs to the people,
-
Not Synced
and it has to be available.