the sound of science

[Chris Daub <daub@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

All this talk of weird sound sources has finally given me a way to de-lurk
in a somewhat topical manner... Lord knows I don't know any of the music
well enough to contribute in that way!

When I did my M.Sc. in physics at U of Guelph, the lab I worked in used a
technique called photoacoustic spectroscopy (PAS).  We'd fire a tunable
laser into a gas sample , with the beam chopped at 50Hz.  If the sample
absorbed at that wavelength, it would expand and contract at the same 50Hz
frequency, and we'd detect this pressure/sound wave with a hearing aid
microphone.  I never actually listened to the raw sound, we just read the
voltage directly... too bad, maybe if I go back sometime I'll try and
record it!

If ya care, the group homepage is at http://pas.chembio.uoguelph.ca, but
there's not much of interest there.

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Construct ID: Chris Daub  --  Neophile  --  Programming: Ph.D Chem, UBC

    "A great truth is a truth whose opposite is also a great truth"
    -- Niels Bohr
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