From stock trends to changes in Earth’s temperature, data that vary over time are usually represented in graphs and charts. How boring! What if, instead, one could listen to the sudden drop of a stock price or the steady increase of global temperatures? Enter sonification, the process of transforming flat data into mellow soundwaves.
Mark Ballora, an expert on music technology at Pennsylvania State University in State College, uses sonification to create symphonies out of scientific data. Raised in the 1960s just outside San Francisco, California, by an architect and a pianist, Ballora lived and breathed music, playing piano, listening to Beatles records, and attending Grateful Dead gigs. For the past 20 years, he has collaborated with dozens of scientists to turn all kinds of data into music, from the energy emitted by a neutron star to the body temperature cycle of arctic squirrels. In June, Ballora received two $50,000 grants from the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative to help marine biologists translate data from the deep ocean into sound. He chatted with Science to discuss how—and why—he turns data into music. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
To read more, click here.