Webinar: Dancing the Milky Way
Aired February 12, 2021
Katie Derloshon:
Hello everyone. My name is Katie and I am so excited to welcome you to today's program. Welcome to today's Soar family program, dancing The Milky Way. And like I said, my name is Katie and I am a museum educator from the National Museum of Natural History. And we are so excited to bring you today's program with others from our Smithsonian family too. And I am also happy to have been welcomed by the National Museum or the National Air and Space Museum to join you all today. And today's program is part of the National Air and Space Museum's Soar Together Program, Exploring Other Worlds. So that's this month's theme and it's about exploring other worlds and discovering more about this one. There will be other programs today and tomorrow highlighting our latest exploration on Mars and considering other worlds in our universe too. So be sure to check them out.
And in our program today though specifically, we will explore how experts can show and interpret data in many different ways to help others understand and learn what that data can tell us about the universe. Now throughout today's program, you'll be able to communicate with us using the Q&A feature in Zoom. This is how you can ask us questions that you may have, share any observations you'd like to share, and share any of the answers to the questions that we ask you throughout today's program. And we'll do our best to get through as many questions as possible. And at the end of our program, if we have a few minutes, we can also ask our experts any of those last minute questions there too. And I see in the Q&A, we've got, "Where's the chat?" So this is a webinar, so there's not a chat in this program today, just that Q&A. And you can use that Q&A to ask me and our experts any questions that you might have throughout today's program.
And if you would like to use closed captions, you can click that CC button located near the Q&A feature. And throughout our program also today we'll be sharing a PowerPoint with you. And when the PowerPoint is on, you can toggle back and forth using this vertical bar in your screen to choose if you want the PowerPoint to be bigger or if you'd like the educators or experts videos to be bigger, you can choose. And we also have a team working behind the scenes, and you'll be hearing from them in the Q&A. If you have questions, they might be able to answer them in the Q&A or give you some more information. But let's go ahead and warm up that Q&A. And I see lots of us have found that Q&A so far.
So again, my name is Katie and I'm joining you from my home in Alexandria, Virginia. But people at home, it's your turn. Where are you joining us from today? All right, I see we've got some friends saying hello in the Q&A and I see someone's asking, what does NASM stand for? So you might see in front of our names or after our names rather, some abbreviations or titles that we are called or where we're coming from. So mine says MNNH, that means National Museum of Natural History. That's where I'm an educator, but we also have people on our program today that might have NASM and that stands for National Air and Space Museum. Together today we're coming to bring you this awesome program.
All right, I see Will from Alexandria, Virginia. Hello, neighbor. I see Judy from Tacoma. All right, awesome. We've got Pierce from Michigan, Lucas coming from his house, hello. Eleanor as well, hello. All right, this is awesome. Hello, and Jillian in Marilyn, Maddie and Charlie, hello welcome to the program. Hello from Puerto Rico. Andre, hello, this is awesome. So many awesome friends here to join us and to move and groove to today's program. All right. And also with that mindset, today's program, we will be dancing. So if you have any favorite dance moves that you want to share with us in the Q&A too, we'd love to hear some of those favorite dance moves. And one more time, again, we want to welcome everyone to who just might have been joining us. My name is Katie, and I'm super excited to welcome you to today's program, Dancing the Milky Way.
So today we'll be using data or information collected by scientists who study space to create dance. Astronomers are scientists that study the universe and collect data or information to better understand what is in space beyond Earth. Now, some of this data that they collect we can see with our eyes, but some of this data we can't see. So not all of it is actually visible to our eyes. And since we cannot see all of the data with our eyes, scientists help us to understand this data in other ways. So scientists can add color as one way to help us understand what's out there but can't be seen. And scientists can also translate data into music to show this data in another way. So during today's program, we will listen to some of this data and begin creating our own original ideas for dance making.
To do this, we have two experts that will be joining us. We have Kim Arcand, a visualization scientist from NASA's Chandra X-Ray Observatory at the Center for Astrophysics, Harvard and Smithsonian. And Kylie Murray, the co-artistic director and teaching artist from the Local Motion Project. Let's go ahead and meet them and get this party started and learn a little bit more about their connection to art and science. Hi Kim. Hi Kylie.
Kylie Murray:
Hi there.
Katie Derloshon:
Hi.
Kim Arcand:
Hello.
Katie Derloshon:
We're so excited to learn from both of you today. So Kylie, you're a dance artist with Local Motion Project in Alexandria, Virginia. Can you tell us a little bit about what you do and how your dance work can connect you with science?
Kylie Murray:
Absolutely. Thank you so much for inviting me to be here today. So I do a lot of different things with Local Motion Project. One of my favorite things is that I get to work with children and adults to create dance based on ideas, thoughts, and feelings. And I love to learn and explore new things and then interpret them with dance. And science is full of interesting concepts and information that is perfect for inspiring dance making.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. Cool. Thank you for sharing. All right, so now let's meet Kim. So Kim, you're a scientist and you also have a passion for art. Can you share a little bit more about the type of science you do and maybe why music?
Kim Arcand:
Yes, for sure. So hi everybody. I'm Kim Arcand, and thanks so much for having me today. I like to say that I'm a data storyteller because I get to take information from our universe and then do something with it that is hopefully kind of cool. And it might be an image, it might be a 3D model or a 3D print, or it might be sound. And I would not say I'm a music expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I've been able to work with colleagues to be able to translate information of our universe into sound, which has been really important to work with different communities, particularly people who might be blind or low vision as a way for them to be able to access data. And also, I just have to add that I was a dancer for many, many years, so I'm really excited to be here today.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. Me too. This is the perfect combination, astronomy and dance. I mean, who could have made a better program? I mean, this is awesome. But before we start dancing, Kim, can you share a little bit more about the science behind the music that we'll be dancing to today? How does this work? How do we hear the data? And if I go outside right now, can I hear this data?
Kim Arcand:
Yeah. So I think we might start by looking at a few images on the screen. And this very first one, it's a very sort of spherical glowing thing, but can anyone take a guess as to what this object might be? You're seeing lots of colors on the screen. Any thoughts what this is?
Katie Derloshon:
Yeah, let's turn to our Q&A and see, do we have anybody sharing some thoughts as to what they might see? So we see the Earth, ooh, that's a star. We also say, we have a hello from someone in our Q&A to Kylie. They remember seeing you from Deep Sea, so hello again. The moon, a star, a star, the sun, we're getting ... the Milky Way, the moon. What do you think?
Kim Arcand:
That's wonderful. So I've heard the answer. It is indeed our sun. So our sun is our closest star, and what's really important to know is that it actually emits many different kinds of light. So there are all these different kinds of light out there in the universe, and they all essentially are grouped together called the electromagnetic spectrum. And you can see on the next slide that there are many different kinds of light from radio waves all the way up to gamma rays. And you've probably actually been using different kinds of light in your day for many, many different times over the past, say even week. So perhaps you could take a guess. How many different kinds of light do you think you have interacted with over the past week?
Katie Derloshon:
Ooh, I think we have a poll for this, Kim. So viewers at home, we're going to pop up a poll here, and then you can choose some possible ways you might have interacted with other types of light. So maybe you listen to the radio, maybe you used a microwave oven, maybe you went outside and saw the sun.
Kim Arcand:
Exactly. So there's all of these different kinds of light that we're interacting with every day. If we're putting sunscreen on our skin to protect from ultraviolet radiation, if we have to go to the dentist or a doctor to get an X-ray so that they can see inside our teeth or inside a bone that might have broken. Or if we're using remote control to talk to a television, we might be using infrared light. So we're actually using many different kinds of light in our daily lives. And for an astronomer, it's really important to be able to use different kinds of light as well.
Katie Derloshon:
All right. So let's go ahead and stop the poll and let's take a look and share those different types of likes that our participants have been using this week. All right. So it looks like the one that mostly everybody picked was a lot of our participants picked was turning on a light in their bedroom. Definitely. I think we might-
Kim Arcand:
Definitely useful.
Katie Derloshon:
Excellent. Thank you for sharing everyone. Great.
Kim Arcand:
So all of this light, essentially it's having a different kind of tool in an astronomer's toolbox. And so even an object like our sun emits many different kinds of light. So being able to study the stars and larger objects through many different kinds of light just gives you different pieces of the puzzle. So on the next slide, the reason that we have to choose many different kinds of light is because you can sort of picture in your head what if you went to a baseball stadium during non-pandemic times and you looked out onto the baseball field and all you could see was just a tiny, thin strip down the third baseline, and that was all the information that you got of the game. It would be really hard to figure out what the rules are, what's going on, where are the players. And that lack of information would be a real struggle. However, once you can see the whole screen, when you can see the whole field, for example, then you get all of the information on the baseball field. I think we have a picture to show that too.
Katie Derloshon:
Yeah. So what you're saying, Kim, is that the light we can see is just that one single strip of the baseball field. But by having these other tools, we can see different types of light or learn information from different types of light that will give us a better picture of the universe, or in this case, the rest of the baseball field.
Kim Arcand:
Exactly. If we could only see down that third baseline, and it'd be only being able to use visible light to study the universe, which is just a small, small piece. But when you can use all the different kinds of light, you get so much more information and it's a lot easier to figure out the rules of the game. But I think what's also interesting to think about how we work with astronomical data, because data of the universe, they're not just like giant space selfies where you just click, shoot, and done. On the next slide, you'll actually see that this information is data. So it's just all of these ones and zeros, all of this computer information essentially that we've been able to capture. And I think on that next slide, there we are. So you can see that astronomers actually need to translate information to something that we can see, what's called a visual representation.
And so on the next slide, what's really useful to consider is that we have some sort of object out in space. And that light, that information has been traveling towards the satellite. The satellite is looking at that object, it captures the information, it bundles it up in the form of ones and zeros, and then sends it down to Earth where it might eventually find its way to my laptop. From there, you can translate it into an image or you can translate it into sound. And so next we see, on the next slide, that sonification is essentially that process of translating information, say of the universe or something else into sound, just using sound to be able to represent data in a different way.
Katie Derloshon:
Interesting. All right, so you've taken this data and instead of maybe having this image that we can see with our eyes, now we have another sense, we can use our ears to hear what's going on in the information. Cool.
Kim Arcand:
Exactly.
Katie Derloshon:
All right. So I'm do want to comment on one thing in the Q&A. So we do have some people wondering about why they can't see other people's comments or other people's screens. So again, this is a webinar, and so for everyone's safety, we just have the Q&A going to our educators here, behind the scenes, and to us on the screen so that to keep everyone safe and so that nobody's personal information is out there as well as cameras are off. So you will only be able to see us because there's a lot of us on here today. So it would be maybe a little overwhelming to see all of the cameras for all of the people that are with us today.
But back on sonification. So Kim was just telling us that scientists can use this data and then translate it into music so we can use our sense of hearing to be able to understand what's going on. So here's an example of what Kim is talking about. Let's listen to the Milky Way, and then afterwards Kim can share more about what's going on in the music.
[soft music plays, including xylophones and violins and piano]
Katie Derloshon:
All right. That was awesome. And we have some really awesome comments also that are coming in the Q&A. And I know for myself, I have never experienced data like this before hearing these sonification, and we heard different musical instruments playing at different volumes. Someone in the Q&A was saying it was sounding like little twinkles of stars, and someone even said it reminds them of some of their video game music they like. So lots of connections that our friends are making at home. So what's going on here, Kim, in this music?
Kim Arcand:
So right here we're actually listening to the core of our very own Milky Way Galaxy, which is a spiral galaxy, and at the core is a super-massive black hole. So all of that sort of busy information that you are hearing towards the right side of the image, that's the area around the super-massive black hole. So we're using three different kinds of light in the sonification, in each different kind of light is assigned to a different sound. So we have the infrared as a piano, we have the optical as a violin, and then we have the highest energy X-ray as a xylophone. And the way this sonification works is it scans from the left of the image all the way to the right of the image. And so the light of the objects located towards the top of the image are heard as higher pitches, while the intensity of the light also controls the volume. So you're hearing stars and other compact sources, you're hearing all of this energy around our super-massive black hole. And then you're hearing all of the different kinds of light in what each brings.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. All right, Kim, we had one question. It's an interesting question. So this is light, these aren't sounds from sound waves, right? These are-
Kim Arcand:
Exactly.
Katie Derloshon:
Okay.
Kim Arcand:
Exactly. So this project is not about capturing sounds that exist in the universe. Out in the universe they say you can't hear, no one can hear you scream when you're out there, it's because there's no stuff, no material for those sound waves to travel on to be able to reach inside your ear. So you're not going to hear sounds in the universe directly yourself. What this project is about is taking information and instead of just representing it as a visual or an image instead, also representing it through sound. And what's interesting about that is when scientists can listen to their data, they can learn new things. And when people can listen to different information of our universe or even things closer to home here on Earth, they can also experience things differently. So it's sort of a win-win.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. Thank you for sharing. So you shared earlier too that there's lots of different types of light out there that some that we can't see. So what types of light are we listening to or looking at here to make this image and to make this sound?
Kim Arcand:
So as the image shows you on the screen, we've got three different parts of this piece, this whole. And it's like each different kind of light has its own little solo going on, but you're hearing them all together to create sort of the symphony. So the lowest-energy material is the infrared light from the Spitzer Space Telescope. The middle-range material is the optical light from the Hubble Space Telescope, and then the highest-energy light is the X-ray information from NASA's Chandra Observatory. And then together they kind of make up this just beautiful symphony.
Katie Derloshon:
I agree. Thank you for sharing. All right. So now it's time to think about dancing. And we had a question in the Q&A from Cord asking what is "Dancing in the Milky Way"? Kim, how would you answer that? What is "Dancing in the Milky Way"?
Kim Arcand:
I think there are a couple ways to answer that question. Sometimes I think of things like stars and other objects as essentially dancing in the Milky Way because everything in our universe is dynamic and things are always moving and changing. And that sort of ever changing aspect of the greater universe that we live in, I think actually translates really well to us down here on Earth. And then more specifically that there is this idea that you can translate information into any kind of way. You can make your own meaning out of it. So being able to take this information that we're seeing or hearing today and then translate it into motion and movement for your own body means that you can do your own dance of what this Milky Way information means.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome, thank you. And Kylie, I'm going to transition to you asking the same question. What does that mean to you, "Dancing in the Milky Way"?
Kylie Murray:
That's a great question, and I think Kim said it really well. The way that we create dance in this context that we're going to be doing today is really about you all expressing your interpretation of what you're hearing and expressing it through creative movement and creative dance. So much like the scientists took the information and interpreted it with music and light, now we get to take it one step further and interpret it into movement.
Katie Derloshon:
All right. So I hear that you have a fun way to introduce those different elements of dance that we'll be working with today. Shall we do it?
Kylie Murray:
Let's do it. Yeah. So similar to how Kim was saying that the different instruments, the different telescopes and things gather different parts of the information as tools for the scientists to learn more. We have the elements of dance, which help us create dances. I like to think of these as ingredients. So there are five elements of dance: body, action, space, time, and energy. And some of you may have heard these five words before. So just really quickly, I have a few little images on here to help us remember what these are. Body is our body parts and different body shapes that we make. Actions can be non-locomotor in one place or locomotor moving through our space. And in our space we can have different levels, high, medium, and low. We can travel in different pathways. In timing, we can move at different speeds from slow to fast and everything in between.
And then finally, in energy, we have different, what we call attacks, like a smooth attack. And I have this bowl of water here to help us remember about being smooth. And this cactus here, that's a sharp energy. And we also have weight like a feather or a heavy weighted object. So let's go ahead and explore all of these in our bodies. Now for those of you at home, whatever space you have is fine. If you are in a chair and you're really close to your computer or if you're in a school space right now, that's perfect. And Kim, you're going to be our chair dancer today, right? Awesome. But if you do have a little bit more room, you can go ahead and stand up in your space and just look around your space and make sure that it is clear of anything that you might trip on. So let's turn on some music and explore some of these elements of dance.
[light, instrumental rock music starts playing]
Body. Can you move just one body part, maybe your shoulder, head, maybe your hips, and now lots of your body parts all at the same time. Nice. And let's make some shapes with our body. Make a curved shape. Explore lots of different curve shapes and straight shapes and angular shapes. Lots of elbows and knees, angles. Nice. All right, action. Non-locomotor means we move to one space. Let's twist. Can you twist different body parts, and bend, and reach? Can you reach with a part of your body that is not your arms? Reach a different part of your body. Good. Locomotor means you travel around our space. Let's all walk or run like into your space, jump, slide. Great job. Space is where we talk about levels. Let's all get a shape on our low level. And you can do an action down here on a low level, maybe you rock on a low level.
And a medium level, maybe wiggle on a medium level. Let them wiggle and let's stretch on a high level. Great job. Can you walk in a circular pathway? Pathway is also part of space. Can you walk on a curve of the pathway? Can you use your hands and make a zigzag pathway? Great. Now move however you like, release slowly. We're thinking about time. Time is slow and now fast. And slow and fast. Thinking of one body part that moves really fast. Nice job. And that last one is energy. So let's think about smooth energy as if you're in a pool or a bath or running a stick through a tunnel, smooth. It keeps moving versus sharp energy where there's little stops in between. And lastly, wait, imagine your body goes light as a feather. As light as a feather. You can be down low in light, maybe just your arms lightly, and heavy. What does it feel like if your body was full of boulders? Can you move up high and heavy? Great job dancers. Nice exploration.
Katie Derloshon:
Woo. All right, thank you. That was a lot of fun.
Kim Arcand:
It was fun.
Katie Derloshon:
All right, so excellent job. So now with those dance elements in mind, shall we go ahead and start listening to some of those official music or sound bites that we'll be actually dancing to today? Let's go ahead and start listening. So the first one, we're going to listen to it first and then Kim, we'll share a little bit about what's going on in that sound clip.
[soft piano music plays]
Kim Arcand:
So in this piece we're listening to the lowest-energy information. It's the infrared light, and it's shown in a red color and it's information that's infrared light from the Spitzer Space Telescope. So now it's the radiation and the winds from stars that are creating these glowing dust clouds that can have some really complex structures from compact spherical globules to these long sort of stringy filaments.
Katie Derloshon:
Thank you for sharing, Kim. Now before we jump over to Kylie, we do have one quick question in the Q&A. Do you always represent different light with the same instrument or does it change?
Kim Arcand:
No, actually that is a great question because just like in images, there's not a true standardization of what you can assign to your information. It's all about the science telling you what it could represent. So the science just sort of helps drive the visual or other representative story. So in this case, we chose these sorts of musical instruments because there was a lot going on, and we wanted to be able to distinguish those very distinct kinds of light, the infrared, the visible, and the X-ray in ways that would sound individual, but still really work more harmoniously together. But there are other pieces that we've created that sound more like a synthesized sound and a very sort of futuristic kind of sound. So it really depends on the type of information that we're trying to help convey. What story we're trying to tell.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome, thank you. And Kylie, when you were listening to Kim talk about the infrared, what types of things were you thinking or what were you writing down?
Kylie Murray:
Yeah, I had my whiteboard out to gather some inspiration for our movements. So I wrote down that it's the lowest data that we have. There are winds that are created from those stars, glowing dust clouds. And Kim mentioned compact kind of rounded shapes and also long stringy shapes. I'm curious from everyone watching what other words you heard that inspire movement or what the music sounded like to you. So I would love for people to write some things down in the Q&A. And Katie, if you could share some of those, that would be great.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. Yes. So we have wow, we have some wow and cools. People were really enjoying the music. The James family says, "Heavy and low," reminded Maggie of, ballet music.
Kylie Murray:
Okay.
Katie Derloshon:
Caylen says, "Slow, light, soft." It reminded Andre of, "Rivers of flowing water."
Kylie Murray:
Awesome. This is great. We can do this all day.
Katie Derloshon:
Yeah, I know, right? This is great.
Kylie Murray:
That's awesome. So let's move some of these words. So let's think about long and stringy. Let's think about this compact and rounded kind of globules. Kim, tell me, say that again how you described it. I loved it. Compact...
Kim Arcand:
Yeah, so these compact spherical globules, which is a great word.
Kylie Murray:
Great. And then let's think about this, this is good, slow and flowing. So as we listen to it again, let's explore some of these words. Here we go, everyone, into your dance space. [inaudible 00:33:12]
[soft piano music plays again]
Beautifully done.
Kim Arcand:
Beautiful.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. All right. So let's go ahead now and take a look at our next piece of data, or rather listen to our next piece of data.
Kim Arcand:
So the second piece is the optical, just kind of over to the near-infrared bits of information from the Hubble Space Telescope. [music starts, violins plucking] And it's being represented from in the yellow light if you're looking at it on your screen as well. So now this information is essentially outlining the slightly more energetic regions of this area where stars are being born and there are these long filaments connecting. And then also that it's revealing hundreds of thousands of stars in this 400-light-year chunk of the center of our Milky Way.
Katie Derloshon:
Wow. All right. Kylie, what did you write down for this one? Oh, Kylie, you're on mute or you're... yep.
Kylie Murray:
Every time. All right. I have that it's this mid-level information and that the energy level is increasing here from the infrared. Stars are being born, thousands of stars. And I heard that in the plucking sounds of the violins. I'm curious what everyone else heard or words that stood out to you. So go ahead and share that in the Q&A and I'll jot some down here.
Katie Derloshon:
All right. So we have Nema thinking that it was reminding her it was kind of sleepy, but in the end it made her think of her puppy Rocky. So I wonder if her puppy, because it did get a little bit woo, woo there at the end. So I'm wondering, it was a little bit more lively at the end. Thank you for sharing Nema. We've got, Tullua says it was very slow, oh, so very excited, but also felt kind of slow. We've got energetic from Kate or from Kathleen. Wind chime, Sonya says, it sounds kind of like wind chimes and Judy notes that there were spurts of energy.
Kylie Murray:
Spurts of energy. Great.
Katie Derloshon:
That's a good one.
Kylie Murray:
Yeah. Okay. So this is where it gets exciting for me in dance when I start to think how can I show slow and excited at the same time? And Kim, that might be a challenge that the scientists had as well.
Kim Arcand:
100 percent, yes.
Kylie Murray:
Great, cool. We're going to be looking at the sleepy slowness. I'm going to put slow here too. But partnering that with the lively and excited. And then how can we also just explore all of those stars? Because that's really I think what we're hearing there. So let's go ahead and watch and listen again and move some of those ideas.
Katie Derloshon:
And Kylie, sometimes it's difficult to hear you when we're listening to the music. So I think we just encourage us to move how we feel, right?
Kylie Murray:
Absolutely.
Katie Derloshon:
Get words in mind.
Kylie Murray:
Yeah. Thank you Katie. Don't worry about what I'm doing. No one should feel like they're copying me because this is just my interpretation. You all have your own interpretation, so go with it. Whatever feels right to your body. And you've heard those words now. So if you can't hear me while we're dancing, that's okay. Just keep going.
Katie Derloshon:
Sounds perfect. Let's do it.
[music with violins plucking plays again]
Kylie Murray:
Nice. I was really listening to some of that violin and it prompted me to, it caught me off guard every time. And that was fun to find in that sound.
Kim Arcand:
I just love this.
Katie Derloshon:
All right, Kim, I think you have one more to share with us, right? For this Milky Way center.
Kim Arcand:
Yep. One more chunk of data, one more solo to listen to. Now in this part we're going to be listening to the most energetic, the highest-energy information yet. It's the X-ray light from the Chandra X-ray Observatory. So we're going to press play [xylophone music begins] and remember, this is the xylophone sound. So now we have this fields of gas, these X-rays that the gas has been heated to millions of degrees by these stellar explosions and these outflows from the super-massive black hole at the Galaxy Center. And that's what that crescendo is going to be. It's like the downtown region of the Milky Way Center where all of the action is taking place. And previously, that sort of bright note we heard just a few seconds ago was that bright blue blob that you can also see on the left side of the image. That is a mission from a double star system that contains one star and either a neutron star or a smaller black hole. And here's the crescendo around the super-massive black hole, [music speeds up and contains more notes] lots of energy and excitement.
Katie Derloshon:
Wow, thank you. We're getting some more Q&A responses too that we were hearing twinkling sounds. It was reminding it was kind of rapid wind. Chimey. Elliot was saying that, "It reminds them of a playful afternoon in their favorite field." So very maybe playful sound name. So what did you put down, Kylie?
Kylie Murray:
Those are great. I added those to my list. I have that this is the highest energy at the beginning. I really hear that smooth droning sound. And then Kim mentioned explosions happening. I like that downtown busyness of that final ... tell me again, Kim, what that really busy bright light is on the bottom.
Kim Arcand:
That's the super-massive black hole, which is I just really fun.
Kylie Murray:
Awesome. I heard the twinkling. Also, I drew this arc here to... or maybe if you're a musician, there's like a big crescendo and then a little de-crescendo at the end, rapid and playful. So I don't know how we can get more expressive and explosion than we did in the last one, but we're going to do it. So explosive, lots of that downtown energy when we get to that super black hole and see at the beginning if you can find that smoothness. So really mapping that journey in this track. Let's go for it.
[soft xylophone music plays]
And [inaudible 00:42:38]. Great.
Katie Derloshon:
All right. That was a lot of fun. All right, so now that we've listened to all of these different, I think Kim, you call them little, what did you call them? Individual pieces, but I forget the term you use.
Kim Arcand:
The solos.
Katie Derloshon:
Yep. All the little solos for each of the wave lengths. We have a question that came up in the Q&A from Sophia, who also agrees, this is super cool. They're wondering when did we come up with this type of interpreting data or sonification, and why again?
Kim Arcand:
Sure. So data sonification has actually been something that's been used for a while. And a friend of mine, Dr. Wanda Diaz, she's an astronomer who is also blind, and she did her Ph.D. work on essentially trying to figure out how humans can become better listeners of scientific data in order to do research and to learn from the information. So she's been investigating these topics for a long time. For me, I am really new to the sonification world, and I started doing this with my colleagues, Matt Russo and Andrew Santaguida because I needed to be able to translate and work with different communities during the pandemic when I could no longer work with my 3D models or do our VR work, virtual reality work, with our community members out events and stuff. So the data sonification and translating this information to sound was just a new way for us to be able to translate this information, to be able to bring it to different audiences for different purposes when we couldn't really leave our houses too much. So I hope that answers.
Katie Derloshon:
Yeah, that's wonderful. What an amazing way to even represent some really cool and amazing data. I wonder what's next, right?
Kim Arcand:
Yeah, we have more stuff. We do have more stuff coming. We're working with haptic technology, the vibrations on your phone to be able to represent data. So there's lots of new fun stuff coming. Yeah.
Katie Derloshon:
Going to be amazing, I can't wait. All right. So what's next, Kylie? Now that we did each individual solo, what's next?
Kylie Murray:
So what we just did was improvisation. This is movement that is not planned ahead of time. We're just feeling inspired and moving some of those ideas. So the next step in dance making is choosing our ideas, making choreographic choices. So that, is what we are going to do. We are going to have a three part dance, and each part is going to represent each one of those data sets that we just explored, the infrared, the optical, and the X-ray. Our dance is also going to start with the beginning shape and an ending shape. So now we get to make those choices. So I'm going to launch a poll here and you all will get to help me decide what we're going to do. So question one, what action should we use to interpret the slow stringy characteristics of the infrared layer? Question two, what body part will initiate swaying? We're going to do the swaying action for the optical, and I'll talk about what initiate means in a moment.
And then three, which pathway should we travel in with the chaotic energy of the X-ray? Oh, I see the responses flying in. So on number two, when we talk about initiating, that means which body part are we going to be starting the action with? So not just moving that body part, but if I initiate with my head, that means that my movement starts with my head starting the movement. Okay, about 10 more seconds. Great. Okay. 3, 2, 1. All right, let's see what we've got. Okay, so for the first section, we are going to be sliding, I'm going to jot that down here in my notes, sliding. And we're going to be thinking about, there was a lot to think about in each level, but specifically, let's do some slow stringy sliding. Slow stringy sliding.
For part two, we're going to be initiating with our hands. Ooh, that's exciting. So hands are going to initiate a swaying action. And then the third part, we're going to travel in a random pathway. I think that is absolutely appropriate for that X-ray data set. So in a random pathway, that means go wherever you want with that chaotic energy. Okay. I will cue this as we hear the whole composite, so that part C is going to come at that busy black hole downtown section. Okay, so I'm going to stop sharing this. Before we start the music, let's all choose a beginning and ending shape. And that is going to be your own choice, right?
Katie Derloshon:
Can we see your whiteboard one more time, just so we can get in our heads again, what are we again?
Kylie Murray:
Did I not share the poll?
Katie Derloshon:
No, you totally did. We just had a request in the Q&A to see the whiteboard one more time.
Kylie Murray:
Great. So part A, sliding, slow, and stringy. Part B, we're going to initiate with our hands in a swaying action. Part C is going to be locomotor, so moving around your space, traveling through your space in a random chaotic pathway.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. All right, let's do it.
Kylie Murray:
Great. So let's again start with that beginning, find the beginning shape. It's kind of representative of the experience today. So I'm going to switch this so I make sure I stay on my camera. There we go, all right.
So let's see. I've been doing a lot of reaching, so this might be my pose, but I'm going to try a few different ones. This is going to be my starting and ending pose. So we can actually, if we could just have, let's pause the music for a moment. Everybody hit your beginning pose. Great. And then choose an ending pose. I'm going to do this for my ending pose. Great.
So again, beginning pose and ending pose. Great. Okay. So here we go. Starting in that beginning shape. And remember, we're going to do the sliding, slow and stringy as first. And let's go ahead and start the music.
[soft music begins, mostly xylophone]
Let's move to part B, hand initiating a sway. We come to the random, the pathway. Can you give me a thumbs up on that? I can't see the image now. Now, now, now random chaotic pathway. And find your ending pose. Nice. So come on back everyone.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome. That was fantastic. Thank you for walking us through all of the pieces and helping us to create a really unique original dance creation inspired by the Milky Way and it's data. This is amazing. This is fantastic. All right. So shall we dance to it one more time? Do you think we have time or?
Kylie Murray:
I would love to do it again. Is there a way to see it at the same time so we can have some of those visual cues too?
Katie Derloshon:
I think, let's get it up. Yes. All right, let's do it one more time.
Kylie Murray:
All right, so we're starting in that beginning shape. And go ahead.
[soft music starts again]
Nicely done.
Kim Arcand:
That was amazing.
Katie Derloshon:
All right.
Kim Arcand:
I love it.
Katie Derloshon:
Great job, everyone. That was so much fun. And thank you so much, Kim, for sharing your knowledge with us and for explaining all of these really beautiful pieces of music. And thank you Kylie, too, for leading us and supporting us all in creating our own original dance to the Milky Way.
Kylie Murray:
You're very welcome.
Kim Arcand:
Happy to be here.
Katie Derloshon:
All right, so this is ... as we start to wrap up our program here today, Kylie, do you have any closing thoughts or little, any pieces of inspiration that you'd like to leave our dancers and scientists with today?
Kylie Murray:
Absolutely. I would just encourage everyone to think about these elements of dance and maybe where you see them around you in the world. One of my favorite things, I said this at the beginning, but I get to learn about so many different things and I would've never known about this information had I not been able to be a part of this. And I will carry this really exciting information about sonification to my friends, to my family, and I really just love to see movement in the world here and the world beyond our world.
Katie Derloshon:
That was beautiful. Thank you for sharing Kylie. And Kim, how about you? Thank you again for sharing all of this amazing knowledge that you have with us and for this beautiful music. Any closing thoughts or pieces of inspiration you like to leave with us?
Kim Arcand:
Well, first I just have to say thank you both Kylie and you, Katie, for ... I've been working on this data for literally decades. I've been working for the Chandra Mission for almost 23 years, and this is the first time I've ever seen this kind of data translated into dance. So to be part of this has just been phenomenally exciting, especially since my daughter's a dancer. I just love dance. I watch it all the time. But also I think it's a great example of what can happen if you just experiment, play and try something different. I think we can all really benefit when we try something new. And in this case, we were trying to make data accessible to another community because astronomy is usually so visual and the images are prioritized so heavily.
But we wanted to be able to keep working with our communities of people who are blind or low vision. So to be able to translate something into sound so that we all have better access to the universe. I mean the universe is everyone's to discover. So we should all be able to be able to experience it and enjoy it in these different and unique ways. So yes, just thank you so much for including me today.
Katie Derloshon:
No problem. And Kim, are there other sonifications that we can hear, or is the Milky Way, is this the only one or are there-
Kim Arcand:
There's so many. We actually are not the only group that works on this either. So there are many different kinds of sonification. You can go to the Chandra website to listen to the specific pieces today and others as well, from baby stars to dead stars. And then there are other programs that are doing things like sonifying and information of exoplanets or planets beyond our solar system, other galaxies, there are researchers that are using this for work on variable stars and other types of objects and even in other fields completely like biology and medicine. So yeah, keep tuning into the world of sound because it's definitely a growing field.
Katie Derloshon:
Thank you. All right, I can't wait to listen to some more of these. So for everyone at home, I hope you enjoyed dancing along with us too, the sound of the Milky Way today or the sound of the light from the Milky Way. And I hope you check out some of those other sonifications that Kim was just sharing with us and that you have the inspiration of the ABC and the elements of dance from Kylie to create your own new dance creations. And before we go, we want you to know, or we would like to know what you thought of this workshop. So we've got one more poll that we're going to pop up. And as that poll has popped up, I'll share a little bit more of information with you. So first let me get that poll popped up here, and then we'll have a couple minutes for a few of our questions or few of our Q&A, questions that are in the Q&A rather.
So here's that poll. And as that poll is popped up, we want to thank you again for everyone sharing your time with us and for sharing your experience with us in the poll. And once you leave today's webinar, a survey will pop up for you to complete if you have time. We are always looking for participant feedback on our programming so that we can continue to improve our offerings and make them as meaningful as possible to all of our participants. So thank you in advance for completing that survey. We also hope to see you at more future programs. In fact, right after this program, the Air and Space Museum is continuing with their Soar Together Family Programming at 2:00, and I think it's up there on the shared screen, it's called Goose Chase, I think. And it's going to start right away after this, as well as it'll be on tomorrow at 1:00 PM, I believe Eastern Time, so you can find more information of the rest of the weekends Soar Together Family Programming on the website.
And for us at Natural History, we have two different types of family programming that we offer monthly. We have an English language program called Natural History at Home where you can join me and my partner Gale, as well as other experts that come and visit us and share lots of interesting facts about natural history on lots of different themes and topics. As well as our Spanish language programing called Historia Natural en Casa, where you can join our colleagues, JP and Odalys and learn all about fantastic programming with them too, of all different types of themes and topics as well. So please check our website out for more programming.
But for now, during our program, we did have a few questions that popped up. So we're going to take a few minutes to answer a couple of those questions. Let's jump right into it. One that we've got here right away. Audrey's asking, and I think this is a fantastic question Audrey's asking. So that means that science can be turned into art? I think this is beautiful. What do you think Kim and Kylie, science can be turned into art?
Kim Arcand:
One hundred percent. So science is just a way of knowing or learning or making meaning of the world around us. And to me, art is the same thing. We might take perhaps different approaches sometimes, but I absolutely love the fact that they can also be so synchronized and really work together. I think there's just a lot of room to explore how we make meaning of the world around us.
Katie Derloshon:
What do you think, Kylie?
Kylie Murray:
Yeah, and I would add to that that art is often a way to express ideas that maybe words don't always capture or conversation doesn't always capture, or a written paragraph doesn't always capture. Poetry or music, as we've seen visual art, dance can all interpret the information in a different way that connects, I think, on a deeper level even sometimes. In a way that works with our brain to help us even remember it more clearly, more long term.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome, thank you. Beautiful. And Kylie or Kim rather, we have a couple science specific questions. Earlier we showed a picture of the satellites collecting some data as well as a bunch of zeros and ones. So do the satellites make a language of zeros and ones to actually play the music? And how did you decide which instruments to use once you figured out that you could play music with this data?
Kim Arcand:
So the ones and the zeros just represent binary code. And binary code is the system of ons and offs just because you're using it to be able to talk to electronic devices like satellites, like computers, like your cellphone, all of those devices use binary code. And the ones and the zeros kind of represent an on and off for the electrical kind of impulses there. So that information though, it's just stored in the form of ones and zeros. So after we get all of that data, we then have to use other types of software to be able to translate it into something else. And usually that next step is translating it into a table of information. And then from there you could take it and create an image and so forth and so forth. So it's not a direct, like, piece of software, write, get ones and zeros, create sound.
It doesn't quite work like that. You have to do a series of processes of translating to be able to get from the ones and zeros to your table of information and to your image. And then from there you can create the sounds. However, there's not a perfect sort of software piece that lets you just represent it in sounds in different ways. So we have to actually use custom scripting to be able to do that. And then we use some sound editing software to be able to piece it all together. And then as far as the choices, as I think I mentioned earlier, it's all about being able to take the science story and represent it faithfully in some way. So we're trying to choose the sounds that best help us not only tell the story, but also our most clear for the data. So whether that is sort of in instrumental symphony like we did here today or some of our other pieces which are more synthesized and sound sort of futuristic and computer sounding, it really depends on the type of information we have to convey. So that's a great question.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome, thank you. And then we have two more questions that we'll end with today. One related to sonification and then one about dancing. So the sonification question comes from Sophia. And Sophia is wondering, is reading a book to someone a type of sonification?
Kim Arcand:
That's not a sonification per se because you're using words. So that is, oh gosh, I'm not sure if the word is audification I think might not be the exact word, but this idea of turning information into sound is more about using nonverbal sounds, if you will. So anything that might just sound like, whether it's a synthesized drone like sound or whether its instrumental type of sound or like a choral note. And as a former choral geek here, there's a lot of potential to be able to use human voices to be able to represent these sounds too. And gosh, I would actually love to do something choral someday. So I hope that sort of answers that question.
Katie Derloshon:
All right. And then our last question comes from Garrett, and then we've got, oh, actually one more question before that. So we'll get to Garrett's question in just a second. The James family, real quick is wondering, how long does it take to create this one piece of music, like the ones that we listen to today?
Kim Arcand:
Oh, that's a great question too. So again, every piece is a little different, but today's piece was one of the very first ones that we did with my collaborators, Andrew and Matt, who are super-talented, by the way, have absolutely enjoyed working with them. And it took, gathering the information, experimenting with the sound that was, that's hours right there already. Going back and forth to make sure the science is represented in a way that made sense. Checking that the sounds worked. And then we also beta tested them with some lifelong learners who were either blind or low vision to make sure the sounds that were being differentiated made sense and were really enjoyable at the same time. And then doing final sort of tweaks and outputs. So I don't have an exact number, maybe I'd guess at 12 hours. I don't know. That's just a guess though.
Katie Derloshon:
Awesome, thank you. All right. And so our final question from Garrett. Garrett is wondering, could you dance in space? And if so, how would you dance in space?
Kim Arcand:
Oh, wow. And I would love Kylie's input on what she thinks here. I don't know if I've ever seen an astronaut dance in space. So this is a fantastic question, perhaps for the NASA historians as well. Yes, you could, oh, 100 percent dance in space, in my opinion. But Kylie, what do you think? Could you weigh in?
Kylie Murray:
I mean, I think you can dance anywhere. So dance is expression and movement, and I would love to see some astronauts dancing in space, if we could make that happen.
Kim Arcand:
Maybe Kylie, you could go up to the space station and do that for us. Would that be good?
Katie Derloshon:
Fantastic. Kylie, can I come with you? Can I come with you, you need a buddy.
Kim Arcand:
I'm going to stay home. I'd rather stick with the Earth.
Katie Derloshon:
All right, awesome. Well, and someone is also letting me know that yesterday was National Women and Girls in Science Day. So happy National Women and Girls in Science Day, everyone. What a wonderful way to celebrate that with this program, with you wonderful women in science. I love it. All right, Thank you everyone again for joining us today. We hope to see you again. And thank you again, Kylie and Kim for coming and sharing your wonderful knowledge of dance and astronomy so that we could create these dances together. We hope to see you all again, and please continue to check out the programming with Air and Space and with us here at Natural History. Thanks everyone. Bye.
